Not too long ago, we published a series of posts in which people shared their wedding regrets (see them here and here), and they shared some serious food for thought. Here are some of the best responses, along with a few new ones from BuzzFeed Community readers:
1. "I regret that I caved in to peer pressure and bought a princess wedding dress that wasn't really me and that I didn't feel beautiful in."
2. "I wish I hadn't done the 'don't see the bride before the wedding' thing. I needed my husband for comfort that day, and didn't get it."
—Cara Young, Facebook
3. "I wish I would have eaten more. We ended up at Walmart in our wedding clothes buying TV dinners to take to our hotel just so we could eat!"
"It was some of the best frozen General Tso's I have ever had though, mostly because I was hungry enough to eat my own arm!"
—Allison Hanson, Facebook
4. "Not taking engagement pictures beforehand. My husband and I felt we really didn't need them, so we skipped them to save money. But on our wedding day, my husband had a hard time getting comfortable in front of the camera. An engagement shoot might have helped with that."
5. "I wish I had shopped around more. I was so excited that I had to have everything right away, so I didn't carefully weigh other options. For example, I really wanted a long-sleeved dress but settled for sleeveless because I was just excited to find a dress.
6. "I wish my husband and I had taken dance lessons beforehand. We are both awkward, so just walking out onto the floor and trying to dance in front of everyone we know was weird. We couldn't even finish the song."
—Amanda Nelson, Facebook
7. "If I could do it again, I would have limited my wedding party to two glasses of champagne and no hard liquor. My maid of honor was drunk at the ceremony and plastered by the reception, and I had to worry about her all day and night, instead of focusing on myself and my husband on our day."
—Kels Marie, Facebook
8. "I regret not splurging for a second photographer. I wish we could have seen what the groom and company were doing while we girls got our hair and makeup done."
—Holly Taylor-Vrhel, Facebook
9. "Inviting certain people just so we didn't offend them, only to have them show us exactly why we didn't want to invite them."
10. "Wearing white! I hate how I look in white, so I was so uncomfortable, and I felt like a giant marshmallow all evening."
11. "I wish we'd waited a day before leaving for our honeymoon — we left at four o'clock in the morning the following day to catch a flight, and everything moved so fast that it took until the middle of the next week for it to hit us that we were actually married and on our honeymoon."
—Shay Cagle, Facebook
12. "I wish I'd worn a veil. I was young, and I wanted to ditch at least one tradition, but now I see how beautiful a veil would have looked."
—Alina QG, Facebook
13. "I wear glasses 365 days a year. But I decided to wear contacts the day of our ceremony, and they were itchy and gave me a migraine. I should've just worn my glasses — my husband likes me more with them anyway."
14. "I wish I'd anticipated that people would just not show up or cancel at the last minute. At $60 a plate, we lost hundreds of dollars because so many people didn't show up."
—Melissa Berry, Facebook
15. "Choosing my maid of honor based on a promise I made with my childhood friend to be maid of honor at each other's wedding."
16. "We found our photographer on Craigslist. We were on a budget, her portfolio looked good enough, and she gave us a great deal, but she absolutely ruined our wedding photos."
"Our formal photos were taken from so far away that we could barely zoom in enough to frame them, she didn't understand light, and half of every photo was the ceiling! We regret not splurging on one of the things that actually last past the wedding day."
17. "I wish I had chosen my wedding hairstyle according to the weather — not the cut of the dress, the shape of my face, or anything in any of the articles online. I was married outside on a foggy, cold day, and while I walked out of my bridal suite with beautiful, polished boho waves, I looked like a wet dog 30 minutes later."
18. "I wish we hadn't DIY'd so much. Yeah, we saved money, but it kind of sucked to have to run around cleaning up in my wedding dress after our reception instead of hanging out with my husband."
19. "I would have had my photo booth stationed inside the reception room. Ours was in the hall outside of the room, so everyone lined up for the booth, leaving hardly anyone on the dance floor!"
"If had been in the room, people would have been able to see when it was available from the dance floor."
—Brittany Palm, Facebook
20. "I wish we hadn't done the stupid cake-face-smash thing to each other. In the moment, it was fun and everyone laughed, but pretty much the next day, I already wished we hadn't. Ugh at us."
21. "I assumed the church organist knew how to play without hearing her first. I was so wrong. There were so many wrong notes played that I clench my teeth whenever I watch the video."
22. "I wish I had chosen a dress less tight and rigid so I could eat more of our food. I just couldn't fit it in!"
23. "I wish I didn't have a wedding. Don't get me wrong, I don't regret getting married — I just regret the wedding because it wasn't what we wanted. We spent all this money to throw a wedding for everyone else, and I wish we had just eloped like we wanted to."
"I let the guilt of not inviting my family overrule what I actually wanted, which was to just spend the whole day with my best friend — my husband — and splurge on the honeymoon."
24. "I regret staying in a separate place from my husband the night before our wedding. We had already been living together for three years, and being apart created so much unnecessary anxiety."
25. "I really wish I had actually stopped to enjoy the night. I was so concerned with making sure everything turned out exactly as I envisioned that I barely got to eat dinner, barely spoke to anyone, and didn't even get to try my cake until the next day!"
26. "I wish I hadn't let me mom talk me into having my hair styled and curled differently than I usually wear it — I don't even recognize myself in the pictures."
—Melissa Lowe, Facebook
27. "Expecting it to be the best day of my life. It wasn't, and that's OK."
"If my husband and I hadn't experienced a better day since that, that would suck."
28. "Drinking too much during our reception — my husband and I spent our first night as a married couple on the hotel bathroom floor, sharing the toilet."
29. "I was so worried I wouldn't be able to enjoy my reception and dance that I made sure I was on the dance floor at all times. I regret it because I wasn't able to talk to all of my guests, take pictures with people, or even use our photo booth."
"I wish I had spent time walking around talking to people instead of just dancing the whole time."
30. "I regret hiring friends as vendors. I had received the advice not to work with friends so many times, but thought, Nah — my friends are professionals. Well, all of the vendors I had issues with were friends. And it was really awkward to confront them after my wedding, especially when I needed to ask one of them for a refund."
31. "Not having the ceremony in the morning. If we had, we wouldn't have had to rush through the photos because we were losing natural light."
32. "I wish we had a receiving line after the ceremony. We ended up spending so much of our reception greeting people instead of doing what we really wanted."
33. "I wish we hadn't worried so much about the little things. Maybe we didn't have our 'dream wedding,' but at the end of the day, we're married and starting our family together. I recently reminded my husband how everything went wrong on our wedding day, and he said, 'It was the best day of my life.'"
Now that we've heard the things you would have done differently, tell us the thing you did at your wedding that you don't regret and why. Whether it was sticking to a tradition some would call 'boring' or trying something unique or unusual, we want to hear about it! Tell us (or show us!) in the comments section, and you could be featured in an upcoming BuzzFeed Community post!
Note: Some responses were edited for length and clarity.