People Tell Us About Ridiculous Wedding Requests

People are still getting married despite statistics that indicate how likely it is these couplings will end in separation or divorce. With marriage usually comes a wedding, and with that, a slew of plans that range from typical to extra af.

A supposed bride-to-be named “Susan” recently made headlines when she reportedly tried to charge her wedding guests $1,500 a head for a destination wedding the engaged couple couldn’t afford in Aruba.

While the existence of Susan and this alleged bridezilla-like behaviour seems to still be unproven days after it erupted on social media, we asked a number of regular people about the [very real] ridiculous asks they’ve gotten when invited to the wedding of a loved one:

“My boss said I could go to his wedding if I paid for my own plate. I didn’t go [laughs]. It was $120. He invited about five people from work who he actually paid for. Then he started going around saying he felt bad because people were left out and invited a bunch of us—but only if we paid. None of us went [to the reception]. And it was actually ironic because a few people went to the ceremony, which was free, but didn’t go to the reception because that was the part they had to pay for. Then two people he actually did pay for didn’t even show up!” —Jada, 25

“My friends got married in the middle of winter in Minnesota roughly a four-hour drive from the closest airport at an expensive resort. It’s where the bride is from, but still, all their friends are in [the] area [I live in], so it was really only convenient for her family and childhood friends. I didn’t end up going because it would have cost me roughly $2,000. Also the bride made her bridesmaids get dresses that were at least $800 each. Oh, and a bunch of people came back from the wedding with the flu.” —Kaylin, 28

“My brother and I have a good but fairly business relationship, and it would have been awkward to be at his bachelor party [as a groomsman]. We get along well, but we’ve never been drinking buddies. It would have been like seeing strippers with your parents. But he needed to give me some sort of token responsibility, so I was a 32-year-old ring bearer (next to a two-year-old flower girl) at my little brother’s wedding.” —Brock, 37

“I was invited to a tropical destination wedding that would have required me to both cancel my winter holiday plans and shell out thousands just between the flights and accommodations. To make things worse, I already felt obligated because this couple had come to my wedding and had given us a generous cash gift. I don’t think she thought about how this trip was inconceivable for me since I was a college student barely scraping by with a part-time job then, as was my husband. She had a rich family, and the guy she was getting married to was even richer. I declined the invite, but our relationship wasn’t the same after she came home, moved into a mansion, and got pregnant.” —Lara, 28

“I had to pay something like $1,200 or $1,400 to stay at a particular boutique hotel down the Jersey shore for my cousin’s wedding so she could have the whole hotel to do pictures in. And it was a holiday weekend, so it was an obligatory three-night stay. I made her come to my expensive destination wedding in Jamaica, but I also had her and all of my bridal party put $600 towards it—and at least it was Jamaica! $1,400 for Jersey?!” —Maura, 33

Interviews have been edited for length and clarity.

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