I’ve gone through six pads of paper. Six pads of paper, which are all now scrunched up and covered in smudged ink and grease from KFC fingers, all because I can’t for the life of me write my wedding vows.
In just under two months, I’m going to stand next to my partner of three-and-a-half years in a dress that costs more than my car, in front of all our family and friends and even some people I don’t even know.
And I have no bloody clue what to say. Legitimately, I have no words. Not even a sentence to sum up our relationship.
Not the hundreds of amazing days we’ve spent together, walking our dog, eating halloumi and laughing until we’re red in the face. Or the 80 odd average days when I couldn’t have given a stuff about his cricket game, and we drove home in the car in silence.
Not even the 25 really, really hard days, during which I wasn’t sure if it was going to work out between us after all, but that I also couldn’t have gotten through without him.
How is it possible to love someone so much, and yet have nothing nice to say about them? What does that say about me?
This is why I think I’m actually going to outsource my wedding vows.
LISTEN: Holly Wainwright, Mia Freedman and Jessie Stephens share their, erm, humble opinions on outsourcing your vow writing (post continues after audio…)
Not on Air Tasker to a stranger, but to my sister or my best friend who are both good with words and emotions. And no, he’ll probably never find out. At least, not from me.
I know it’s meant to come from my heart, but I’m scared I’ll hurt his feelings if they’re not as emotional or heartfelt as what he’s secretly hoping they’ll be.
His vows will be everything. I’ll be crying, he’ll be crying, it’ll be a bit weird but also so special. He’s the sensitive, emotionally intelligent one in this thing, and I’m the awkward one who took six months to splutter a cough that sounded a lot like ‘I love you’.
Even though we communicate differently, and he knows that, it won’t change the fact that me failing to pull it together for this one moment we’ll look back on forever will disappoint him.
And I don’t think I could bare that.
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Top Comments
Like FlissyB and Rush have already said, it sounds like you've already got a good foundation for your vows going - just throw in a humerous anecdote about your days together and I reckon you're good to go. Sounds like you want it to be perfect, don't sweat it, heartfelt is enough.
Best of luck.
As a marriage celebrant I love writing ceremonies, but I tell all my couples their wedding vows are the only part of the ceremony I can’t write for them. As you’ve said, they need to come from the heart and are so personal to you both. But what I do is give them some examples and this almost always inspires them to write something beautiful and meaningful to them. Eg “You are my best friend and life partner, the one I pledge my life and love to. I promise to love and respect you, to be honest and faithful to you, to comfort and support you all the days of my life. I give you my hand to hold and my life to share” or “I promise to encourage you in everything you do, to laugh with you and cry with you, and always stand by your side” and so on. Some people even recite song lyrics - and of course don’t be afraid to use humour. So as suggested, Google for inspiration. Good luck! I’m sure you’ll be fine once you start writing 😊 Have a beautiful wedding!