Planning a wedding can be an extremely stressful and expensive time in someone’s life. It is supposed to be a joyous occasion which will doubtless end up in fraught family arguments — but what the heck, that’s all part of it!
However, making sure the person you are marrying is definitely the person you want to spend the rest of your life with is the most important aspect of the entire occasion. Sadly, some people make the wrong decisions leading up to a wedding and end up being left or leaving someone at the altar.
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One person took to Reddit to find out the details about why people had left their fiancé at the altar or what it felt like to be left, by asking, “People who left someone at the alter, what made you do it and what was the fallout?”
So, here are some of the most shocking, heartbreaking, and disastrous stories that people had to share!
Over Cows
“My mom called off a wedding to a man she was engaged to before she met my dad. It was only one week before. She said they got into an argument over something very trivial (something having to do with cows?) but it was enough of a wakeup call for her that they were not right for each other. I know this man and she was right not to marry him. There were people that did not get word the wedding was canceled and showed up at the church.” — rumchhataa
Cows are fantastic creatures and you should absolutely break up with someone if they aren’t in agreement over that fact! Although joking aside, this person updated the comment to say that her mother and the guy had passed a field and she had remarked upon how beautiful cowbells sound, and he basically told her that she was stupid for caring. He sounds delightful.
“Do You Take This Man?”
“As someone who was left at the altar, that sucked. I was dating this girl for 5 years. I popped the question and she happily agreed, 10 months in and the day had come, everything was fine until that question from the padre… I didn’t notice at first but someone walked as a guest to watch, […] her demeanor instantly changed, so when the padre asked the question she said a loud NO. And she walked away with someone.
“As it turns out, she was cheating on me with some dude for 1 year, apparently that dude knew about out wedding and walked in to scoop her out. I was left with severe anger, not even a shred of sadness, just extremely pissed. Soon after the sadness came in. But I got over here surprisingly quick, took me 4 months. Which was good because I found out the dude was using her hard-earned savings for his meth addiction.” — miloca1983
According to this person, the last time they heard from their ex-fiance, they were living in a homeless shelter.
Religious Differences
“My wife was set to be a bridesmaid in this wedding of her college friend. It was an out of state wedding, and they had people coming in from all over the USA and Europe for this. Expensive sorta deal, just my wife’s dress was over $1,000 easy.
“Five days before the wedding, the groom called the whole entire thing off. The reason? He was Church of Christ and she was a Baptist and according to him, she was in the wrong church and since she wouldn’t join his church then he had to break it off. To the weeping bride’s credit, her parents did pay back everyone, including my wife the money for her bridesmaid dress.” — Americasycho
I find it ludicrous that some people can let their religious differences get in the way of a relationship. Of course, people’s religious beliefs are important to them, but to not marry someone you love because they simply believe something slightly different is baffling.
Prostitute At The Wedding
“I was a plus one in a super fancy wedding, high profile family on the bride’s side As the bride was preparing to enter the venue, we heard screaming outside. A sex worker was at the door demanding to see the groom. Apparently, he had sex with her at his bachelor party the week before and failed to pay the agreed amount. She had been threatening to show up at his wedding if he didn’t pay and he didn’t take her seriously. Oh, well…
“He denied at first, then argued that she was paid but demanded more money after they were done. The bride was not moved by his defense and a screaming match ensued. The bride left crying with her parents, we all stood there for a while and slowly started to go home. They broke up (of course).” — krncrds
Well, a prostitute at the wedding (aside from being the most amazing lo-fi indie rock album of all time) sounds like a pretty quick way to getting jibbed at the altar!
Already Married
“Went to a wedding where the priest and the groom came out from sanctuary, then the bride (dressed in regular dress clothes) and her father came out. There was mumbling, the priest made the announcement. There would be no wedding that day, but there would be a prayer said for the couple and their family and friends. A short reception (1 hour long at a restaurant on the same block) was held with parents of the couple welcoming the guests. Each had been too scared to cancel. Bride and groom each married others and are still with those spouses. Most civilized and best ending to a rough day.” — ladyvivace
This seems like a ridiculously calm way to handle this situation. Although, I do enjoy the idea that two people would let this situation get all the way to the wedding day essentially out of embarrassment.
