With all that goes into a wedding, it's kind of hard to believe someone would wait until the day of to call things off.
Still, this isn't just an idea out of a rom-com. Whether you call them runaway brides and grooms or consider the situation being left at the altar, the truth is many weddings don't make it through the "I do" part.
Here are some stories from across Reddit of times that people pulled the plug on a wedding as it was already in motion.
1."Friend of mine once canceled her wedding after finding out that a 'meet up to plan his bachelor party' was actually him meeting like five of his female friends so he could bang them all one last time before the wedding..."
2."One time I saw a guy smash a mirror after his sister told him that his bride-to-be wasn't coming. Luckily, he got over her and fell for a nice girl and she did show up to their wedding."
3."They had already paid for it all so we just went to the reception (free bar) and even the bride had a good time."
4."Hells yeah there was a reception, girl drank and ate the night away then took her mom with her to the honeymoon in the Bahamas after."
5."Catholic wedding where the groom had been previously married but granted an annulment. Comes the wedding day, and the priest stands in front of the assembled guests in the church. 'Ladies and gentlemen, we're in a bit of an... awkward situation here. The annulment was approved by the Marriage Tribunal, but hasn't received final certification. So, we're not going to have a wedding today.'"
"Instead, we'll have a 'commitment ceremony' where the bride-to-be and the groom-to-be will express their continuing commitment to each other as they prepare for marriage in hopefully the near future.' Awk-ward. Anyway, the reception went on as planned, the couple got married in a civil ceremony the next day, and went on their honeymoon without their piece of paper from a guy who was never married."
6."My French teacher was left by the altar. Her husband got on a plane without explanation and never returned. She's very bitter and negative now, which is depressing."
7."Had a friend that didn’t know she was the bride until she was halfway down the aisle. Her parents had arranged a marriage for her (common in her culture) and had told her that the family had all been invited to a cousin’s wedding. My friend was told everyone was going to be wearing white for whatever reason, I don’t remember. They arrived at the church just before the bride was scheduled to walk down the aisle. My friend, thinking they were late, wanted to slip in and stay in the back. Her father, however, takes her arm, and they start walking up the aisle. It isn’t until they’re halfway up that she stops and realizes everyone is looking at her and smiling and crying tears of joy."
"She turned to one of her aunts in the pew next to her and asked them who was getting married. The whole church went silent, and then the aunt looked at my friend's father and said, 'You can’t be serious! You planned a wedding for your daughter and just expected her to go along with it?! Have the two of them even met? Did you seriously think this would work?!' The whole room was chattering about them, and the father just clear his throat and told his daughter to keep walking. Luckily the aunt grabbed my friend first and pulled her into the pew, pushed her past the row of people, and they both ran out of the church. Her parents disowned her after that, and she moved in with that aunt."
8."My brother left his bride at the altar after he found out she was cheating on him and pregnant with the lover's baby. She told him about an hour before. He grabbed me, his best man, and another groomsman (the rest were her brothers). We drank at the park across town."
9."I was on the 'wrong' side of this. My fiance left me at the altar and never spoke to me again. I can only assume that this is because I had just received my dream job offer, and it interfered with his dreams of me being a stay-at-home wife. I picked my life up, moved across the country, took my dream job, and am now engaged to a fantastic man who I love very much. I couldn't be happier. There's a happy ending to being left at the altar."
10."A woman I briefly dated was a runaway bride. Her ex never hit her but constantly belittled her, and was basically emotionally abusive. Your standard kit. Telling her she was lucky he wanted her, that she could never find anyone better, that she was ugly, but he dealt with it, etc. She was a smart kid (was a medic in the military, saving dozens of lives in Pakistan), but emotionally manipulative people can get anyone if given enough time, and he got her. On her wedding day, her dad, who wasn't usually in the picture (having divorced when she was a teen), was having a conversation with her in the ready room and got concerned when she started repeating a lot of the things her fiance was saying to her."
