The Wedding Planning Roller Coaster

It’s been 6 weeks since I became engaged. There are 9 weeks and two days until I get married, and what a journey it has thus been.

What began as a bit of bumpy, albeit sometimes scary, ride has turned into the most stunning, breathtaking, miraculous quest I’ve ever endeavored.

When we became engaged on Labour Day weekend, I knew we only had 3-4 weeks until the High Holy Days, which would halt most, if not all, wedding planning. It should because our focus should be on Hashem during that time, not ourselves, even if it’s something as significant and life-changing as getting married.

During this time, too, our rabbi and rebbetzin were in Israel leading a study tour scheduled to return only 5 days before Rosh Hashanah. Five. Days. We didn’t know if we could meet with them briefly before either. In the interim, we had to plan what we could without them. That was an tiny list.

Thus, between getting as much achieved or planned before Rosh Hashanah as possible whilst also being extremely limited to what we could plan without our rabbi or rebbetzin, our first 4 weeks of being engaged, were as I said, bumpy.

I constantly felt frantic, sometimes stressed, and I unfortunately succumbed to the tyranny of the urgent in those first weeks, which did not allow me to enjoy being engaged. I know because my fiance, not one week after he proposed, confronted me saying, “Can’t you just let me enjoy being engaged to you for one week?!” Admonished, I relinquished my urgency, but unfortunately that’s when the existentialism kicked in full force.

My life started flashing before my eyes as I surveyed the scope of the horizon before me, of changing my last name and taking on a new identity as the wife of this man I’ve helplessly fallen madly in love with, and I’m reluctant to admit: it scared me.

I didn’t want to “leave my family behind” to start a new family. I felt as though I had just won them back from the tragedies of my youth, and now I was being asked to give them away again? B”H for my fiance who understands me, and knew why this dawning realisation caused such inner turmoil for me, who knows my sometimes unyielding aversion to change, who exercises sagacious patience with me when I’m acting like a child.

As I wrestled with this impending change, I became an emotional wreck who only fought with the family I felt so desperate to cling to. Struggling with my feelings created confusion, distress, and misunderstandings, and I caused it.

B”H it was Elul, a time for searching the deep recesses of my soul, a time of preparation for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. Why? Because it spoke truth into my woes, redefining my struggles.

In Judaism, your wedding day is likened to your own personalised version of Yom Kippur. You fast and pray all day to prepare your soul for taking on the vows of eternal, covenantal commitment that is marriage, for becoming a new person. Thus, this year as I prepared my soul for the actual day of Yom Kippur, my perspective was entirely different than ever before.

I knew I needed to let go because Hashem wanted me to be free. Only then could He use me as a vessel for creating His glory within the bounds of my marriage. I need to create room for Him to use me.

This did not mean what I feared was true: that I loved my family less, that I would lose them, etc. It meant I needed to entrust them to Hashem now so I could focus on my coming new life instead. Such trust did not negate my past nor disqualify their involvement from my future. It merely ensured it.

The next big hurdle we faced came when our rabbi and rebbetzin returned from Israel. It felt worse.

Our rabbi returned sick and injured, then our rebbetzin broke her knee, we thought, as she tried helping up her fallen elderly mother, who died a week later on the Friday before Yom Kippur.

Yeah; that all really did happen to our rabbi’s family.

This made Yom Kippur excruciating on one hand, and seemingly effortless on the other hand.

Unfortunately for us, my fiance and I did not know how this affected our future wedding planning, how much we may need to do without them now their lives had been complicated in the midst of the Days of Awe.

Then last weekend began Sukkot, a time of joy and celebration.

Last weekend, I also had a massive angry cry as an extremely disgruntled bride beseeching Hashem to do something.

What did He do? Well…

1. Our rebbetzin found out she does not need surgery, B”H, and returned to shul, which she then reached out to us to meet to discuss wedding plans.
2. On Wednesday, I sat in my car eating lunch on the roof of the KC Library parking lot, and after looking online all morning for a beautiful but affordable photographer, begged Hashem to send us a photographer. Not 10 minutes later, a group of people walked out onto the roof, and it was none other than a couple getting their engagement photos taken. I interrupted like some creepy but mortifyingly awkward stalker in my car and got the photographers information. My dignity was a price worth paying if she was any good, and I think so!
3. (Not “lastly” because our quest to get married certainly isn’t over yet) we ordered our wedding rings last night, and this store in Jerusalem where we bought them has what they call a “sunrise sale,” which means if you’re their first customer of the day, the most expensive item you purchase is 50% off. They have a countdown on their website for online customers. Needless to say, WE WON! Now we have the extra money we can order our ketubah sooner than anticipated!

If that’s what the first 6 weeks of being engaged has been, I can’t wait to see what Hashem is going to do with the final 9 weeks He has.

I still wake up every morning and pinch myself because in only a few weeks, I’ll begin waking up to someone lying next to me for the rest of my life.

I can’t believe it!

There’s a reason my fiance and I chose to be married during Chanukkah, and it’s for stories like ours: that even in the midst of darkness, there is still light. No matter how small, it creates something beautiful, dispelling the darkness with its radiance. That no matter how bleak life may seem, Hashem is still near and still creates miracles for you and me.

I’m living my own miracle, and I can’t tell you how many happy, wonderful tears are being shed as I pause to watch Hashem write this story, as I watch it unfold around me. It’s incredulous, unfathomable, and makes me fall in love with not only my fiance more, but Hashem. He’s indescribable to me.

Thus, whatever challenges or darkness you may be facing, remember, Hashem hears our voices when we plea to Him, and sometimes all we need is to simply turn on the light.

Shabbat Shalom!