Can everyone get onboard and make this a thing? If your closest friends and family hate your fiancé(e)… would you seriously hear them out—without getting defensive and shutting them down?
Idk who watched the train wreck reality gold that was the Love Is Blind Season 6 Reunion, but I do know whoever did was like:
AD, no you didn’t go on two dates-ish (and probably had sexual relations with) the socially-divergent Matt! And please don’t tell us you’re back together with the man who greeted you at your wedding altar with, “Okay, body!” and then proceeded to dump you in front of an international television audience and your family, including some very impressionable young nieces.1
AD wouldn’t be able to spot a red flag if it were wrapped around her shoulders when she wins gold at the Olympic event of dating emotionally stunted and unavailable men.
Same, girl, same.
Before I got married, I had an international, long-distance relationship that lasted 4 years until we got hitched. During those 4 years, we broke up 4 times. These breakups were due to immaturity, emotional unavailability and plain ol’ cheating.2
Several of my good and best friends tried to advise me—very nicely and patiently—to end this obviously unhealthy relationship.
I reacted… poorly:
“How dare you/you don’t know what you’re talking about!”
“You don’t know him/what our relationship is really like.”
“You’re jealous I’m marrying exactly who I want and not settling for just anyone [unspoken: like you].”
I was a colossal, hellfire bitch.
What I didn’t see then that I do now is my best friends and family (who I’m still best friends and family with) want me to be happy. They’d seen me cry too many times over my ex while we were dating—and probably knew what would happen if we got married.
(Here I am, writing the shrapnel of my divorce.)
When I talk to them about it now, they’re still gentle with my heart: “You were sad or heartbroken after almost every trip to Paris.”
They were right, but I was too ego-driven and emotionally unaware to recognize the red flags.
Unfortunately, well-meaning dating advice3 from your squad goes down about as well as funky spunk.
When love is blind, deaf and dumb, nothing gets through the thick fog of dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin and norepinephrine. Maybe it’s not supposed to, biologically. Mammals are wired to mate, procreate and move on.
Human mammals have made this much more complex with til-death-do-you-part commitment, twin flame theory and rearing children well into their 40’s.
We take a chemical romance and try to turn it into the fairytale of a lifetime, even though Prince Eric has a Cluster B personality disorder and you’re marrying him because you haven’t sorted out your daddy issues.
Your friends and family watch it like a slow-motion car crash, usually without saying a word, because we all know we’re not supposed to say anything negative about the person our BFF is marrying.
Well, I call bullshit on both sides.
How To Tell Your BFF You Hate Her Fiancé(e)
If you love your friend, you need to do everything you can to help her not make one of the most enormous mistakes of her life. The caveat: This has to be a truly selfless act that has nothing to do with always-a-bridesmaid jealousy or my-younger-sister-shouldn’t-get-married-before-me sibling rivalry.
You should only try to dissuade your friend’s relationship/engagement because she really is marrying someone who will ruin her life—as evidenced by multiple breakups, pre-marital cheating, pathological lying, financial shadiness, violence of any kind, etc.
I’d say that a life of quiet desperation and low-level misery is another reason not to get married, but this one is harder to obtain evidence for.
In my love/ego haze, I think what possibly could have gotten through to me was an intervention. Facing a concerned crowd of my loved ones, armed with facts about the reality of my relationship and my future marriage, would have made me reflect, especially seeing that I had the support of this group of people should my relationship/engagement fail.
It’s hard to know whether I would have reacted in anger and indignation or gratitude. Still, a loving, nonjudgmental approach: “Hey, are you really happy? What happens if he keeps behaving like this in your marriage?” may have worked. At the very least, I would not have shut out a friend for voicing their concern in a productive manner.
Heart matters are delicate; they need to be handled with kid gloves. But if your heart hurts over how your friend is being treated in her relationship, it’s worth the risk of speaking up.
If she furiously rejects your advice, let it go because everyone has their own destiny and sometimes, it’s going to be horrible. Tell her you love and support her always and be there for her if and when things do fall apart.4
How To Listen When Your BFF Hates Your Fiancé(e)
It sucks when your best friends and family can’t get onboard with your serious, headed-to-the-altar relationship. It feels disappointing, embarrassing and angry-making: Why can’t they see he’s not a douche?
Thing is, “not a douche” is a pretty low bar. Why is your bar below street level? Are you willing to contemplate your self-worth and boundaries? If you don’t want to go there with your self-exploration, I can almost guarantee major difficulties in your future marriage.
When someone you love, trust and have known for decades/your whole life tells you they have issues with your fiancé(e), try to have an open mind. Our loved ones generally don’t want to see us in pain nor cause us pain. Risking your wrath because they want your happiness is a sign they’re looking out for you.
Listen to their concerns and really think about what they’re saying and why. Ask for concrete examples if you’re a fan of logic.
Our independent, individualistic culture ostensibly doesn’t reward group think, though social media and politics show otherwise. If we’re turning to Reddit to know whether or not we’re assholes, then we should maybe listen to our closest friends and family when they’re saying our fiancé(e) is an asshole.
Deep down inside, we probably already know this, but because of the sunk cost or the shame of not being married by 30 or the fear of dying alone, we would rather say yes at the altar than consider the possibility that we’re marrying a very wrong person.
Of course, this is always, ultimately your choice. But take it from someone who wished she’d heeded the warnings: Listen with an open mind and heart when your friends and family hate your fiancé.
Can we please normalize this and make it a thing?
Turning Diamonds Into… More Diamonds
I have to wonder if Emily Ratajkowski’s friends and family warned her when she was about to marry Sebastian Bear-McClard, the predatory producer with a bad case of perma-sweat. I think maybe not because they got married after only two weeks of dating, which DO NOT DO THIS, FOLKS!
Two years! You need to know someone at least TWO YEARS before considering marriage.
Anyway, Emrata remains gorgeous and relevant as she goes through her divorce and custody battle and she made headlines this past week for turning her engagement ring into two divorce rings.
IMO, her divorce rings are so much nicer than the toi-et-moi monstrosity that was her engagement ring from the King of Douche.
The lemonade: She got two diamond rings—and her adorable son—from this misbegotten union.
This is also making me think I should turn my eternity wedding band into another form of jewelry.
Any ideas?
Apparently she is NOT back together with Clay. Go, AD!
My favorite comment re: what’s going on inside Clay’s head when he’s staring blank-faced at AD: “Don’t cheat, don’t cheat, don’t cheat.”
Same goes for parenting advice.
I’ve had so much friend support for the many years of my divorce, but would I have preferred having less years of it in exchange for a pre-marriage breakup? Probably.