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An $80,000 Wedding Is Not Normal
Social media has ruined our perception of weddings.
I wasn’t the girl who dreamed about her wedding day growing up. I never had a set timeline — married by 25, kids by 27. Instead, I focused on achieving career milestones with a kind of unwavering determination. In my early adulthood, dating took a backseat to my ambition, partly because I was skeptical about long-term commitment. I wasn’t sure if marriage was something I even wanted. But as I got older, one thing became clear: I did want to be in love.
Thinking about planning a wedding feels surreal.
As a child of divorce, I’m still wrapping my head around the whole wedding industrial complex, and sometimes I feel naive navigating it all. I’m not dead set on practicing every detailed tradition, and cannot wrap my head around the need for a wedding invitation suite.
Since getting engaged I’ve been in a deep wedding research rabbit hole. Pinterest boards, bridal subreddits, weddingtok — the works. This all started when we decided we’d have an engagement party this year. We’re having a longer engagement, and want to celebrate this milestone. I started looking into traditional wedding venues, and inquiring about quotes. When that served to be out of our budget for a pre-wedding celebration, I…
