We all like to think our wedding will go off without a hitch, but with so much riding on one day, little things are bound to go wrong here and there. Except, sometimes those "little things" aren't too little. From shocking objections to bridezillas to full-on fistfights, these weddings went brutally wrong.
1. Sister Act
First of all, if you've never been to a Jewish wedding, the way it goes is, first they have the reception with the bride and groom in separate rooms, then the ceremony, then family goes away to sit for pictures while the guests sit down to eat. Then the bride and groom come in and the dancing starts. In between the ceremony and the pictures, though, is what's called "Yichud" which doesn't really translate, but it approximately means "isolation together."
The bride and groom lock themselves in a room and are observed by two reliable witnesses outside the door to have stayed therein long enough to have consummated the marriage. Although nobody actually does it there; it's considered declasse. This is one of the things that actually solemnizes the marriage. So. After the yichud, the bride comes out and drops a bombshell.
She announces, "Sorry everyone, the wedding's off. We'll be getting a divorce, and we're returning all the gifts…except for the bedroom set, where I caught my new husband trying it out with my sister last week." So? Well, think about this. She knew about the episode before the wedding. Why'd she go through with it? Because under Jewish law, if you've once been married to a woman, even after divorcing her you aren't allowed to marry her sister at any time until your first wife has passed.
By going through with the ceremony, she in effect locked her sister out of ever being able to get together with her soon-to-be-ex...
2. Shameless Saboteurs
I was at a wedding where there were three main parties: the bride's party, the groom's party, and the groom's parents' party. The groom's parents hated the bride—they thought she was not good enough for their son and they were desperate for the relationship to fall apart. Obviously, the bride and groom had to invite them to the wedding, but they specifically asked the priest to avoid the "Does anyone object" part of the ceremony.
At the reception, there was a moment where the groom's father danced with the bride, and a few minutes later, she stormed off the dance floor. When I found out what he'd said to her, my blood ran cold. Apparently, the groom's father had offered her $5,000 cash to leave his son right then and there and have the marriage annulled. The reception featured a flambeau entrée, and everybody was watching the groom's mother, half expecting her to grab one of the flaming skewers from one of the waiters and hurl it at the bride.
They're still married 30 years later and they have two kids together, but I believe they are estranged from the groom's family.
3. The Family That Lies Together Stays Together
My sister and her husband. They met each other our junior year of high school, and she moved in with him halfway through our senior year. I never liked him and did not hide that fact. I especially didn't like him after he hit on me while they were dating. Didn't hide that fact either, but my sister brushed me off. Before he popped the question, she found out he'd been texting other girls.
He promised he'd change. The wedding was a train wreck, honestly. It was a small affair in our family back yard, with our aunt officiating. That same aunt started crying midway through the ceremony. My stepmother read a poem about them she wrote halfway through the ceremony—she always wants to be the center of attention.
The groom’s drunken father, who had been barred from the wedding, came stumbling in at some point during the vows to search for alcohol, and I saw the groom grab one of the bridesmaids’ bottoms. I didn't point that out to my deliriously happy stepsister. I should have. A year later it turned out the groom had been sexting my stepmom.
My sister somehow forgave both of them. She has low self-esteem. They got caught again a year after that. At that point, my dad had divorced my stepmother, so I have been distant from this whole shebang. But my sister—who I do still talk to—finally divorced that scumbag. Divorce for everyone! Let's pull an Oprah.
4. Objecting Under The Influence
I was sitting in at a friend's wedding. It was very last-minute—he was pressured to marry this girl who thought expired aspirin was an acceptable alternative to birth control. Obviously, he knocked her up just before we graduated high school and she made him marry her. She was completely out of her mind, well beyond normal. Someone HAD to say something. But it was so much more shocking than I expected.
His cousin objected at the wedding with something along the lines of, "Come on man, the witch was using expired aspirin as birth control." Puke then followed from his mouth because he had pre-gamed so hard. There was applause, and I laughed until I cried.
5. It Be Your Own Blood
I grew up in a super fundamentalist Christian community. My best friend fell in love, but her parents were upset because they wanted to do an arranged marriage for her, so they locked her in the house for months. Finally, I helped her escape and she got married in a very small ceremony. She used to be very close to her brother, so she invited him. That was a HUGE mistake.
He was also angry about her eloping, so he wore all black, including black sunglasses, and stood there looking upset the whole time. We specifically asked the pastor to not do the "Does anyone object" thing because we didn't want to give anyone the chance. When her brother realized the pastor wasn't going to say it, he tried to stop the wedding anyway.
My brothers had to physically drag him out of the venue. The whole thing was freaking brutal.
6. Forget Fainting Goats…
My cousin and his very sweet wife got married two years ago. First off, they got really unlucky with the weather, and what was supposed to be nice cool fall weather ended up being a heatwave with a dust storm. It was steaming outside, 100 degrees with full humidity. The first very obvious problem was that they had been planning for an outdoor wedding in a cool climate. As such, many of the dishes that they were going to have for their buffet dinner were mayonnaise and meat-based, and they'd been sitting outside in the heat after the ceremony without much means of keeping them cold.
To be fair, the Church was beautiful, and the bride looked gorgeous. In the middle of the ceremony though, we noticed the bride start to sway. As everyone started to murmur, she fainted, woke up...and then vomited all over her wedding dress. She looked horrified and humiliated, and then started crying. During the super hot day, she hadn't had enough to drink or enough to eat, so when everything calmed down, her body had caught up with her.
The priest asked her if she needed to stop, but she waved him onward, determined to finish the wedding. The priest said something really nice about how marriage is not about these random happy moments like a wedding, but about the challenges that you go through as a couple and how you thrive from them. She made it through and then we headed outside to the heat and the possibly rotting and poisonous food.
I managed to avoid most of the mayonnaise-based foods, but my brother and sister did not...they would suffer greatly in the aftermath.
7. Taking Out The Trash
My older sister’s wedding was held in Vegas. The groom, who is still my brother-in-law, is a pretty awesome dude. Still, my sister’s biological mother objected at the last moment. It's important to note that the rest of my family DO NOT like this lady or any of this lady's family. Anyway, her biological mother objected and started spewing all of these lies that she used on my sister before to manipulate her into doing what SHE wanted. When she got put in her place, it was so satisfying.
My grandfather, who is 89 now, very scrawny, 6’2”, and an English professor, piped up and said, “I’m 87, but if you don’t shut up right now I’ll put all 87 years of my fist into your face.” The lady was stunned but she eventually replied in a sarcastic tone, which caused my brother-in-law and me to get up and kick her out of the venue along with the rest of her awful family.
8. A Rough Journey
My whole family and all my friends objected to me marrying my first husband…so we eloped on a whim after knowing each other for two months. God, I WISH I had listened to them. In retrospect, it wasn’t wise to marry a dude straight out of rehab, who was also a decade older than me. But, hey, 19-year-olds do as they do, am I right? I miserably stuck around through five years of horrible treatment, and I had continued relapses.
During one of his manic episodes, I got choked out on the floor. I also found out later that he had hep C, drained my bank account twice, cheated on me, and left multiple times without explanation. Part of me wishes I divorced him sooner, but I also feel it was for the best only because the timing led me to the true love of my life who I’ve now married, been with three years, and have a daughter with.
Oh, and my family and friends couldn’t be happier and more supportive of this union. He’s night and day from my ex...just a really, phenomenal individual.
9. One Wedding To Mar Them All
I once photographed a wedding that made me quit photographing weddings. My husband was my second photographer, and even he couldn't believe the day we had. We showed up early to get a feel for the venue and grab photos of guests and details. Then, I went to check on the bride and my husband checked on the guys. The bride was extremely angry with everyone because apparently her husband-to-be had been smoking earlier and when she had ordered him to stop, he decided to have a drink instead.
The wedding ceremony was very dry. No tears. No sincere words. Then at the reception, the brother of the groom got up to speak. His toast included things like, "I can't believe we're here today; no one thought you would make it this far" and, "You know we wish the best for you and we hope you're happy." All of the guests were cringing.
Immediately after the speech, the bride said to me, "I don't want photos of any of his (the groom's) family. I also don't want photos of my sister who thinks she's a model." That was the last wedding I shot, and it was nearly four years ago. That man was miserable. I could see it in his face and everyone else's.
10. The Good And The Bad
My dad objected leading up to my wedding. He even went as far as to make a Facebook account just to let a bunch of our family and friends know he was against it. There was no way he could object at the wedding, however, because he didn't come. He felt that my bride was trying to take advantage of me. But, to be fair, he kinda had a point... We both came from poor families and I had moved up fairly quickly once I turned 17 and started working.
We had known each other for a while and she was like a child. She slept 10 to 12 hours a day, and she needed help with doing the most basic chores. On top of that, she was always pushing me to seek out promotions, even though I only met one of the 10 qualifications required to move up in my job. This might be terrible for me to admit, but I'm a pretty ugly guy and I've had a tough time with girls all my life.
That said, she never treated me weird and she stuck by my side, so I owed it to her to accept her flaws the way she accepted mine. We are still together today—we have one child and we're about to hit our five-year anniversary. We're closer than we were when we first got married, and I'm glad I never listened to my dad.
11. A Little Too Late
Not at the wedding, but the day after...My entire family didn't agree with my brother marrying his second wife, but we all kept our mouths shut about it. The day after, my mom called my brother and completely ripped his new wife apart. She ranted on about her "holier than thou" attitude, her blatant disrespect for everyone in our family, and her complete lack of gratitude.
Why she waited, I'll never understand why. It would've saved us seven years of heartache.
12. The Cats Are Fighting
My uncle was getting married to this woman who is now my aunt, and she wasn't very good friends with my mom. That said, my mom is an insane woman, so it made sense that she picked all my other aunts to be her bridesmaids and not my mom. I immediately knew something bad was going to happen. I could tell my mother was ticked off and somewhat hurt.
I tried to explain to her that it was THEIR day, not hers, but she was inconsolable. So bing, bang, boom—the wedding day was upon us and we arrived at the venue. During the "Does anyone object" part, my mother actually pretended to cough and called the bride a horrible word...while the rest of the room was completely silent. The wedding went on as normal until during the reception when the mother of the bride approached my mom and asked her to leave.
After that, she turned around and started to walk away...but then my mom leaped at her and started to pull her hair. This started a vicious catfight that involved the bride, my mom, the bride's mom, and my grandmother. My mom left the wedding with a black eye. To this day, she is still single and my aunt and uncle are happily married.
