Why does he not participte in the planning of our wedding?

Let's face it ladies, you probably are getting upset at your grooms lack of interest in the wedding planning. I don't want to get into premarital counseling, or even to defend the male population, but I would like to clear two points of where some of this may be coming from before I offer up a suggestion on how to involve the groom in the planning of the biggest day of your lives so far.

My first point is: Weddings are not marketed to guys, other than to say "it is the biggest day of her life, so make her happy." The mainstream pressure of society takes all of the glory of the wedding and places it firmly of the bride. Brides wear the gown, which will never be worn again, carry flowers down the aisle to show fertility, and the guy wears the same Tuxedo that he wears to all black tie events. As where the bride will spend all day getting ready for the entrance, the groom, waits around for the wedding to begin, guys typically will just get a haircut before the wedding day, but often fore go the manicure and pedicure as they are wearing close toed shows and everyone is looking at the bride. At a recent wedding, I was waiting with the groomsmen, who were quite young and had never heard that they were wearing the same as the groom in case of fainting. The joke is that if the groom faints, the groomsmen all take one step closer to the bride, and we have another groom to proceed on with the wedding. My point is that the groom will often be pushed closer to the background than to the spotlight so why should he bother with the planning.

Secondly: The groom just started thinking about his wedding day since he gave you the ring, and his interests are more in the honeymoon afterwards. Your groom is a man of action, standing in one place for a few minutes does not inspire much. Brides on the other hand, were once girls whom have been inundated by thoughts and dreams of their wedding day since they could walk. And every wedding that a bride to be (even if she did not know she was going to get married because she was 7) or her mother has taken what they each liked from the wedding and molded it into their dream wedding. Some brides want a big event, some have pictured a small intimate beach or other wedding, your dream wedding may change as you mature and your priorities in life change, but most women have a dream wedding. Now men being the good little dutiful providers and men of action that they are know this and say, "she gets what she wants, just give me my portion of the bill, and I'll worry about paying it." After all, he has no etched in stone idea of his wedding like the bride does, or the mother of the bride, so why should he fight for something that he will ultimately lose on.- I can speak from experience here as I was this person, I assigned my wife to all, or resigned myself from making any decisions about my wedding, I don't even think I picked out my tux. I knew that I would not get my way, so why should I put forth the energy.

So how do you get him to participate: Be open to his suggestions and even use some of his ideas, if you take him to look at flowers and he is looking at freeway daisies, you may have to surprise him and use them somewhere. It is his wedding day too. To get him to make some decisions about your wedding that truly are his, though you will need to have him start before the wedding planning if you run the show. Eat where he likes, nix the chick flick a few times for adventure movies, and go play golf or pool. Marriage is about give and take, and you should suck up a few bad dates to get what is really important, beside once you get married, you will rule anyway right? If you don't accept his ideas before the planning, he will just play it safe and give you what you want, or what he thinks you want.
Give the groom some areas that he is responsible for; the location for the reception, the DJ, the entire reception, may be not all at once, he may need to make the decisions in steps, but let him know what your needs are and then go with his choice, this will be relieve you of some of the stress, and will build a strong foundation for the marital relationship, where you both can give input and not fear resentment. If the groom make some of the decisions and sees that you will let him speak freely and if he chooses something, it will be strongly considered, when it come time to pick vows or wording for the ceremony, you will have his input. If you don't trust the grooms style decisions because he only can match a white shirt to a suit, then I recommend have him get no more than 3 final choices and you both select from the three over a conversation.

Planning a wedding is a lot of work, and whether you are working, raising a child, going to school, or searching for employment there is not enough time to plan your wedding on your own. You need help, and you need to delegate things out to anyone who will help you. I recommend that brides start with their fiancee as he needs to be there and look happy in the pictures.

Have a great New Year's.
Rev. Nick Metz