Arranged Marriage
“One of my friend’s sisters. It was a few years back…it was an arranged Indian wedding and the lady was initially very accepting and happy with the groom. They talked and fell in love with each other leading to the marriage…she was really looking forward to the wedding because she was very much involved in her wedding planning and preparation
“So about one month before her wedding the lady met her high school crush and started to bond with him. Then she fell in love with the high school him. Well, she eloped with the guy just hours before the wedding. Her parents disowned her…..she hurt a lot of people doing that.” — yakshan
This one was quite a rollercoaster of emotion. The responses to this one quickly became a series of people’s arguments for and against the idea of arranged marriages, with the debate becoming quite heated.
Gold-Digging
“My friend, we will call her Klarah, invited me as her plus 1. The moment we show up everything seemed normal. I wandered around and found a tense older man in the back. I thought maybe he was nervous so I decided to chat it up with him and after getting to know him a bit he apologized to me for ‘going so far out of my way for a wedding that’ll get canceled’. Outside I was like ‘Oh no, whatever do you mean?’, but on the inside, I was screaming for joy and going ‘Talk about a plot twist!’.
“The old man was the groom’s Dad and he had proof that the bride-to-be was only using his son as a meal ticket and she planned on leaving him after he paid off all her college debt and bought a house. He got all this from one of the bridesmaids who secretly had a crush on the groom and didn’t want to see his life get ruined by the bride. I’m talking screenshots of admitting what she was planning to do, recordings, pictures of the bride cheating on the groom, the whole package.” — LuLuCheng
The groom reportedly waited until it was his turn to say “I do”, but capped it with “not!” He also apparently, when asked why, said: “Because she’s an unfaithful skank who’s not even fit enough to work at Hooters”.
Groom Swap
“My buddy was engaged to be married, everything was going great up until about 2 months before the wedding when the bride freaked out about something very minor during a family vacation and stopped speaking to him. They would text once a day so the other knew they were okay, they would say I love you and she would assure him she still wanted to get married.
“One month before the wedding she called it off. They still hadn’t talked except for the texts. So he called all his people and told them the wedding was off. Only he forgot about one of his friends who had been on his fiance’s list as he was a mutual friend. Mutual friend still went to the wedding where he found….a wedding. The woman had been seeing someone on the side, still went through with the wedding but to a different guy, all on my friend’s dime. He had left her in charge of canceling everything.” — Ask_A_Sadist
Who knows if they would have grounds to sue her in this instance. I suppose it would also depend on what state they were in. Still, having to text someone to say “I still want to get married” seems like a red flag regardless of context.
Close Call
“Not entirely on message, but we almost called off our wedding the day before. Her dad had a massive heart attack and almost died 2 days beforehand. He had surgery, died 2 or 3 times during it. We got like 7 hours of sleep over 2 nights, 3 days. He was in the ICU up until the ceremony. He then showed up and walked her down the aisle… with an automatic defibrillator vest. (then sat in a wheelchair thank god). My emotions were all over the place, I don’t know how she kept it together lol.” — summonsays
Well, thank goodness that he was able to make it! He must have been incredibly strong to hold on for this specific moment, and I imagine that thinking about being able to walk his daughter down the aisle will have helped give him the inspiration to keep fighting.
Emotional Abuse
“Not quite at the altar, but a few weeks before the wedding I left my fiance. We had been together for years and the proposal was really half-assed, like he was asking because we had been together so long and it seemed the the next thing to do, not because he actually was excited about marrying me. I had been unhappy with him for a long time but his emotional abuse had convinced me that this was the best relationship I was ever going to find so I stayed.
“My mom came to visit a month before the wedding and saw how miserable I was. She said, ‘You don’t have to marry him if it won’t make you happy.’ It was such a simple thing to say, but it was like someone finally gave me permission to consider my own feelings for the first time in years and it changed my whole perspective.” — the-magnificunt
Thankfully, this person went on to say that they moved out, focussed on themself, and are now much happier in life!