13. Love Triangle
My cousin was getting married, a really nice guy to a really nice girl, in this large Anglican Church. The pianist is behind the altar, and to the right. Everything is going just swimmingly, until the pastor got to the part, "Do you take this man to be your lawfully wedded husband." While she's saying that, there are some ridiculously loud noises coming from outside the church. Most of us assume traffic. We were very, very wrong.
Suddenly, the doors on the right open, and a pair of socks come flying in and hit the pianist, while a man, hidden from sight, is shouting, "You're a liar! This is BS! This is BS!" (censorship required when you're in church). My brother is at the end of the pew, closest to that door, and he jumps up and pushes the guy back out, while the pianist jumps and follows them outside.
We hear some more ruckus, and then eventually silence. Ten minutes later, my brother returns. He told us that once they were outside the pianist guy and this other guy started fighting. Realizing they knew each other, he left the two men alone until he noticed that the pianist was getting beaten, and may be needed for later in the service, so my brother takes the other guy again and puts him outside the church property.
The pianist tells my brother that this guy was his boyfriend, but he had broken it off with him last week. We thought it was just some crazy person.
14. What A Way To Go
I've been to a few awful weddings, but this one was the worst. I did a dessert table for a wedding at my old country club job once. As I was setting up, people started shuffling in...keep in mind, the actual marriage ceremony was supposed to be going on at that moment, so nothing was fully set up. The couple was nowhere to be found.
It felt more like a funeral than anything else; just people talking quietly amongst themselves. I tracked down the club's wedding photographer since I knew he'd probably have details and I found him chatting with a bridesmaid. Apparently, the couple was super Christian, conservative, and young—like, in their 20s. The groom got sent to a “pray away the gay camp” as a high schooler after getting caught with his best friend.
He was there for a year. When he came back, he met this girl and they decided to get married. Well, he ran into the guy he got caught with like two months before the wedding, decided he missed their friendship, and they started hanging out again. As the wedding got closer, he realizes: “What the heck am I doing?” He started freaking out, and the night before the wedding, he went to the guy's house. That's when it got WEIRD.
He called the bride and she refused to accept that he was not showing. So she went through the whole mess of getting ready and he didn't show up. She lost her darn mind on the speakerphone with him at the church where everyone could hear, all while he was yelling, “I'm gay! I like men! I love him, and my parents can't force me anymore! This isn't about you and you'll thank me in the long run!”
15. That’s Nuts
A co-worker of mine was at his best friend’s wedding. At the reception, there were very specific rules about the food—no nuts was the big one. There were a couple of people there, including the maid of honor, who was severely allergic to them. Well, the venue served something that had nuts, and the maid of honor went anaphylactic. Her Epi-pen wasn’t effective, and she passed on the way to the hospital. Obviously, lawsuits were expected.
16. No Show Nuptials
I've catered many weddings and there have been some memorable ones. Fights between guests, wedding cakes falling over, things spilled on wedding dresses, the lot. But there was one I’ll never forget. It was an all-day do with a small ceremony of a few close friends and family. There was then a big reception filled with a huge buffet and a free bar.
It was all in the same venue and they had paid for 250 evening guests. But here's the thing—only 30 guests turned up, at most. My heart broke for this couple. A beautifully converted barn, loads of food and drinks, great music—but no guests. At about 10 pm (the venue was licensed until 11 pm), the buffet food had barely been touched.
The few people who were there ate, but it hardly made a dent as it was planned for so many more people. I asked the mother of the bride if she wanted me to cover and refrigerate the untouched food so the new couple could take it home. Her reply made me cringe. She said, "Oh no, there are still a lot of people coming." It was the most awkward I've ever felt in my life.
No more guests showed. There was a flash of car headlights in the distance at about 10:30 pm and the bride BEAMED when she thought it was latecomers arriving. But no, it was just taxis arriving to pick up the few who were there. It's the only event I have ever done where we didn't have to ask people to leave the venue. At 11 pm, the place was empty. Then we found out the whole story.
In a nutshell, the bride’s parents paid for the day, and the happy couple had zero control over their guest list. Her parents invited all their “friends” to the evening function, but in reality, it was just associates they wanted to flex on—resulting in no one caring at all about an invite to a wedding where they didn't know the bride or groom. It was basically just a networking event for the bride’s parents.
17. Angry Grandma
My grandmother on my father's side objected to my brother getting married on the grounds that she didn't like us. She did everything in her power to make sure he didn't get married, even going as far as to accuse my sister-in-law of being...let's say "promiscuous." My brother still got married. Then, a few days later, she kept telling my father to disown me and not to let me inherit anything.
I know why she hated us, but thankfully, she passed last week...You don't know how happy that made me.
18. Ulterior Intentions
It wasn't verbal, and no one will admit it was 100% on purpose, but my husband's grandmother intentionally made him an hour late to our wedding in hopes that we would just call it off. I have to admit, her evil plan was genius. She gave him directions to her timeshare that was her gift to us for the wedding night, and it was where he was supposed to get ready...except she conveniently gave him the wrong one.
It was on the other side of the city from both the wedding and the correct timeshare, and he had to cross Interstate 4 (one of the worst highways in Florida, and possibly America) during 5 pm traffic on a weekday to get to the wedding. Everyone chalked it up to "Oh, she's a senile old lady, she just got mixed up." No, she wasn't, and no she didn't.
She was only senile when she could use it as a cover for being malicious. I could detail many other examples, but I won't. What happened? The wedding started an hour late, so we lost an hour of the reception, and we're still married 13 years later.
19. Blast With the Past
I once went to a wedding where both families were Irish and the booze was flowing. At some point I used the men’s room and noticed the groom in a stall (the door was open) with someone who was not the bride. I didn't know these people (I was my girlfriend's plus one), and it might have just been some other guy in a suit, so I said nothing.
Some time later, my girlfriend states seriously "We should get going now.” Weird but okay. We grab our stuff and head downstairs. I see the suspicious fellow again in the stairwell going to absolute town on this same lady... My girlfriend grabs my arm tightly and keeps walking past, mumbling a thank you for the invite. I just smile and follow cause it's all weird.
Long story short: yep, that was the groom... and the woman he was with was his ex-wife... All this went down at his own wedding to another woman (and the bride genuinely seemed like a great girl). The look that woman gave us as we passed was this smugly dominant "I always get what I want, heck yeah." My girlfriend explained the whole sordid story to me in the cab on the way home.
I never got a follow up to that story, but 10/10 on the music and the drinks. Would tag along to an Irish wedding again!
20. Well, That's Rude
My mom's sister-in-law (my dad's brother's wife) pulled what has to be the most deranged plan to ruin a wedding ever. And it almost worked! She rang the church and reception and said the bride and groom had split up. She told everyone that the wedding was off. The venue had canceled everything—the caterers, the DJ, etc. They didn't even check with the bride and groom. Anyway, the couple got word of what happened early enough to reorganize a new event and the wedding went ahead within a couple of days.
They served different food than was originally planned, and some of the decorations weren't there...but the venue really did try to put it right and by all accounts, they did a surprisingly good job. Nothing like a bit of family drama for a wedding.
21. Liar, Liar
The sister of the groom chatted with the sister of the bride. Just casual conversation, but it came to light that almost 100% of what the bride had said besides her name was a complete lie. Sister of the groom calls him up and says he really needs to figure out if this is right. A few fights and some long thinking later, the groom leaves her and leaves town. It got worse though.
It turns out pretty much all the bride's friends had been lied to as well. They all stopped talking to her. She lied about all the normal details of a person's life. Where she went to high school, instead of a boring suburban school it was an expensive private school.
She claimed her family had a ton of money she was set to inherit. Claimed they had a home in Hawaii. Faked knowing people in the same industry. Small to large, didn't really matter, almost all of it was fake from what I heard. I didn't really know her, but we were at the same company. People I worked with used to work in her department so I just heard most of it second-hand.
I have no idea how she thought this would work for the rest of her life. I honestly think she had a mental condition. From what I understand, she tried to rekindle the friendships but quickly started to lie again and that was it. She quit the company shortly after all this went down.
22. In The Dark
I used to do catering work, and this one time, my boss sent me to a remote location in the woods on a beautiful river. I found out while we were loading the truck that the boss wouldn't be going and that I was essentially in charge. My boss promised me that everything was taken care of...Little did I know it would be a complete nightmare.
You can imagine my surprise when I arrived at this remote location and literally nothing was set up. We were only about an hour early, so I frantically started trying to get the tent in order. We needed extension cords to run the coffee and tea, but there were none there. We needed tables to set up the food, but there were none. I somehow whipped up some last-minute fixes for the missing things.
Then, just as the bride and groom are arriving, it got so much worse. We blew the fuse for our only power source and the place was plunged into darkness. We reset the breaker and I moved some stuff around, but the fuse blew again. This delicate dance went on for the entire evening—through speeches, the first dance, everything. I think the worst part of the entire experience was when we went to rinse our dishes before boxing them up and found out that the water pump for the place stopped working and needed to be primed again.
At that point, I said forget about it, we'll take them back dirty, and the crew and I spent several more hours after the long ride home doing them. That was the day I worked a 15-hour shift without a break—and still ruined the wedding. Needless to say, I quit that job.
23. Mommy Caught Someone Under the Hot Tub Water
This might not count, but it was like 12 hours before the wedding and one of my ex’s best friends had a destination wedding in Mexico. Both parties stayed in a huge mansion house overlooking the water. I wasn’t in the wedding party but I was in a hotel close by. The night before the wedding, the bridesmaids and groomsmen stayed up late partying.
Everyone passed out but at midnight or so the bride’s mom woke up because she heard the living room speakers, which hadn't been turned off. She happens to hear noise coming from outside and she goes out there...to find the maid of honor in the hot tub, doing it with the groom. The maid of honor had been raised by the bride’s mom, basically like a second mom thing, so she was shocked to say the least.
They had just bought a house too. The wedding never happened and I enjoyed my vacation and returned the dress. Super after the fact, but I did some research and last year they made up, got married, and had a kid. I feel bad for the girl for not just kicking him aside.
24. The Confusing Groom’s Son
When I was 13, we went to my second cousin's second wedding. Everything is going great. They even got past the speak now or forever hold your peace part. They wrote their own vows, but before my second cousin’s fiancé/wife could even begin her vows, his son got up announced to the entire room that she was cheating on his dad with her drug dealer and he couldn't let his dad marry her.
