Calling off a wedding is never an easy task. Doesn’t matter whatever the reasons are, it always takes a lot of courage to call off a wedding. And, our patriarchal society makes it much more difficult for women than men to cancel the wedding.
Sometimes you don’t have a choice but to show the courage to save yourself from a bad marriage. After realizing that the person you are about to marry isn’t right for you, it is always better to call off the wedding, rather than pursue it for the sake of society. Here are some such courageous souls who revealed their stories about why they cancelled their weddings.
1. When to be in-laws turned out to be greedy &to-be husband to be spineless: “The guy was super nice to me and earned decently. So, we proceeded but the ideologies and thinking of our families were a clear mismatch. My family is very open-minded and progressive and his family kept giving primary importance to pleasing their relatives. They forced us to give expensive gifts to their each family member. They forced us to bear the majority of the expenses. They did not even bother to visit our home town once. All the functions right from roka to the wedding were to be held at their place. All the dates, venue and rituals were decided by them. The only contribution my parents had was to finance the wedding. When my mom opposed all this, it led to a huge quarrel between the families. In the end, my father went ahead and apologized. I started having second thoughts about the guy and especially about his family. A day after the roka function, the guy messaged me saying that his family is extremely annoyed because the presentation of my family was bad, the gifts were not as per the expectations and they again wanted my parents to apologize for this. That was the point where I lost all my respect for the guy and his family and finally my marriage was called off.” – Ankita Saxena
2. When To-be-Husband turns out to be a cheater: “I called off my wedding four days before the big day. Two of my bridesmaids (my best friend since high school and my cousin) got into a huge fight because they found out that he was sleeping with both of them. It was cheating within cheating and was easily the most surreal and heart-breakingly awful experience of my entire life.” – Redditor
ALSO READ: 29 Best Quotes For Cheating Husband & Boyfriend
3. When To-be-Husband turns out to be greedy: “I met Stephen when I was at University and was bowled over by what I thought was his charm and sophistication. He asked me to marry him after 3 months; he telephoned my dad to ask for his permission. It was only later I learnt that he had asked my dad for money for the engagement ring because I wanted an expensive one, which wasn’t true. My parents had suggested a local hotel for the wedding but he pushed for a 5-star hotel in a stately home. The guest list kept growing, 200 guests to a 4-course meal after the wedding, with another 300 in the evening. A string quartet, a live band, a photographer from London because anybody local was too ‘provincial’ for him. I was complicit in all of this, swept along in the ‘excitement.’ Of course, my dad was picking up the bill for all of this. And ‘all of this’ was (grotesquely) expensive. The meal alone was just over £100 per head. The champagne had to be vintage, the flowers needed to be ‘better than anyone else’s.’ I started to feel uneasy about 4 months before the ‘big day.’ My uneasiness and unhappiness grew, I lost weight (a lot of it) I didn’t sleep; I was drinking more than I should. I finally made my decision three days (yes, 3 days) before the wedding. I told my dad first. He looked me up and down, touched my hair, hugged me and said, “better now than afterwards.” It felt awful. It still feels awful. It isn’t about the money which my dad lost (although I feel tremendous guilt) it’s about my feelings of letting people down. I’ve cried again writing this, I don’t know why I got swept away by the event- the romance of it perhaps. I do know that not marrying him was the right decision. I just did it too late.” – Quora User
4. When To-be-Husband turns out to be abusive: “I was 18 and had just had a kid with my first boyfriend. Unfortunately, he was abusive as shit, but I’d been putting up with it because I didn’t have a family to help me out. The wedding was 2 weeks away, invitations had gone out and I had my dress. Everything was ready to go. Then, one night he starts up with his craziness and he ran into my infant son’s room, woke him up by snatching him out of his crib and threatens to leave with him and never come back. As I’m on my knees crying and begging him to please give me the baby, he’s held the screaming child above me like someone holding a piece of steak just out of a dog’s reach. I started thinking twice about the whole marriage thing. I did what I had to appease him that night and the next day when he came home from work, he had no idea where I’d moved to. Fuck that guy.”– Redditor
ALSO READ: Women Share To-Be In-Laws & Husbands’ Expectations From Them In This Disturbing Twitter Thread
5. When To-be-Husband turns out to be a jerk: “My cousin’s wedding was called off after the engagement. The guy had been following her for some time now. In mid-2019, he approached her and she started talking to him. He was very nice and caring in the beginning and after talking for 3 months they told their parents and parents agreed. The engagement ceremony was done. A few weeks after the engagement suddenly the guy’s mom passed away from a lung infection. The guy was sad and depressed and it was decided that the wedding will be postponed by a year. My cousin was sad but understood the situation. When I met my cousin, she said that he had stopped talking to her citing reasons for depression. She understood and decided not to communicate and give him space. The only time she called him was to wish him on his birthday but he did not even pick her call. She was sad but felt that he was depressed due to the loss of his mother. Just before the lockdown, she happened to talk to a common friend of theirs who was unaware that they were engaged. She informed my cousin that she had just seen the guy a few days back roaming with his ex-girlfriend and they had even spent the new year in Gokarna. My cousin was shocked and she called her fiancée to ask to which he replied she is just a friend and they are not in a relationship anymore and if she wants to marry him she has to accept the girl as his friend as they are very close. She spoke about all this with her parents and later we found out that the guy’s family were very conservative and they did not allow him to marry his girlfriend, so he found my cousin instead to marry. And thus, the wedding was called off.”– Priya
6. When you save yourself from marrying a cheater: “After a day of trying on wedding dresses, just me and my maid of honour, we met my family and hubby-to-be at my brother’s house for dinner. While showing a picture of myself in a dress to my mother, which was on my bff’s phone, she gets a text message from my fiance. This is odd because I can see him in the next room and I can see my friend in the kitchen. I read it of course and it’s a huge confession from him to her, addressing how they had fooled around a few weeks ago and he was really regretting he hadn’t taken things further with her. He had NO idea I had her phone in my hand. I simply stood up and walked the 10 feet to him, held up her phone and looked him in the eye. The look on his face was priceless, and when I could speak i and my entire family let them both have it verbally. Needless to say, I don’t speak to either of them anymore.” – Redditor
ALSO READ: 7 Sexist & Insulting Indian Marriage Customs That Should Be Banned Immediately
Well, these are just some of the stories where women found courage to stand for themselves, when they were cheated or abused. We are in awe of these inspiring women, who stood against society to call off the wedding for a brighter future! We wish them luck for a life full of happiness!