Tales From The DJ Booth
“I was the DJ. ‘please take your gifts home with you when you leave’ was one of the weirdest announcements I’ve ever made, of the 80+ Weddings I’ve done, it’s definitely the weirdest, and I guess… technically not a wedding. The ceremony walking-down-the-aisle music just kept looping and looping until the parents walked up and announced the couple was ‘postponing things’ which was code for ‘damn I really hope they work this sh*t out, because if they don’t… that’s a lot of money down the drain.’
“The bride and groom never showed their faces for the entirety of the day […] I was forced to make announcements like ‘the buffet has now opened, yes they are serving the food’ and ‘there will be no ceremonial cutting of the cake, so… feel free to grab some.’ […] I just played jazz and daft punk seemed to fit somehow.” — rossmoney
Who would have thought that jazz and daft punk could soundtrack a relationship falling apart in the most spectacular fashion imaginable? This person went on to write that there had been an entire 6-piece Katy Perry cover band that didn’t even get to play, so it actually sounds like everyone dodged a bullet really.
Not Sexually Compatible
“I called off an engagement months before the wedding because the bride to be was too scared of sex to want it. I couldn’t live my life like that. My whole extended family got cancellation notices. They had never even gotten the invitation in the first place.
“Then six months later she tried to get back together and I turned her down. She immediately came back with an ‘ohh. Well, I’ve met someone new and we have expressed deep feelings for each other, so goodbye.’ I felt sorry for the new guy. She was looking to offload him in favor of me so how ‘deep’ did these feelings actually go? I often wondered if I should have given him a heads up about what just about happened to their relationship.” — frans42000
There is nothing wrong with someone not wanting to have sex in a relationship. However, by that token, there are people to whom sexual compatibility is very important. At the end of the day, it is about finding someone who shares your own viewpoint and desires.
College Sweethearts
“I just found out my mom called off her wedding, pretty late in the process (this was in the 1960s and the formal wedding announcement with photos had already been posted in the newspaper because that’s a thing that people used to do? IDGI.)
“She and her fiancé (who I’ll call ‘Steve’) had met in college, gotten pregnant, and gave the baby up for adoption. They then continued to date for another 3 years, got engaged when my mom was 21, and called off the wedding a month before the ceremony […] She says that everyone just assumed they would get married, so they were going to ‘because where else do they go from [the adoption]?’ Luckily they realized they were just going along with the motions in time. My mom says it was no hard feelings between her and Steve, that they meet up every 3-5 years just to see what’s up with the other, and she has no regrets. (Unlike her actual marriage to my father, but hey she got me out of that deal so it wasn’t all bad)” — murr_mcmurr
This person went on to write that they eventually got to meet their 54-year-old sister and that they are glad their mother told them about this story before it was too late.
Forced Into Marriage
“A family friend (much much older) had a similar situation. The groom told her a few days before the wedding that he was gay. She wanted to call it off. But her parents wouldn’t let her. Imagine the embarrassment! The Bishop is going to marry you, what would he think? We have all these people coming to this very expensive event! Etc. The wedding went on. Not surprisingly, the marriage wasn’t consummated and didn’t last long. But at least her parents were spared the embarrassment” — usually_just_lurking
Hearing stories about people hiding their true self away like this is heartbreaking. You should never be scared to be yourself, and anyone who makes you feel like that doesn’t deserve to be in your life.
The Dangers Of Butt Dialing
“Not me but I was able to witness the entire debacle. My ex wife’s uncle was getting married in San Diego to a very superficial golddigger, plastic, California blonde. Her uncle had some incredibly wealthy friends and they flew us down on a private jet and put us up in one of their beachfront homes in La Jolla. It was interesting to get a glimpse into the life of the 1%.