My second cousin yelled at his son to either sit down or leave. The son left and my second cousin married her anyway. Five years and one baby later he finds out it was true and they separated but were too under the influence to be able to afford a divorce. Finally, he got married a third time—and that's where things get truly insane. Before he could go through with it, his new wife-to-be had to pay for his divorce from his second wife!
At least their wedding had no objections. They moved to Missouri and this time, instead of separating or asking for a divorce, he decided he didn't want to be married anymore and just moved back to Cali to get back together with his second ex-wife. Yep family dinners are a little awkward.
25. The Bride Did What With Who???
My older brother and sister have always been super close. They're both much older than me, so I always felt like the third wheel in sibling stuff. When my sister started dating this guy that she met at college seriously, I could tell something wasn't sitting right with my brother. I could hear him crying at night and he was missing work a whole lot. She was a big part of his life.
I figured he was upset that she wouldn't be moving back home after college. Eventually, it all blew over, but I could tell he still wasn't right. My sister's boyfriend eventually proposed to her and she said yes. Her fiancé was a software engineer for an investment firm, so he was loaded. Their wedding seemed like a fairy tale—but we had no idea what was coming.
We all thought it was going to be the wedding of the decade. On the day of, my brother is nowhere to be seen. My parents were starting to get concerned, but they kept quiet because they didn't want to ruin my sister's big day. Everything was absolutely perfect. As we sat and watched the 40-hour long Catholic ceremony, we heard a car come to a screeching halt in front of the church. Everyone turned their heads towards the door, waiting to hear a crash.
A few moments later, the church doors open and it's my brother. It's a big church, so I didn't have a good view, but I could hear people gasping. I knew something juicy was going down. As my brother got closer, I noticed why everyone was in such shock. He was completely naked and drunk. He stood in front of the front row and slurred, "I object" like they do in the movies. It was there that he broke down and admitted his love for our sister.
He revealed that they had been sleeping together for several years. My jaw was on the floor at this point. My mom was hysterical and my dad held my mom with his eyes closed. My brother then went on to reveal that he had gotten my sister pregnant and that he was broken over her decision to abort. He said he still wanted to start a family with her and that her fiancé didn't deserve her.
Several of my uncles dragged him away as he screamed about his love for my sister. Upon learning this news, the priest canceled the ceremony and the wedding was called off. My sister's fiancé didn't say a word. He just left and we never saw him again. I still talk to my sister, but her and my brother have been excommunicated from the family.
My parents even went as far as taking them off their wills.
26. The One Where Someone Had to Say, “Lonnie No!”
I got booted out of my cousin's wedding reception with about 20 other people. My cousin had her wedding on a farm with a massive pig roast. From what I remember, there were a ton of people. Anyway, her father and my other older cousin never really got along. At one point during the reception, my older cousin had enough and absolutely lost it.
He looked at a handful of us and asked if we had his back. Of course, we all nodded not really knowing what was about to happen. He disappeared and a few minutes later comes back with a 20lb bag of pork meat from the leftover roast. He walks down to where my cousin’s dad is (my aunt proceeds to yell, “Lonnie NO!!!”) and smacks him right in the side of the face with the bag of meat.
An all-out family brawl ensued. The whole family hasn't been invited to a wedding ever since.
27. The Worst Wedding Crashers Who Stayed
It was a same-sex marriage where the parents and family of spouse #1 were incredibly homophobic and religious. They have been estranged for years due to the terrible stuff that they did about their child’s sexuality. Somehow, they found out about the wedding (none of them were invited) and showed up as a group mid-ceremony yelling about how they object to this union and it is ungodly for a man to marry a man.
It ended with all of them being carried out by other guests and locking the doors so they couldn’t come in. The whole group stood outside the venue to yell all night until we left.
28. I’m Like A Bird
I was the best man at my sister-in-law’s wedding. After a whole year of planning, all the bride wanted was a ex release while they said handwritten vows to each other. It was a very small, non-denominational wedding. The day arrived in early summer and all seemed to be going well...except something was off with the bird handlers.
They showed up a bit late and were sourcing help from the wedding party to get everything in line. When the time came to say their vows, I helped the handler carry the chest with the doves in it over to the altar where the bride and groom were standing. Vows were just about wrapping up and the handler gave ME the signal to open the chest. I opened it and witnessed a horrific sight.
I saw 20 to 30 DEAD DOVES IN THE CRATE! I immediately closed it and tried to pretend nothing was wrong. Too late. The look of horror on the bride’s face was all that was needed. We spent the next few hours trying to cheer everyone up, but by the end of the reception, the entire wedding party had organized and filed animal cruelty complaints on the handler. It was all anyone could focus on.
29. The Closet Is Open
Not exactly at the wedding, but the night before; at a close family friend's gathering. It was mostly my fiance's relatives who were there. His college roommate came in late, CRYING. The guy is a beefy cowboy type but also has luxurious Stevie Nicks hair. He was comforted by my fiance's redneck insurance-selling cousins. I'm like, what's wrong??? Did someone pass? When I finally learned what was happening, my jaw dropped.
Turns out, he can't handle my husband getting married because he's in love with him but is so deep in the closet. Everyone buys it. His relatives started glaring at me as if I was just the scum of the earth, and my husband said nothing to me or to anyone. Super awkward spin on the entire wedding vibe after that. I should have left. God, I would have saved myself so much misery.
30. Don't Trust Her
I was the best man at my friend's wedding. Me and two other groomsmen conspired with one another a couple of weeks before the wedding to tell the groom we didn't think it was a good idea that he marry this girl. It just HAD to tell him what she did. The truth is, she had been trying to get with me since they met. At her wedding, she bragged to one of her bridesmaids that she slept with "over half" the groomsmen.
There were four of us. Since I didn't do it with her, "over half" suggests she claimed to have gotten with the other three groomsmen, one of which was her brother. I told my friend, and he never wanted to talk to me again. They went through with the wedding...then divorced a year later. Maybe I wasn't the best choice for the best man, but I tried to be a good friend.
31. Fair Warning
One of my best friends got engaged to a very pretty girl who was showing more and more red flags the longer we got to know her. When he told me that he was engaged, my stomach dropped. I told him straight up that I could not let him get married without voicing my concern at his choice, and that I should politely avoid attending because I thought it was such a bad idea.
I also mentioned that he might want to keep my opinion to himself to keep the peace with his fiance. He didn't, and she ended up screaming, "Them or me!" while she was on the phone with him, loud enough that we could hear her. At the end of it all, he chose her and cut ties with us that day. About a decade later I heard from my then ex-roommate that he had resurfaced on Facebook.
We caught up to him and he admitted that she then subjected him to years of emotional mind games. She also cheated on him which pushed him to divorce her.
32. A Nasty Surprise
I worked at a music venue in the Detroit area that was also a popular wedding reception location. Came into work one week in the fall, when pretty much every weekend is booked solid with weddings, and noticed Saturday was open, no one scheduled. I talked to the wedding planner and she tells me the groom canceled...Odd. Talk to the wedding planner’s younger brother, who was our head bartender.
He tells me that the groom, excited for the wedding, left work at lunch on Friday, bought a nice bottle of red, and headed home to surprise his bride-to-be. Except, he was the one in for a surprise. He walked into his new house to hear sounds coming from their bedroom. He walked in to find his bride in bed with another man…his father. We tried to talk him into doing a big screw you party because we'd never fill the space and there was no refund, but he declined.
33. A Whole Lot Of Fuss
This happened several years ago. My ex was the best man in a wedding for his best friend. The night of the bachelor/bachelorette party, the men and women each had their own get-together, and then were supposed to meet up with each other later that night at a bar downtown. I was with the ladies and after our party, we got into the party bus and headed down.
The bride called the groom and told him to leave to meet us there. We waited and waited. Groom is a no-show. Bride demands that I call my then-boyfriend and find out where they were. Boyfriend reports that they made a pit-stop at strip joint, which the bride and groom apparently had an agreement they wouldn’t do. The bride obviously flips out.
She grabs my phone demands that my ex order everyone to leave the club. Ex tries to explain that it is not going to be easy to get 40 highly intoxicated men out of the club when they had already "started." Meanwhile, the groom is still ignoring bride's calls. The bride demands that we all leave. The bride and groom's sister get into a physical altercation and have to be pulled apart.
The bride is screaming that she is canceling the wedding. The ex and I hightailed it out of there as it had escalated into a two-family brawl. The next day, the groom calls my ex and asks if we want to come over to watch movies with him and the bride. They got married weeks later and are still married.
34. The Guilty, But Honest Lover
I was working at a wedding when I was younger. I was running the bar at the reception, which was very close to the hall the weddings were at. We were told that the reception would begin around 4 PM. It was already about 3ish and I was packing fridges, the usual barman things, while one of the male guests was still sitting there drinking.
I asked if he was not joining the reception, to which he replied something along the lines of “When I have the courage.” He downs his drink and leaves. 10 minutes later he’s back looking extremely disappointed. Guy orders a drink, and less than 30 seconds later another guy who’s dressed extremely well (turned out to be the groom), walks in, punches him in the back of the head, and leaves.
This dude just picked his drink up and sipped it further. I eventually found out that this dude had downed his drink, walked into the reception and admitted to sleeping with the wife on her hen night and again the night before the wedding. He was never invited to the wedding. He just felt the groom needed to know.
So, he found out where the wedding was, suited up and dropped the info mid-ceremony.
35. The Evil Mother-in-Law Who Almost Did
Sort of—it was my own wedding. My Mother-In-Law hated me. I married a southerner (I'm a darned Yankee) and we are of different religions. She did everything she could to stop her daughter from dating me, including cutting off her tuition. Anyway, we decide to get married by a Justice of the Peace. He was retired and really cool—a former judge and minister.
He asked questions and we had to tell him about my witch of a Mother-In-Law. So the night of the rehearsal, just as we are wrapping up, this 85-year-old Justice of the Peace stands up and asks for everyone's attention. He said, "These two kids love each other and are getting married tomorrow. If anyone has any objections they can speak NOW because they will not ruin the ceremony tomorrow."
Then he proceeded to look coldly at Mother-In-Law and said, "Is there anything you want to say?" Her face scrunched up like she was sucking on a lemon. You knew she had been planning on it all along and had just had all the wind taken out of her sails. She cowed down and just shook her head. He just looked at her and said, "I thought not."
The phrase was never uttered during the wedding, so all was well. Witch still hates me even now though her daughter and I have been married 27 years now.
36. Surprise, Surprise
I used to work at a pretty upscale catering hall in New Jersey back when I was in college, and we had one instance where I witnessed a ruined wedding. We all thought it was weird when a couple of the groomsmen got access to the reception room during cocktail hour. It was for “decorating,” they said. Not something we normally saw the men do.