"She said that she was mid-sentence when he stood up and said 'Let's go to Dairy Queen' out of the blue. When she was little they often went to DQ and talked over ice creams. She took a second, agreed, and they left to go to DQ. But he drove three towns over, and they sat and talked over ice cream for hours while her phone rang the battery dead in the car. She said she felt like a huge weight was lifted and felt bad that her friends and family were waiting for her, but they would all understand later. He eventually went back to the church and told the bridal party it wasn't happening and got his buddies to come and move all her stuff out the next day. She said that while her dad wasn't the best father in her teens, he was the best dad anyone could ask for that day."
11."I had dated my fiancee for four years before we were engaged. After a 14-month engagement, we had planned a relatively large wedding for our friends and family. I was the only one to show up at the altar. I waited in front of everyone for quite some time before we called the thing off."
12."My friend's groom-to-be left her at the altar. He took the tickets to Hawaii for their honeymoon and instead went with his brother. She spent a year dating around before he begged her to take him back, saying that he was wrong. He, a very well-off young lawyer, bought her a huge rock and paid for a lavish wedding, and she agreed. They were married soon after and now have a baby daughter."
13."We were together for three years and engaged for a year and a half. When she didn't show up, I was devastated. I would be lying that it still doesn't affect me. I would also be lying if I said that I still didn't love her."
14."My aunt was left at the altar her husband just basically never showed up for the wedding. They had been dating for almost two years and lived together for one of them. He was the one who suggested getting married. She described the experience almost like having a heart attack. One of the happiest days of her life turned into her worst nightmare."
15."Long time ago, I went to my father's wedding. It would have been his 4th. They got to the altar and mutually decided to call it off. We still had the reception, as there was no reason to waste all the booze and food. They stayed together as a couple for another month or two. It's sad I don't even remember her name. Then again, out of the five marriages, my father had only two that lasted more than three years."
16."My pastor once officiated a wedding. He had done all the premarital counseling for the couple, and they seemed good to go and fine. Got to the altar, and he did his opening prayer and welcome. He gets to the part when he says, 'Do you take this woman to be your wife?' and the guy looked at her, back and him, and said 'No.'"
"Pastor laughed a little and repeated the question, thinking he misunderstood, but the guy stopped him and said, 'No, I don't.' He took the groom aside to a back room, where the guy essentially said that he couldn't do it, that the bride and her mother had manipulated the whole wedding and he had been too chicken to stand up to her before, but that he couldn't throw his life away. They brought in both families and had a very real conversation, and then the pastor had to go back out and explain to the very uncomfortable congregation that there would be no wedding today, that the guests could help themselves to some refreshments, but that the rest of the evening's events were canceled."
17."My entire fourth-grade class was in attendance at our teacher's wedding where she was left at the altar. The whole situation was ugly. My teacher was the bride and was about 3/4 down the aisle when the groom decided he couldn't do it. He walked off to the side, and at first, my teacher and her father didn't notice and kept walking, smiling radiantly. There was about a minute of really solid confusion (last-minute cold feet? bathroom emergency?) before everyone realized what was going on. My teacher was whisked out of the church, and an announcement was made that there was not going to be a wedding. This happened the second or third week of June; she didn't come back for the last week of school."
18."Two of my fiancé's friends were getting married. The groom had been struggling for a few years deciding whether to get married and have a family or join a priory and eventually become a priest. He made his decision the morning of the wedding and just didn't show up."
19."The guy I was supposed to marry just didn't show up at all. He called all of his friends and family on his side and told them not to bother showing up because he wouldn't be there. We waited around til about an hour after the wedding started and finally got a text message saying he wasn't coming. So I got to look like a jerk by telling my family, 'Oh, sorry, there won't be a wedding today.' It was mortifying. And to top things off, my son was asking me why his daddy didn't want to marry mommy. Very hard to explain that to a two year old."
20."I was at the wedding of one of my sister's friends who was the bride. The bride never showed up at the wedding, and no one could find her. After several hours the groom and his family all went home. Turned out the bride went for a wild night of partying and slept with some guy she met at a club. She was passed out drunk at his place all day long before she came around and realized she missed her own wedding. She was out with a friend that did nothing to stop her from getting wasted and screwing around."
Have you ever witnessed a wedding that got called off? Maybe you were a runaway bride or groom? Share your experiences in the comments!