“The night before the wedding the entire family (minus the golddigger) went out to dinner at a nice restaurant. Her uncle’s closest male friends took him out into the balcony and had a very frank discussion about the marriage with him. Somehow he had butt-dialed her and she heard the entire conversation which was not at all flattering to her […] the entire wedding was called off. Her uncle had all of his family in town so he took us all to dinner instead. The golddigger showed up drunk on the street with a bottle in her hand and railed at everyone like a manic street preacher. It was glorious to revel in the entire scene knowing the drama had nothing to do with me.” — turdferguson2000
Arguments Between Family And Fiance
“Not really at the altar, but my fiancee dumped me a few months before the wedding date over something I thought was really trivial. She hated my family for no good reason and had a very arms-length relationship with her own, which she wanted to emulate with my family. She couldn’t handle them coming over twice a year so she started treating them like crap the few times they came by. It ended up with both sides hating each other and me trying to play the middle man.
“The fallout at the time was awful. Outside of being generally embarrassed to everyone we told about the wedding, we didn’t get any of our deposits back and I had moved cities and got a new job for her. Also had a really expensive ring that fetched me less than half of what I paid for it if I wanted to sell it to someone else.
“I was inconsolable for months, but little by little, really realized that we weren’t right for each other and the breakup was the absolute best thing that ever happened to me.” — muhwahahahah
Lingering Feelings Of Resentment
“I didn’t leave her at the altar, I was the one that was left. It happened not the day of the wedding but just a couple days before it, when literally guests from all over the country had already arrived and the last of the $40k had been spent. It was the worst day of my life. She didn’t even tell me in person, she called me and told me while I was at work […] I drove straight to my parent’s house and locked myself in the guest room for a week, never knew so much liquid could come out of someone’s face […]
“There is a bit of a back story but basically she deeply betrayed my trust about a year before the wedding and from that day forward my confidence fell and it was apparent I didn’t feel like an equal in the relationship. So, she essentially didn’t feel as doted upon or loved as she once was, which is true. Anyway, yea the saying is true… When you hit rock bottom, the only way out is up.” — TheCollectorOne
The Bachelorette Party
“Not quite at the altar, but an ex-girlfriend was at a Bachelorette party at a seedy male strip club. She came home from the party and said ‘well, the wedding is off’. She said the bride was getting the usual treatment, sitting in a chair with strippers gyrating around her, whipping dongs around, and then one put whipped cream on his cock and invited her to lick it off. which she did, with her tonsils, until the stripper shoots his load all over the front of her ‘I’m the Bride’ t-shirt.
“About this moment, the bride kind of comes to her senses, looks around and sees like 20 of her friends pointing cell phones at her recording and taking photos and starts freaking out. my girlfriend says she started screaming at everyone ‘you better delete that sh*t’ and generally having a full rage meltdown, which is apparently tough to take seriously when you’re based in stripper jizz.” — McFeely_Smackup
Wow, what a delightful story. According to this person, the groom-to-be received countless copies of the images and quickly rang her for a quite terse argument.
Stringing Someone Along
“As someone who married someone who should have left me standing at the altar instead of dragging a lie on for another ten years with all the nasty consequences:
“I applaud you for doing the right thing before the ring.” — Poh_Lahr_Bare
This one raises a good point. While there are a lot of stories here which are shockingly heartbreaking for the people involved. There is also something to be said for the fact that, if you really don’t love someone and aren’t sure about the wedding, then maybe you shouldn’t go through with it, and have a conversation with your fiancé before it is too late?
The Groom Was Gay
“I was a guest on the bride’s side […] She started walking down the aisle then stopped halfway. Her father and mother came over. She whispered to them then they all turned around and walked away. The groom immediately followed. A couple of minutes later the father of the bride came back down the aisle and apologized but there was going to be no wedding today.
“We all just got up and slowly left. There were a couple of angry family members on the groom’s side but once they talked to the father of the bride they immediately just left. At the door, the mother of the bride shook my hand and thanked us for coming, told us that they would explain everything later […] The story is that the groom the night before ceremony confessed to the bride that he was gay. He loved her. He still wanted to marry her, provide and raise children. But he needed her to know. She couldn’t let him live like that and it wasn’t fair to either of them.” — RoboticEnterprise
While these stories may have put you off the idea of marriage, remember that there are a lot of successful marriage stories out there. It is all about finding that one person that you know you will be able to happily spend the rest of your life together with.