In any case, we got through the main courses just fine, and then one thing became VERY clear to us staff. The bride’s side of the family was VERY conservative. They didn’t drink, they barely danced, and they watched wide-eyed as the groom’s side of the party went wild. Anyway, it came time for the speeches, and about halfway through his speech, the best man stood up.
He said something like, “Hey, bride’s family—I know you think your girl is so sweet and innocent, but if you want to see what they’re REALLY like, look under your seat! That's when things got insane. Well, taped under EVERY chair was a picture of the bride and groom caught in the act. The groom’s family and friends roared with laughter, but the bride’s side was MORTIFIED.
There were so many fights that broke out that night. Did I mention this was in New Jersey? The wedding was pretty much over at that point.
37. Too Much Fun
I worked on a tropical island off the coast of Queensland, Australia, and loads of weddings happened there. Most days, there’d be one or two. One time, this groom’s party came through my bar. They were on the bucks party thing before the wedding the next day, and they were pretty in their cups by 4 pm. I figured they started early and would finish early, given they had a sunrise ceremony.
About an hour later, they left for another bar on the island. Then, the bride’s party came through, equally sloshed. I finished work at 9 pm, then came back three hours later to work in the nightclub. I got in at midnight and started pouring drinks. It was busy as heck with like 250 people in the club. Around 1 am, the bride, groom, and their wedding parties rolled in absolutely destroyed.
They looked disgusting. I had no idea why security let them in because I wasn’t going to be serving them. They left about 45 minutes later, which means they would roughly arrive back at their hotel rooms around 2 am with the expectation that the bride and her party needed to be up at 4 am for hair and makeup. But they all decided to keep partying. “We’ll just stay up all night and keep drinking until the wedding!”
At that point, they had to have been drinking for 15 to 18 hours. It backfired so badly. Ceremony time rolled around and she couldn’t walk down the aisle in her heels, so she tossed them off. The groom and all his friends were drunk as heck and could barely stand. They tried to say their vows, but the celebrant couldn’t understand them. This was a huge problem.
She wasn’t allowed to marry them because they were too far gone to consent to marriage. The whole wedding was canned. A simple wedding like the one they had cost $35,000, so they wasted all that money. They did have the reception, though. From what I was told, the bride passed out about an hour in. The groom threw up everywhere.
The mothers of the bride and groom were both crying.
38. Hakuna Matata
The groom had his car stolen on the morning of the wedding and spent the whole day swearing and punching inanimate objects because, as we all heard a thousand times that day, not only was the car "the most important thing in his life," it also wasn't insured. The wedding was at a Boy Scout hall, for no apparent reason...maybe irony…but the reception was in the cafeteria at one of those "Underwater World" places. There was a glass tunnel that you could walk through to see fish swimming all around you, but no one was allowed to go see the fish because, get this: the whole day had a Lion King theme. Except for, you know, the venue.
Then, towards the end of the night, the bride got into a physical fight with one of the bridesmaids because she caught her sleeping with a groomsman. The bride then tearfully admonished the groomsman caught with his pants down for cheating on her (the bride). I have no idea how long the marriage lasted for, as I never saw or heard from them again.
39. Mistaken Identity
I got invited to the wedding by a friend and went because I was told that there was going to be a really good band and a high-level buffet at the reception. We showed up a bit early and things were still being set up. Someone needed some stuff from the grocery store, so I volunteered to go. A woman said she would go with me to show me where the grocery store was and to help get stuff, so I agreed. On the ride to the grocery store, she started talking about the wedding and how going to weddings was always kind of sad for her. I asked if she had a bad divorce or something, and she straight up told me that she found weddings arousing, but never had any luck finding a man at one.
Ok, red lights and warning buzzers should have been going off. I knew they should have. They were at some level, probably, but I totally ignored them—huge mistake. When we got to the store, she asked me to pull around to the side and park behind a bunch of empty semi-trailers. I did, and she crawled across the seat of my truck and started kissing me. Things progressed and stuff happened. It took maybe five minutes total. It was the definition of a quickie.
Afterward, we shopped and got the stuff that was needed and headed back to the Church. When we got there and the stuff was taken to the kitchen, I found my friend. She asked why it had taken so long and I dodged the question. I’m not a good liar, so she got suspicious and I dodged that. Then she got mad and demanded that I tell her what happened. So I did. And she freaked. She told me that the woman that I had gone to the store with was...the bride! She was not amused. I was not amused! The groom, when he walked up to me about five minutes later, was not AT ALL amused.
He just punched me. I went down, and he walked away. Apparently a few people knew what had happened, as I was getting the stink eye from a number of people as I picked myself up off the floor. I asked my friend if we should leave and she agreed. I heard later that there was a three-hour delay and a lot of serious negotiating after I left, but that the wedding ultimately proceeded. The marriage lasted eight months, which was a good six months longer than anyone I talked to about it had given it.
40. A Scheduling Conflict
I once witnessed a bride show up almost two hours late to her own wedding. This was in Southern California, in an open field with no water and no shade. She shows up and wants to get married in her yoga outfit. The groom got very angry and shut the whole thing down. When she refused to change her clothes, the groom decided to just leave her there looking stupid and they never got married.
I spoke with my uncle and it turns out that the groom had been having some suspicions that his fiancé was sleeping with her personal trainer. When she showed up to the wedding in her yoga outfit, it was all he needed to see to call off the wedding. She ended up getting married to her personal trainer shortly after, and then they got divorced soon after.
41. This One Takes the Cake
I once attended a classmate’s wedding. They were both young, maybe about 22 or 23 years old. There is apparently a “caking” tradition in some parts of the country where, when they cut the wedding cake, the couple feeds each other a little bit of it and smears some onto each other’s faces as a joke. The bride had absolutely made it 1000% clear to the groom that she did NOT want to be caked.
He did it anyway. And not just a small smear. He full-on smushed the entire slice into her face. She was stunned initially, then got up, with her face full of cake, and yelled “YOU JERK! I TOLD YOU NOT TO DO THAT!” She then ran as fast as she could to a back area near the reception. The groom tried to follow her, but the bridesmaids and the mother of the bride stopped him.
So, the groom ended up sitting awkwardly at the head table by himself while half the wedding party rushed off with the bride. She stayed back there for like an hour. They eventually did let him go back there to check on her. We could hear her crying and them arguing. The rest of the reception came to a screeching halt until one of the bride’s aunts emerged and directed the servers to clear the tables and put on some music.
They got divorced two years later.
42. Not The Vibe
This girl I worked with broke up with her boyfriend, but she started dating a new guy shortly after. A year later, they got engaged, and a couple of months after that, they decided to get married. The ceremony was done outdoors about 45 minutes from town. The guests started arriving, and everyone took their seats in the venue. Out of nowhere, her ex-boyfriend showed up...
He'd clearly been drinking and he looked absolutely horrible. Some people who were mutual friends between the two of them tried to get him to leave, but he just kept screaming that he just wanted to talk to her. She was not there yet, but it was literally like a scene out of a movie. There was a crowd starting to build around him with people asking him to leave, but he just pushed them back.
At one point, he got put in a headlock and was brought to the ground—that's when he finally gave up and one of their mutual friends drove him back to town. Somehow, this all happened before the wedding parties got there. A family member then stood up and said, "Obviously, they are going to find out about this; but we ask that you please just wait till tomorrow to bring it up. Don't let this jerk wreck the wedding day."
When the wedding party arrived, the ceremony went on with them never knowing. Then it was time for the reception, which was being held back in the town. It was then that someone leaked it to her that night, and it kind of destroyed the vibe. It was so close to not having any effect on the actual wedding.
43. The Wrong "I Do"
This happened to me. I met my wife after she had left a bad relationship. Apparently, the guy was always asking for money and he never held on to a job. Even after they broke up, he would periodically show up asking for some money. So, at our wedding, when we said our vows and the minister asked if anyone objected, we heard a strange voice in the back. “I do.”
It was the no-good ex-boyfriend. At that point, I was fuming. The guy was basically harmless, but he was making a spectacle out of our day. People were talking, and what should have been a good day was ruined by his idiocy. I asked him what the heck he wanted, and he said, “About $3.50.” I told him, “No way am I giving you $3.50, you monster!” and he eventually left.
44. Blinded By Love
I went to a coworker's wedding, and I really thought someone would object. She was sleeping with a guy who worked with us and we all knew it. One day she came in showing off her engagement ring from her boyfriend who she was in a long-distance relationship with, even though none of us had ever heard her talk about him before. And that's not even the crazy part!
She actually invited THE GUY SHE WAS SLEEPING WITH. He sat in the pew by himself crying during the ceremony. Then she actually slow danced with him in front of her now-husband. There were a whole bunch of us there that worked with her and knew. It was so uncomfortable.
45. Case Of The Side Chick
At my co-worker's wedding, the groom’s side chick showed up absolutely hammered right when the ceremony started. She started screaming at him, saying she was supposed to be the one to marry him. She was carried out by a few of the groomsmen. The ceremony then went on as if nothing happened. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. And want to know the worst part?
I found out about a year later that he was still cheating on his bride...with that chick and another one.
46. Stairway From Heaven
I'm a wedding photographer. I was at one really fancy event a couple of years ago. It was a typical outdoor deal at a swanky location in the middle of nowhere. The place was really nice—it had a large concrete stairway flanked by water fountains that led down to the altar area, so the bride could be seen by all like she was ascending from heaven.
The ceremony began and the bridal party came down to take their places. Then the bride appeared with her father. She took three or four steps down the concrete steps, then disaster hit. Her shoe twisted on her and she tumbled down a good 12 feet or more. She busted out the majority of her front teeth in the fall, and there was so much blood all over her.
With the place being so isolated, it took a good 40 minutes for the ambulance to arrive and she was in intense pain. Ultimately, she was OK and I got an email from them weeks later with the reschedule date. This time, there were no stairs anywhere in sight.
47. A Dark Turn
I was studying photography and used to act as an assistant to a well-known wedding photographer. One day, we went to a couple's wedding. He shot digital and I shot black and white film. We spent all day with the couple from 9 am through until 2 am the next morning when we left. I could see how genuinely in love they were.
It was only a day, but I got to know them quite well and I really liked them both. The next morning, I got a call from the photographer and his voice was shaky. He hit me with the most gut-wrenching news—he explained that the groom had been killed that night after the reception party. Three guys had broken into their bungalow to steal their wedding gifts. The groom got out of bed to stop them and they executed him in front of the bride. I was in shock for about two weeks.
