Broke Off Engagement?

RhoSigma2003 · #1 05-13-2008, 04:29 PM

Has anyone broke off their engagement? How far were you in the planning process? Cold feet?

Please share your stories!

KSUViolet06 · #2 05-13-2008, 04:41 PM

This has never happened to me personally, but I have friends that have postponed wedding dates because one of them had cold feet.

I think that if someone is having cold feet, they need to listen to that and really sit down and think about why. Is it nervousnes about the day itself? Or is it something more serious like "I'm not sure I want to spend the rest of my life with this person?"

It's okay to be nervous about the wedding day (i.e. I'm worried something will go wrong with the venue), but it's another thing to be unsure about the person you're marrying or your relationship.

Really sit down and think about whether it is one or the other.

If it turns out to be second thoughts about the person or the relationship, don't let the wedding itself get in the way of you having a conversation with the fiance about your feeelings. Don't feel like it's too late to push things back. You don't want to be sitting alone days before the wedding feeling trapped or unsure just because you didn't want to postpone the plans.

If your fiance loves you, he will understand and have no problem with possibly getting married later if it means you are happier together. If you talk to him about how you feel and he blows up on you, then maybe you need to re-evaluate spending your life with him.

WhiteDaisy128 · #3 05-13-2008, 06:19 PM

I have not...but I know someone that has...they found a lot of solace on www.theregoesthebride.com - I believe it's a message board for "brides" that are no longer engaged. I haven't looked at it too much.

AGDee · #4 05-13-2008, 11:47 PM

I didn't, but I should have and knew it days before the wedding. 14 months and lots of abuse later, I left, but I knew the day I married him it was going to end badly and that's a horrible place to be. In fact, I was quite the Bridezilla that day because I knew it was all wrong.

Leslie Anne · #5 05-14-2008, 02:36 AM

^^^ I'm sorry you suffered the abuse and I'm glad you're out of it now. How horrible.

My sister broke off her engagement. She was 19 at the time and her fiance was a very nice guy but my mother and I were really worried about it. She took a trip out to Utah to meet her fiance's Mormon family. For a while after she got back she was like a zombie. All I remember her talking about were embroidered dish towels for each day of the week.

Finally she snapped out of it and called it off. My mother and I were SO relieved! My sister looks back in horror at the possibility that she could have been just a "baby-making machine."

kstar · #6 05-14-2008, 02:48 PM

My current boyfriend and ex-fiance broke off our engagement a few years ago on St. Valentine's Day. He was panicking because two of his best friends were getting divorced and another was breaking up with his long time girlfriend. (It didn't help that he was in the middle of his first year of law school.) We were in the very early planning stages and hadn't even agreed on a place or date yet.

It took him about 3 months to calm down and realize the mistake, but it took me about 6 months to forgive him and another 3 before I would agree to date him again.

nittanyalum · #7 05-14-2008, 03:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kstar

My current boyfriend and ex-fiance broke off our engagement a few years ago on St. Valentine's Day.

Brutal!

Quote:

It took him about 3 months to calm down and realize the mistake, but it took me about 6 months to forgive him and another 3 before I would agree to date him again.

He's a lucky man.

ForeverRoses · #8 05-14-2008, 04:15 PM

Two of my friends met at my wedding. One of them was engaged at the time, but her fiance bailed on my wedding to go to a hockey game. Four months later my engaged friend was no longer engaged and a couple months after that I set my two friends up. Now they have two kids (neither one was named for me even though I really think I should have had naming rights). They did dedicate a song to my husband and I at their wedding, though.

I do know that she lost a bundle on the non-wedding, but it's a small price to pay for happiness.

APhi Sailorgirl · #9 05-15-2008, 11:41 AM

I had a sorority sister break off her engagement, she wasn't ready to be engaged, but he asked her at a family event and I think the excitement got to her so she said Yes.

They broke it off about 6 months later once the shinyness went away. I believe a huge reason was their difference in religions.

summer_gphib · #10 05-15-2008, 01:26 PM

We weren't technically engaged yet, but seriously talking marriage...
Then he cheated with a woman that his MOTHER had worked with when she was pregnant with HIM.

It was devastating to me, my family, and most of our friends. He was my first love, and it truly broke my heart. I often wonder if he knows what he did to me.

Now I have a wonderful husband with a great relationship. But I still have "trust" issues. It turns out the ex cheated a lot (we went to separate colleges but saw each other EVERY weekend for almost 3 years.)

MTSUGURL · #11 05-15-2008, 02:18 PM

I've broken off two. I think that deep down (maybe not no deep down...) I knew it would end even if we did get married, but honestly, for a long time I bought into the lie that you were nothing if you weren't married by 25. The first fiance was the one that I've shared my story about in other threads in this forum. I thought I was pregnant, and my first thought was, "There's no way this man is raising my child." Then it hit me: Why was I planning to marry him?

The second guy came clean about several large things in his life that he had lied about, one being a 6 year old daughter that he had fathered. This wouldn't have been a problem - I would've loved her like she was my own given the opportunity. However, there were no pictures, no visits, no calls... He had basically just decided he didn't want anything to do with her. After learning that, I decided I didn't want anything to do with him.

I've been proposed to several times, but not by anyone that has inspired a feeling of permanence in me.

If you have solid, real, genuine reasons, not just cold feet that might go away after a long reassuring talk, for breaking off an engagement, it doesn't matter how far you are into the planning process. As messy and disappointing as a breaking of an engagement can be, it's no where near as messy, expensive or involved as a divorce would be.