The next weekend, the photographer and I went to the bride's house to present her with the photos. We'd worked together to get the job massively accelerated so she had the photos of her husband. We did it at our own expense and didn't charge her a penny for the day or all the prints and album. It was sort of the least we could do.
Because my photos didn't matter as much, I'd been able to simply capture those natural moments between them, rather than the staged wedding photos. So they had the normal album pictures but also about 150 snaps of just them being a couple. She was in tears from the moment we arrived until we left a few hours later. She was a shadow of the woman I'd met only a week earlier. That still haunts me.
48. Wrong And Strong
My ex-wife's grandmother was in her 90s and in a wheelchair. While we were up at the altar, she wouldn't shut up about the flowers and how they might need water. She was not talking quietly to her neighbor, either—she was yelling in her old lady voice. She didn't have dementia—she was very with it—she just had no volume control or understanding that what she was doing was inappropriate.
"THEY LOOK TERRIBLE!" she yelled. One of the cousins, without saying anything, got up and started to just wheel her out. "WHERE ARE WE GOING?!" She yelled. We all got a chuckle at her, then we went on with the ceremony.
49. For The Birds
A friend of my girlfriend was getting married. The wedding was quite normal—they got married in the local church, then there was a party in a nice restaurant. The photographer asked the bride and her bridesmaids (my girlfriend was one of them) to go outside for some photos. Some minutes later, one of the bridesmaids came back asking for help. The most unexpected thing had happened.
Apparently, there were some swans that attacked the photographer and the majority of the people around him were not doing anything other than laughing. In their defense, it was hard not to—the guy who was running around and screaming.
50. Stage Fright
It was a big wedding with around 500 people. It was all the wife's doing—she wanted a huge $70,000 wedding. I was a groomsman. Pre-wedding, the groom was nervous as heck. There was a lot of pressure for the day to be perfect, and it was her dream wedding, yadda yadda. At some point, a bottle was pulled out. It went from a few "calm the nerves" shots to finishing the whole bottle.
We gave him water, got him in the shower, and then redressed him. Midway through her vows, he puked all down the front of her dress. It was horrible, but it was great to watch. They're going on eight years strong.
51. Runaway Bride
My mother was a church organist and she attended many weddings. I suppose the story that stands out the most was one where the bride said she couldn't marry the guy because she didn't love him. She then ran out of the church in full Runaway Bride fashion. It was a smallish town, so people found out later that she had met somebody new and fallen hopelessly in love with him.
52. The Things These Eyes Have Seen
The bride and groom got way in their cups, then eventually started to argue with each other. They were crying, yelling, and screaming, running out into the courtyard and causing a scene. The best man went to check on them and found them rolling on the ground, but not in a sexy way. The best man threw the bride out of the way, slammed the groom’s head into the sidewalk, and pinned him down. The bride then started kicking the groom in the face.
The best man pushed her away while sitting on top of the groom, and the bride finally stormed off with a bridesmaid. Then, the best man let the groom up, who began kicking trees and breaking the posts off the gazebo. That's when he revealed what had been building up inside of him for months: "I'm going to kill myself!" The best man told the bridesmaid to go grab an officer from inside for assistance.
The officer came out and tried to help get the groom to his room since the wedding was at a fancy hotel. The groom proceeded to be disrespectful with the officer and ended up getting detained. The father of the groom then disowned him but also yelled at the bride. The best man and his date ended up taking care of the bride and groom’s child. At least they got to stay in their honeymoon suite for the night.
Source: I was the best man.
53. For Richer or…Richest?
I once attended a really awkward wedding. The bride, who we all thought was a bit of a gold digger to begin with, laughed uncontrollably during the rehearsal when she was supposed to say the "for richer or poorer" part. She promised to get it together during the ceremony the next day. She didn't get it together. She burst out laughing again in the middle of the real ceremony, and she never did actually say it.
54. Breaking News
I attended my niece’s wedding. It was a beautiful ceremony, and they seemed to be genuinely in love. Then, shortly after the ceremony, the groom dropped a bombshell; he announced to everyone, including his bride, that he had enlisted in the Navy and was due to report in a few weeks. She was beyond surprised. They didn't even make it a year.
55. Last Call
The bride got so loaded at the wedding that the bar stopped serving drinks before midnight in an effort to cut her off. The groom was also blackout. People started leaving at midnight, and the bride got mad and yelled about how they were all "ruining" her wedding because she wanted to dance and drink more, but they all wanted to leave.
I was their designated driver to get them to their hotel. The entire drive there, they fought. She berated him; he cried. That was a long 20-minute drive. I could have scrubbed vomit out with cleaners, but the awkwardness has stained that car forever.
56. Music Makes the World Go Round
I once attended a wedding where the bride and groom sang their vows to each other. Neither of them had a singing voice. The vows were also totally crazy and inappropriate. She promised to do whatever he wanted in the bedroom, and he promised not to always ask where she was going whenever she left the house.
The autotuned microphones were also a terrible idea. Their vow songs shared a chorus and it was awful, yet they expected all the guests to sing along with the chorus. The singing of the vows lasted more than twenty minutes. Calling it twenty minutes of pure cringe would not be an exaggeration to anyone who was there. Kids, don’t sing your wedding vows!
57. Belated Bride
My sister-in-law is just a horrible, thoughtless person—but this took the cake. Her wedding to my brother was supposed to start at 3:00 pm. At 2:59, she was getting in a bathtub in her hotel room to “unwind” before starting to get ready. All of us bridesmaids were already ready. We had been ready for hours. I had to call my mom at 3 and tell her that we were at least an hour out, because my brother was already there obviously, and I didn’t want him to think he was getting left at the altar.
Oh, and did I mention it was October? It was actually Halloween, around 40 degrees Fahrenheit, and windy. This is important because it was an outdoor wedding in a park with no indoor venue attached, so the guests literally had to wait in their seats in the freezing cold. They ended up waiting more than an hour and a half. The divorce papers have now been filed and should be final within a few months.
58. Mom-Zilla
At my sister’s wedding, the mother of the groom arrived late…wearing a bright red, skin-tight mini dress with stilettos. She then proceeded to try to get in front of the camera so as to block it from taking photos of the bride. During the vows, she coughed loudly and made groaning noises. The pastor apparently decided it would be prudent to not ask if anyone objected to the union.
After the ceremony, as we were getting ready to leave, she tried physically attacking my sister, but there were enough of us to get in her way. They are no longer together.
59. Thrift Store Wedding
A friend of mine from high school foolishly decided to marry the childhood friend that got her pregnant via a drunken one-night stand. They’d known each other most of their lives, but hadn’t seriously dated before the pregnancy. She bought a rather ill-fitting “proper” wedding dress from a thrift store for the occasion.
Honestly, it was cocktail-dress length in front and had a train in the back, it didn’t zip all the way, and it was supposed to be off the shoulder but was so tight that she wore it as strapless. The wedding took place on a Wednesday afternoon in the middle of nowhere. I stepped into the room where she was getting ready and she was bawling her eyes out.
I asked her what was wrong, and she said that she knew the groom was a player and that he’d cheated on his previous girlfriend with her. She added that she knew that he was only marrying her because of the baby, and that she didn’t know what else to do. She still went through with it.
60. Not Everyone Loves Surprises
During his wedding speech, the groom excitedly announced that he'd bought their dream house...in a different state. He also announced that he had put in his notice at work, and they would be moving by the end of the month. The thing is, this was all new information to the bride as well as to all of the wedding guests.
I think he was going for a "grand romantic gesture" and expected to be hailed as "such a great guy," but the bride was absolutely livid that he'd made major life decisions for them both without even discussing it with her. They didn't last long after that.
61. Willful Ignorance
The first warning sign happened before the wedding when my childhood friend introduced her new fiancé to our friend group. He failed to speak to anyone and had his eyes on his phone the whole night. Then during the wedding ceremony, our friend, who normally wears her heart on her sleeve and cries at the drop of a hat, was oddly unemotional, even through both of their personalized vows. She kept one eye on the camera and seemed to just be posing the whole time.
The couple also had the groom’s family’s Priest officiating the wedding—and I still can't believe what he said. This Priest recited a long monologue during the ceremony about how the bride’s life’s purpose now was to make her husband happy and support him by staying home and being a dutiful wife. This definitely hit a sour note, as the bride was the bread-winner at that time, and was helping to support both him and his parents. But when I spoke to his parents during the reception, they were gushing praises about what the priest had had to say. The marriage lasted about three months.
62. It’s My Turn to Use the Husband
My boyfriend was friends with a guy who was getting a quickie marriage and needed witnesses. We agreed and went inside the little reception room, where the preacher, bride, and groom were lined up, waiting for us. The preacher started his thing and I noticed a woman come in and lean against the back wall. She looked mad, standing with her arms crossed.
Preacher: Is there anyone here today who objects to the union of **** and ****? Please, speak now.
The couple looked back at us and we both smiled. Suddenly, the bride’s attention turned to the woman in the back of the room.
Bride: What the freak is she doing here?!
The woman quickly raises her hand, looking at the old preacher.
Woman: I object! I don't agree with this marriage!
The bride glares at her.
Bride: Shut up! Wait your freaking turn! It's my scheduled day! You're just mad you didn't think of it first!
The woman had to be dragged out of the room, kicking and screaming and spitting at the bride...
After the reception, my friend explained that the groom was originally in a relationship with the bride. After 10 years together, he started sleeping with her sister, the woman at the back of the room. They were close sisters, until both ladies got pregnant by him, simultaneously.They fought each other like cats and dogs for the next several years.
Then, the two young cousins became school-aged and absolute best friends. Neither one of the sisters would give up the man, and he wasn't sure which one he loved more, so he kept seeing both women. Last I heard they were all still together, but the two sisters had now teamed up to take down his pregnant mistress...
63. He’s Just Playing the Long-Con
The groom's ex got up and screamed that he was her soulmate, that she forgave him for "this whole thing” and that they should leave now because he'd proven his point. By breaking up with her five years earlier, falling in love, and holding a wedding. I ate so much cake and got so drunk at that wedding. Meanwhile everyone else was screaming and throwing stuff. Good times.
64. No Double Dipping!
I once went to a wedding where the bride got back at her cheating groom in the most ingenious way possible. In the final moments of a Jewish wedding, after the marriage was finalized and all official, the bride straight up runs to the crowd and says, “I’m divorcing my husband for sleeping with my sister!”
I'm not Jewish but apparently, once you’re married in that faith, the bride or groom cannot marry or remarry someone related to the previous wife or something like that. So, this bride not only publicly humiliated her cheating groom and her sister by outing them. She also sealed the fact that they can never ever be together. Mic dropped.
65. The Family That Stays Together Objects Together
A friend of mine was getting married to a guy she had previously dated but broke off the relationship because one night he was drunk and tried to strangle her. They were apart for a couple of years (he supposedly cleaned up), and then started dating again. This guy was bad news. He would talk smack about her all the time, make her cry and stuff, but she kept dating him.
The worst I ever saw him treat her was after I'd already received their wedding invitation in the mail. I was out with my girlfriend when we see Mr. Toxic sitting at the bar, kissing some random woman. I whip out the phone and start filming. I go over to my friends' house. Mr. Toxic's car isn't there so I show her the video.
She breaks down and says she says she doesn't want to marry him, but feels obligated because all the reservations are already made. I'm like, okay she's never going to end it so I go see her dad (we're good friends). He's a hulking 6'4" 300lb. Harley rider with a handlebar mustache. When I show him the video, veins start showing up on his forehead.
Before I left, he asked if I could send him the video. I'm like, "Of course." The next day he calls me up and tells me that the wedding is going to now be a “Dodging A Bullet ceremony with maybe a butt-kicking for the finale.” I told him that I would be more than happy to attend. Apparently, dad told my friend he'd never let her marry Mr. Toxic and they hatched an amazing revenge plan.
The day of the ceremony, Dad had a huge flat screen TV plugged in at the venue. When dad and daughter got to the end of the aisle, the flat screen with surround sound came on and the video played. Mr. Toxic was pasty white, sweating profusely. He did the perp walk down the center aisle, caught my eye with me giving him the finger too.
When he leaves, Dad says, "Let's Party!" It was amazing. We had a great night. My friend danced her butt off and laughed a lot overall. About six months later, she met the man of her dreams. Just a really fantastic guy. The wedding is this September.
66. A Double-Decker of Trouble
I was at my good friend’s wedding. She's a sweet girl and she'd fallen hard for a truck driver. Their relationship was long distance forever, so she was thrilled that they were finally getting married. When the priest says, “Does anyone object to this?” a woman stands up and says, “I do.” Turns out the guy wasn’t a truck driver but a married man from Florida who had two kids. He just said he was a driver so he could play her long-distance. Oh and obviously the objecting woman was his real wife. Awkward...
67. In This Case, First Is Probably the Worst
The groom’s dad interrupted the wedding to ask the bride’s father whether or not she was truly a virgin. Then he went on about how he didn’t know anything about the wedding and blah blah blah. Truly weird and embarrassing. When the groom’s father interrupted the wedding, the bride’s father (officiating the wedding) did in fact say it was confirmed.
I have no clue how or what. They seemed to be super conservative and wore sleeved dresses, long hair, etc. They eventually showed the father-in-law out and continued the ceremony, which was super awkward afterwards. It was literally as if I was on Punk’d. I'd gone with a boyfriend. After seeing what his family was like, I did not stay in that relationship for much longer.
68. The In-Laws Who Desperately Wanted To
At my wedding, my mom was the officiant so she didn’t put it in because we assumed that we’d have at least one person from his side say something. My in-laws still made sure to beg my now husband not to marry me literally MINUTES from when the wedding was supposed to start. After our honeymoon, there were like three months that we lived with my in-laws.
They would beg him to leave me, take full custody of our son, and just forget about me, IN FRONT OF ME. They would tell him that I wasn’t the girl they had planned for him (very controlling people) or that there was someone who they thought would better fit into the family, etc. We’ve been together almost four years now and my Father-In-Law will still say things like that in front of me.
My Mother-In-Law waits until I’m not around to say things.
69. The “Best” Man
The best man at my step-sister’s wedding did this. It happened at the rehearsal the night before. It was a very large wedding and the rehearsal was bigger than a lot of weddings. The minister was going over the vows quickly while giving instructions on what to do. When he said something about objections, the best man interrupted saying he had to put a stop to this.
He was in love with the bride and was sure she felt the same way. My sister and everyone else were horrified. It caused plenty of chaos and confusion. As far as I know, after that, neither the bride nor groom ever spoke to him again.
70. A Door Long Open
One of my friends interrupted his cousin’s wedding to come out of the closet. But that's not even the weirdest part. This was actually the second time my friend had come out to his family. The first time was when he was a teenager (about eight years earlier). Almost everyone at the wedding already knew. He couldn’t understand why people were so mad at him.
71. Addicted to You
When I was 13, I went to my second cousin's wedding. Everything was going great... they even got past the "speak now or forever hold your peace" part. They wrote their own vows, but before my second cousin’s fiancé could even begin her vows, the groom's son (from a previous relationship) got up and announced to the entire room that the bride was cheating on his dad with her dealer.
My second cousin yelled at his son to either sit down or leave. The son left, my second cousin married her anyways. Five years and one baby later, he finds out it was true, and they separated. They were too tweaked out to afford a divorce. Finally, he got engaged a third time but before he could get married, his ex-wife had to pay for their divorce. Yep, family dinners are a little awkward.
72. The Vengeful Groom
I heard of a local wedding where the church service was absolutely beautiful and the reception was near perfect. After the speeches to the Bride and Groom, the Bride spoke in appreciation for all friends, family, and her new husband and their excitement for life together. The Groom was last to speak. He thanked everyone for being so good to them, and then apologized for what was coming next: a bombshell.
He explained that the night before, his bride slept with his best man and that he was filing for annulment immediately. He also explained that he felt it best to proceed with the wedding while he made his final decision. He also suggested that the Father of the Bride, who paid significant amounts towards their wedding, hold both his daughter and the best man financially responsible. Then he walked out.
73. Keep It In The Family
Several years ago, I got a phone call from the maid of honor for a wedding I was going to attend (as a guest) two weeks from then. She was flustered, but managed to get out: "There's no wedding, Groom called it off. He's in love with someone else." Well, I didn't press. I was friends with both of them, so I knew that the full details would eventually make their way back to me. I could not believe what I found out.
Turns out, a couple weeks before the wedding, the groom called the bride and said he was coming over. They needed to talk. When he got to her apartment, he broke down in tears and confessed that he was in love with someone else. He loved her, but couldn't marry her because he didn't love her in the way a bride deserves. There was much crying and shouting over it all, but eventually, the bride recovered from the news enough to ask him who he was in love with.
"Well," Groom said, "It's [Bride's Brother]." The wedding was definitely off at that point. Now, five or six years later, the groom and the bride's brother are married and happy. However, I lost contact with the bride shortly after her wedding plans imploded, so I'm not sure if she ever forgave the boys for that one.
74. I Just Keep Coming Back To You
After the wedding at the reception, the newlyweds took forever to show up. They were nearly an hour late. When they did arrive, they were arguing loudly the entire time. They got "introduced" and we all clapped as per tradition and they sat down at the main table in a huff. Sometime between the appetizer and the main course, the argument started again.
The groom stormed off and my girlfriend and I were nosey so we went to see what was up. He ended up in the hotel lobby on his cell phone. We thought nothing of it and we were about to go back when the wife shows up, still obviously in her wedding dress, and continues to ream him out. Now for the first time, we can hear what the argument is about. As we listened, our jaws dropped.
He had invited his ex to the wedding. She showed up to the ceremony and that threw the bride off. Apparently, also...he had cheated on the new wife with this ex-girlfriend several times, with the last time being only about a month prior to the wedding. Additionally, the ex-girlfriend/mistress was on her way to come pick up the new husband to take him away from the new bride...because she was "acting crazy" according to the groom.
After a couple minutes of watching this train wreck of an argument, a rust bucket sedan shows up with the ex-girlfriend in it. The groom gets into the car with his ex or whatever the heck she is and they drive off. Last words went to the bride, though, who screamed at him as he tore off: "Well, I guess I'm going to go back to sleeping with your brother then, you jerk!”
So, they are no longer married now.
75. My Way Or The Highway
I was going to be at a wedding as a bridesmaid. The bride-to-be took us—the maid of honor, another bridesmaid, and myself—out to pick out dresses. The bride's mother and the groom's mother also came at her insistence. We arrived at the dress shop only to find that the bride, her mom, and the groom's mom had already picked out the dress she wanted us to wear for the wedding.
Okay, that was fine in theory, but we had been under the impression that we'd get to pick our own dresses. Whatever, it was her wedding. When we tried the dresses on, however, we realized something disturbing—they didn't really look good on the two of us because we both had different frames and sizes. We came out, showing the bride and two moms, and the moms were in agreement that the dress they picked really didn't work. The bride’s response, on the other hand, was jaw-dropping.
The bride was very upset that we didn't magically look great in the same dress. She then started making snide, subtle comments about our appearances, implying that we'd need to lose weight to look good in them, and telling one of the other girls how she'd need a push-up bra to look "normal." The moms ignored the bride's attitude and flagged down an employee to help us find some alternatives.
We live in a small city, so the selection they had wasn't the best, but the employee found at least half a dozen other dresses that come in the color the bride wanted. We tried them all on, but because we vary so much in body type, most of them didn't look good on both of us. For example, the strapless ones looked bad on the busty girls, while the long dresses didn't fit right on the short ones, etc.
The bride continued to make comments about our bodies. Finally, the last dress we tried on was generic enough that it looked fine on all of us...except the bride didn't like it because it didn't make us look "sexy" enough. To make matters worse, the dress had pockets. She absolutely did not want her bridesmaids to have pockets.
At this point, every single one of us was happy with this choice except for her. She reluctantly agreed to let us pick that dress but she was very clearly not happy. So then we picked out shoes. The bride told us we will be wearing the same shoes as her but in a different color. Weird, but again, we didn't argue with her.
When we tried them on, though, there was a snag in her plans. I have very small feet (technically a 3 in kids, though some size 5 shoes will fit). The heels she wanted were sky high and strapless. When I put them on and tried to walk, my feet kept slipping out. They were also open-toed, so I couldn't really stuff the front as I'd done in the past.
To top it off, just standing in them to try them on, the front was absolutely ruining my feet. I told her this, and she watched me try to walk in them only to have them flop off. Her mom asked me if they came in a smaller size, but they were fancy shoes, so no, they obviously didn't make them for kids. The bride's solution?
"Once you start to wear them, your feet will swell and they'll fit then." She then walked off. The bride's mom assured me that we'd "figure something out" and bought all of our outfits as her condolences. I never got to know how that would have worked out, though, because the bride and groom simultaneously cheated on each other, and they called off the wedding.
The bride didn't even have the nerve to tell me herself; I had to hear it from the maid of honor. We are no longer friends, and it's sad to me that this wasn't even the reason why. I can't believe I let someone treat me, and other people she called friends, like that.
76. Speaking from the Heart
The most cringeworthy thing that I have ever seen at a wedding was not the fault of the bride or groom, but of the bride’s father. I was the best man at this wedding, so I had a front-row seat for the entire thing. The couple was marrying young after the bride had fallen pregnant. It obviously wasn’t planned, but they clearly loved each other and it was the right thing for them to do in their eyes.
Anyway, come the wedding day, I’m sitting next to the bride's father at the reception and I can see he’s looking at his prepared speech repeatedly. I can see phrases like "not ideal," "would’ve preferred not to welcome you into the family under these circumstances," etc. Just before the groom gets up to give a speech, the bride’s father excuses himself to use the washroom, leaving his "speech" behind.
I knew that something needed to be done before he turned the entire wedding into a nightmare. I’m not ashamed to say that I swiped the speech and then pleaded ignorance when he returned and asked what had happened to it. In the end, he stood up and muttered a few generic words about love and then sat down without any issues. I never told the groom, and I’m happy to say that they’re still happily married twenty years later.
77. Think of the Children!!
So this wedding took place in an Episcopal church. The priest had all his finery on and the church itself was decorated very nicely for the occasion. The bride and groom had made a point of asking everyone to wear casual clothes. We all took that to mean "semi-formal." Nope. They and their kids all came out wearing overalls and white t-shirts.
They stood next to the priest, who was in his formal robes. The other cringey part was when the groom, in the middle of the ceremony, started repeatedly talking about the Bible verse "let the little children come to me" and insisting it implied "and listen to what they're telling you." He kept saying that over and over again, even though most of us had no idea what he meant.
He then launched into an impromptu twenty-minute speech explaining about how he and the bride had gotten together. There were plenty of parts in the story where the groom was like "I wasn't sure she was right for me," but his son was pressing him because "he wanted a mom." It was a sad story actually, as his biological mom passed away when the kid was only four and this was eight years later.
So, his speech was basically this long and unfocused story that boiled down to "I'm marrying this woman so that my kid can have a mom." That, and some more confusing Bible references mixed in here and there for good measure. Not a good sign when that's your main reason for getting married to someone. Nevertheless, I knew it, probably half the attendees knew it, and the priest definitely knew it.
That whole background story might have been okay to tell during the reception, under a certain kind of atmosphere, but I have no idea why he decided to tell it in the middle of the actual wedding ceremony. When all was said and done, I’m pretty sure this couple ended up getting divorced less than two years later.
78. A Lot of Energy in This One
My brother managed a gas station about ten years ago and had hired the soon-to-be bride as an employee. A little while into her employment, she requested a few days off for her wedding. The date was still a couple months out, so it was no big deal. About a week before her requested time off, she came into work and had the following exchange with my brother:
Bride: "Wanna see my new tattoo?" Bro: "Uh, sure." She lifts the back of her shirt to reveal a huge, green, Monster Energy "M" covering the whole upper half of her back. Bro: "Holy moly! Wow!" Bride: "Awesome, huh? And my fiance got the same tat!" Bro: "Really?..." Bride: "I know, I know what you're thinking. Copyright, right?"
"But what are they gonna do? It's already on my body! It's ALREADY ON MY BODY! Ha ha!" Bro: "Right. That. That is what I was thinking." Then, at the ceremony, the pair awkwardly gave the same demonstration to all their guests. There are even pictures of it. I'm working on getting a hold of those. It was a camouflage themed wedding.
She had an open-back camo gown with camo heels. She even had a camo veil. I really wish it had been ghillie suit headgear. The groom had camo pants with camo boots and a camo bowtie. He was, indeed, shirtless. He did wear a camo ball cap, though. I imagine them walking down the aisle, backs glistening in the sun with vaseline over a huge Monster logo.
Just the perfect day that every kid dreams about someday having. They were happily married for seven months.
79. The Show Must Go On
The bachelorette party is three days before the destination wedding. My sister (the bride) is taken by her friends for a dinner. I'm at the bachelor party with the groom, and we start getting weird messages. Garbled texts, and then we get a call from a local hospital. They’ve all got food poisoning from the dinner. The groom goes "Yeah, this isn't happening boys" and we figure one more shot and we'll make our way to the hospital.
Never underestimate the determination of a bride and bridesmaids. The wedding was delayed by only a day, to the Sunday, and she walked down the aisle with enough gravol shoved up her bum and shot into her veins that I'm not sure she knew where she was, let alone that it was a wedding. The bridesmaids were all various shades of grey, green, and ill.
It was open bar, and to avoid spoiling the party, the husband and groomsmen stayed back and kept drinking. My sister was so tired that she and the bridesmaids took another dose of gravol and all went to sleep in their hotel room. My mother, who is a retired ICU nurse, went to take care of them.
80. This Took A Turn
I went to a co-worker's wedding about 15 years ago and this happened at the reception. It was a beautiful outdoor venue overlooking a lake. Anyway, the groom had planned to sing a song to his new wife and have a fireworks launch as he was singing the last note. Well, that last note came but the fireworks did not. He held that last note for a good 10 seconds before he finally yelled “JESUS” and threw the mic down. He then ran to go fight the fireworks guy.
No fists were thrown, but somebody did end up in the lake. The party kind of broke up after that. They also ended up getting a divorce about a year later after the groom got fired from his job for showing his “package” to his boss’s underage daughter.
81. All In The Family
A fight broke out between the father of the bride, brother of the bride, and some guy who just happened to be staying at the hotel. In reality, I don’t know how much of a “fight” it was; it was more just the dad and brother assaulting some man. So anyway, they were both detained. Cut to the bride sobbing at breakfast because her dad and brother spent the evening of her wedding in the slammer. They faced assault charges for what they did to that poor man.
82. Beauty Is Pain
The bride and groom decided to "get a few pictures in" right after the ceremony...except they disappeared for about five hours. We all waited at the venue for them, but since no one got any word from them, the buffet wasn't set and the DJ didn't play any music. After two hours, most guests decided to collect some cash. We talked the manager of the venue into serving the buffet and getting the DJ to play music.
So we basically started the party without the couple. When they finally got back, they were in shock—basically, all food was gone, people were sloshed, and everybody had forgotten that this was their wedding. So the wedding itself wasn't ruined, but everything around it, well...at least the guests had a great time when we took things into our own hands.
For what it’s worth, they did actually take pictures during that time. The photographer did his best but to be honest, the couple wasn't that good-looking and they thought he could simply work some voodoo magic on the spot to make them look good. He was angry, to say the least, and actually tried to talk them into going back to their party several times.
83. Truth Hurts
I was a guest of a friend of the bride, and I did not know anyone attending. It was a very expensive, over-the-top place, and there were several hundred guests at this very Italian wedding. The maid of honor grabbed the mic at the cocktail hour and began her speech, rambling and clearly having had a few drinks. It quickly devolved into her stating that the recently deceased mother of the bride was against the wedding and that was what ended her.
She also said that “Vinny,” the groom, will never give up his sidepieces. The maid was tackled by several people and dragged away. The happy couple separated and divorced within a year.
84. Safe And Not-So Sound
This was around 2009 in Tenerife. On the second day of the wedding, the bride went swimming in the ocean. She swam out too far and was basically “lost at sea” for nine hours or so. She eventually found her way back but was in bad shape. Everyone was panicked the whole day and thought she drowned. By the time she got back, there was a twisted development.
Her husband found her phone and read a bunch of messages supposedly from her aunt, but it was clear from the content it wasn’t her aunt at all. She had been having an affair with the best man for years. They got an annulment shortly after. $60,000 down the drain. It was one of the most opulent weddings I’ve ever been to.
85. All’s Well That Ends Badly
It was a big wedding with an open bar, and most of the attendees (including the wedding party) were apparently gussied up white trash. The ceremony itself went on without any issue, but the reception became a big, messy party. It then started to run late, so the catering manager told the father of the bride that they'd exceeded their time and needed to start shutting down.
This led to an argument involving several members of the wedding party. "Do you know how much I paid?!" They eventually complied, but it stirred the inner white trash. The party then spilled out to the hotel bar where people continued drinking. Members of the wedding party were still stewing about the reception getting shut down and tempers were short.
Finally, something triggers the groom and he takes a swing at someone. That person swung back. Then the groomsmen started swinging. Now, it was a full-on donnybrook. The hotel staff managed to get them out of the bar and the fight spilled out into the front entrance of the hotel. The authorities showed up and tried to break up the fight, but the groom then tried to take a swing at an officer and proceeded to get the tar beat out of him.
The bride, at this point, was just standing on the sidelines screaming in support of her hubby. But a few minutes later, she said to herself, "Well, I guess we're doing this." She walked up to a female officer and took a swing at her. She chose the wrong female officer though because this woman was apparently way more yoked than she appeared to be and she took the bride to the ground.
The bride’s face hit a planter on the way down and she busted her nose. She started bleeding all over her wedding dress. By that point, the wagon showed up. Several people were handcuffed and loaded up, including the bride and groom.
86. Bad Reputation
My best friend's mom got remarried and had an expensive, beautiful wedding; but for some reason, she didn't hire a DJ. Last-minute, her mom asked me to manage the CD and gave me a list along with verbal instructions of when to play each song. I tried to warn her that I simply did not follow what she was trying to say, but she told me she had confidence in me.
Apparently, all her life, she wanted to walk down the aisle to some specific song, but I just couldn't figure it out. They had to get walking to match the sunset, so she went ahead down the aisle while I flipped through a series of incorrect songs to the horror and amusement of the crowd. For years afterward, when I called my friend's house and her stepdad answered, he'd say, "Is this the guy who screwed up my wedding? How are ya?"
87. Childish Behavior
I was invited to the reception of one of my good friends. They had been courthouse married for months and were living happily. When I arrived at the location and saw the big crowd, I knew something was wrong. My friend's wife is prone to panic attacks and is extremely agoraphobic to the point of breaking down if she is overwhelmed.
I immediately called my friend and ask what was going on and if everything was okay. It turned out, out my friend's parents invited everyone possible to be there without my friend knowing. After I sent him a picture of the crowd, he and his wife thought it would be better to go on a second honeymoon than have a reception. He sent a message apologizing to everyone and told them to leave without telling his parents. His parents had a meltdown as we left.
88. Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off
A couple of years back, I was waitressing at this function lounge that was hosting a reception. The music started but nobody came in for a solid 30 seconds, so the DJ cuts the music. Everyone then heard loud arguing in the foyer for about a minute, and two men later came stumbling into the hall fighting each other bloody. It was the groom and the bride’s brother.
Turns out, the groom's side of the family didn’t want him marrying the girl, and the groom decided at the reception that he agreed with his family. Long story short, more people got involved with the fighting, and officers were called. The bride was, understandably, a crying mess. Still, she decided that if she spent so much money on the event, then they were going to have a party with or without the groom.
Honestly, she was so much stronger than I could have ever been, so good on her for that…but the whole thing was an absolute mess.
89. Head Games
This was one I worked at. After the ceremony, right at the start of the reception, the photographer was taking “jumping” photos of the bride and bridesmaids, so they were all jumping in the air while wearing heels. The bride landed and dislocated her knee, then passed out and kept going in and out of consciousness. We called an ambulance, who turned up and fixed her knee, but she wanted to continue with the wedding.
She then had the first course of the meal and threw up down her dress, and had to sit with her mother in another room while everyone else danced, etc. I felt so bad for her as she spent the rest of the evening crying.
90. Not A Good Look
The groom got so sloshed the night before that he couldn't make it to the altar at the ceremony. They still had the ceremony with only the bride and her party, plus one of the groomsmen, who apparently didn't get wasted. Everyone was shaking their heads the entire time. The groom did make one singular appearance for a few seconds at the reception.
He looked like a zombie and was wearing street clothes, which made things worse as it was no trashy wedding. The bride was a professional dancer for a major label pop star, so that gives you an idea of the type of people that were in attendance. 200 plus people were at the ceremony alone, and probably double that was at the reception. They divorced within six months.
91. Young And Dumb
I was invited to a wedding of a friend’s friend because she didn‘t have enough of her own people to get the reception as big as she wanted it to be. Also, the bride and groom were super young—she got pregnant three months after hooking up with him and were marrying for all the wrong reasons. When the party started, the whole atmosphere was forced and strained.
Everybody knew the whole thing was fake in a way, so I decided to spend my time outside instead. I was having a wonderful time…until I heard screaming inside. The bride then ran past us very Hollywood-style, all teary and dramatic. It turned out that the ice cake wasn‘t stored properly, so it melted and came out a little lopsided. The bride didn‘t come back, even though the cake was still really nice. The couple got divorced nine months later...
92. A Real Showstopper
This didn't happen at a wedding but at a 30-year wedding anniversary. I was working as a waiter at a hotel and we had ballrooms for private parties and other bigger events. The bride and groom had spared no expense. There were about 100 guests, a five-course meal, an open bar, and a whole day party. We were supposed to close it at 4 in the morning.
It was grand—one of the biggest parties I had waited on so far. After the main course, the husband stood up and gave a speech. A long one. He started out reminiscing about when they had met: their early life together, the hard times they had endured, etc. He then talked at length about how he loved their children and told each of them how proud he was of their accomplishments.
So far, it was one of the better speeches I had ever heard. It was heartfelt, and he had a lot of charisma. He was well-spoken and funny, too. But then it took a dark turn. He looked at his wife again. He told her that he had hated her for the last four years of their life together. He called her a toxic narcissist and said she had made him feel miserable to the point where he contemplated ending it all.
He also her that he knew she had a lover. He pointed him out in the crowd, next to his wife and children. He had evidence and was suing for divorce, intending to take everything. He gave her the divorce papers right then and there. Oh, but it got even better. He then announced to everyone that he had gotten his own apartment. He had hired movers to move all his stuff while they were at the party, and he said he would be leaving shortly.
In the stunned silence that ensued, he tipped all staff, dishwashers, bosses, waiters, and busboys $200 each and left. Needless to say, everyone left within the hour.
93. Change of Heart
Amazingly, I saw the groom himself object. He just stood up there and started crying, then announced in front of everyone that he had fallen out of love with the bride a while before but didn't know how to break it off. It was extremely uncomfortable, and they both stepped out. Ten minutes later, they came back in and got married—because she'd apparently told him she was pregnant. They're still together, with three kids now. I'm not sure about the husband, but I can confirm that the wife is having an affair. Neither of them are happy, but she has a comfortable life and he doesn't have the spine to leave.
94. The Cruelest Trick
When my cousin got married to her wife, her parents, grandparents and a few other older family members stood up and walked out. They didn't say anything or try to stop the wedding; it was just a show of their disproval. My cousin was pretty devastated because she thought their attendance meant they had changed their minds and wanted to support her, but it was just a trick.
95. Top Secret
The bride gave explicit wedding instructions beforehand through various channels. One rule was that there were to be no posts on social media before the bride gave the OK, and certainly no posts before she posted herself. Anyway, a few hours before the wedding, someone posted something, saying that they were at the wedding or whatever.
Absolutely nothing malicious, just a generic statement. The bride saw this and everyone could tell she was about to blow up. At the end of the vows, the bride turned to the congregation and said, "Can you all please unfriend Jennifer as I gave out explicit instructions that there are to be no social posts until I give the OK, and she has broken that rule today."
Just imagine—she literally just finished her vows and she finally has a new husband, but that was the first thing on her mind. Everyone awkwardly laughed as if she was joking…nope. She then stormed off, with her new husband awkwardly following behind. There was a weird atmosphere after that and everyone started making excuses to go home.
I'm talking proper fake emergency stuff here: "I have to get back because I need to err, my erm, yeah bye..." Everyone left much earlier than usual. No one wanted to be there and have awkward conversations with the bride.
96. I’m Gonna Getcha
I was dating this girl who asked me to go to her ex’s wedding. We dated for a few months prior, but asking me to go to a wedding together felt like a serious commitment...I still accepted. I planned for the week off work and we went all out for this wedding. Half the time, I was trying to make the most of our time together, but she always went missing.
Fast forward to the reception. She made a scene in the most unstable and mentally sick way. In front of the groom, the bride, and everyone else, she said out loud: “I’m still in love with you. We literally have been sleeping together all week and I can't stop thinking about you." She quickly got escorted out after that.
The bride was clearly upset, but everyone tried to go about their business. As soon as I left, my “girlfriend” started completely ruining the hall and all the decorations, just throwing a fit on her way out. It was so embarrassing. I figured she was telling the truth since she was missing the whole time, but I’m pretty sure that everyone during the whole thing assumed this was too crazy to be real.
I definitely regret not seeing her true colors before, but when you work so much and try to date at the same time, you have very little time to get to really know some people. Time sort of flies by and you end up dating for a few months. Fast forward a month or two later...she got together with the groom and I’m pretty sure she has no regrets about wasting my time.
She probably doesn’t even feel bad about using me or even ruining that man’s marriage. This woman is seriously twisted.
97. Wedding Transference
I work in the industry and my friend is the wedding planner. He is a good-looking, straight male who has an amazing eye for design and detail. He can do everything from wedding dress design and execution to flowers, you name it. And his services are not cheap. He once had a bride who called him up a few days before her wedding.
She told him she couldn't go through with the wedding because she was in love with someone else. The conversation went something like this: Bride: "I can't marry him, I just don't love him anymore, I think I'm in love with someone else!" Him: "What do you mean you're in love with someone else!? Your wedding is in five days!"
Bride: "Well...I'm in love with you. You just GET me! I've never met anyone else like you!" Him: "...Do you know how much your parents are paying me to get you?!" She ended up getting married five days later as planned, and it was never mentioned again.
98. Whoops!
I work wedding bars often in between library shifts, and I saw a wedding where the bride never turned up to the altar and texted the guy 15 minutes before saying, "Sorry but I'm not coming." It was super depressing, they went ahead with the 'party' and the groom ended up leaving at around half 7, the rest of the guests at 10.
What had happened was the bride had spent all day with her parents the day before and they apparently hated her husband to be and had convinced her not to show up. Last thing I heard was she came to his door the next morning and apologized, they're still together as far as I know... Man was that an awkward work night.
99. Missed Encounters
At a wedding of a college friend of my husband’s, we learned that the bride (his old friend) had been in love with him for over a decade. We learned this from the women at our table at the reception. We introduced ourselves while we waited for the bride and groom to arrive. They were horrified that we were there—and extremely worried.
My husband had NO idea that she had feelings for him. She bee-lined right for our table after the "introducing Mr & Mrs" thing—ignoring her family and leaving her husband standing alone. She clung to my husband and sobbed—lifting her head to glare at me. She had to be pulled off of him.
She repaired herself, then followed us as we tried to leave quietly—her parting shot was to stare at my chest and say, "Well I guess I know what I was missing all along!" Her new husband was in shock and my husband was horrified and embarrassed—he was completely clueless and would never have gone to the wedding if he'd know she was obsessed with him. It was bizarre.
100. Leaving So Soon?
When I was in college studying photography, I got friendly with a fellow student who had a wedding photography business but was still studying to get his qualifications. After seeing my work, he asks me if I want to assist him at his next wedding. I agree to do so. The big day finally comes and I'm all prepared to go in and see the groom, the best man, the ushers, and a bunch of other participants to get some pre-event photos of them getting ready and whatnot.
To my surprise, the groom refused to be in any pictures, stating that he was feeling under the weather. I kinda thought he should just suck it up. It was his wedding day, after all. Nevertheless, he was insistent, so no pre-event photos were taken of him. A little while later, the ceremony comes and goes. It’s now time for the bridal party photos at the church.
Once again, the groom refuses to be in any photos, much to everyone's annoyance. We all get to the reception, the speeches begin, and, midway through the father of the bride’s speech, the groom just straight up leaves. He once again repeats the fact that he was feeling a bit ill. This is where the bride drew the line—she went into a full-on rage. She started pulling the small groom and bride figurines off the top of the cake and stomping on them.
She shouted, "I knew I shouldn't have married him!" There was a lot of hullabaloo at this point, with guests trying to console her. Everyone agreed that he was being dramatic and was basically a huge jerk. We got paid in full even though at that point we were done. I go home, put my feet up, drink a few beers, and then answer an unexpected phone call from my friend.
I was expecting him to just be calling to joke around a little bit more about how crazy that wedding had just been. Not even close. In reality, he was calling to inform me that the groom had passed away shortly after leaving the reception hall, and that our photo job would now be turning into a two-for-one wedding and funeral service.
