Wedding Planning Stress: Advice for Newly Engaged Couples in 2025
Did you enter the New Year adding Fiancée to your bio? If so, congratulations to you and your partner on your engagement! I am sure you have been catapulted into a whirlwind of engaged bliss, from engagement parties, to extra special vacations, with all your family, friends (and even strangers!) asking you a million and one questions about your big day! You have dreamt of this exact moment for so long and now it is finally here, with one small catch…the wedding planning Excel Spreadsheet is looming around your living room corner, watching your every move as your actively try to ignore the impending administration adventure of a lifetime and you aren’t quite sure how to even approach it. It’s okay, that is perfectly normal, and this is a judge free zone, so, this blog post is exactly what you need to empower you as a couple, providing you a stress-free strategy to kickstart your wedding planning journey!
Let’s just take a brief moment to break down some statistics for you, to demonstrate how normalised feeling the pinch of balancing your time can be for many newly engaged couples. Accordingly to a 2023 Zola Survey, more than 52% of polled respondents described their wedding planning experience as “stressful”, with another 59% claiming their experiences were “overwhelming”. With only 6% of the polled population revealing that they didn’t experience heightened anxiety or stress around their big day, that left a shocking 94% of the population feeling stressed, confused and overwhelmed curating their vision for their wedding day.
From balancing your budget sheets to ensure supplier costs and payment schedules are adhered to, crafting your ultimate guest list (sorry Aunt Karen, but your neighbour from 50 years ago isn’t invited), selecting your breathtaking gowns and wedding attire to meeting societal expectations forged on social media. Hold up, you also have to maintain your social life, family relationships, your full-time job, nourishing the relationship you have with yourself and remember to feed the dog. Add wedding planning on top of your busy lifestyle and it can quickly feel like an impossible task at times. Stress in small doses is a normal, and even necessary (yet uncomfortable) byproduct of the inevitable big changes in your life.
Before you let the stress of wedding planning get insurmountable, whereby this beautiful experience is now one which you resent, there are easy, effective and proven methods to help calm your nerves and allow the planning experience to become a joyous affair.
Credit: Unknown
Focus on Your Priorities
Before you get stuck down the Alice in Wonderland sized wedding sinkhole, worrying about minute details from flatware choices, to stationary paper selections, focus on priorisiting your non-negotiable elements. Centre yourselves and find your grounding in this new journey. Getting engaged is a once-in-a-lifetime experience that will alter the fundamentals and dynamics of your relationship forever (in a positive way, I promise!). The one piece of advice which I will always share is: Do only what brings you joy on your wedding day. Not your mum’s vision, or your best friend’s ultimate wedding day. What is it that brings both of you, as a couple, JOY? Throughout the planning process, hold yourselves to account by continuously referring back to your non-negotiable list, to ensure you stay on track, remain focused on the task you have delegated yourself for the week and finally, remain true to your vision and budget. By setting the stage for success at the beginning of your journey, you will avoid significant stressors down the line, as you will have remained true to your own unique priorities, principles and values.
Break Down the Process
Break the process down into manageable bite sized chunks, like you did during your GCSE History Exams. If you attempt to tackle all of your tasks head on, at the same time, you will swiftly begin to feel overwhelmed, confused and burnout. I personally advise my couples to designate one hour a day, or selecting one day of the week if this is more feasible, to tackling whichever weekly task you have appointed yourselves. Breaking the tasks up into more manageable pieces will help you feel less overwhelmed. Remember to take regular breaks to increase your productivity!
Create a Plan B
In a previous life, before I swan dived beautifully into the wedding industry, I worked within the UK Defence Sphere. A saying which is synonymous with anyone in the Services is “no plan survives first contact”. Reality is, this can be applied to almost any scenario in your life, outside of an active war zone. Regardless of how structured your planning binder is, or how meticulous your timelines are, there will always be a situation(s) beyond your control. Your celebrant’s car couldn’t start that morning of your wedding, so they are now running late, or your own vintage vehicle to transport you to your chosen wedding venue is now caught in traffic. Life happens, and unfortunately it doesn’t stop for your wedding day.
To alleviate your anxiety and stress around unforeseen circumstances, prepare yourself for “first contact”, strategically planning for a worse-case scenario. Have your Plan B, and even have a Plan C to help you sleep leading up to your big day! I also recommend having another designated point of contact to communicate instructions on your wedding day, should anything unexpected occur. If anticipation of your wedding day is only exacerbating your stress levels, letting go of your fixation to meddle with the outcome, and learning to accept whatever happens, happens, will give you peace of mind. It really can be that simple; however, it is one of the most difficult concepts for the human brain to accept. In the words of Mark Manson, renowned author of ‘The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F**k’, “Stop chasing outcomes. Let go of things beyond your control. Find your inner peace”.
Establish an Open Line of Communication
Family. We all have them. Sometimes they can bring us immense joy and other times keeping everyone happy when everyone thinks they have the most important opinion can be incredibly stressful. This statement is especially true, and incredibly common, when you are planning your own wedding. As family members, from parents to in-laws, kindly start to offer their hard earned cash to fund some of (or all) of your wedding, the decision-making process swiftly becomes intricate and complex. To prevent an arguement or resentment brewing silently in the background, I am an advocate for getting all of your thoughts, opinions and expectations out in the open from the beginning of your planning journey, to avoid confusion, misinterpretations of visions or ideas. Have an open, honest and maybe a little bit of an uncomfortable conversation to create strong boundaries which aligns to your relationship needs.
Allow your family members to discuss their priorities, ensuring that you listen to their thoughts in a judgement free zone, whilst maintaining your own boundaries and non-negotiable’s you selected in Step One. We like the judgement free zone around here! Then, find ways to compromise. It sounds really simple in theory, but I know it isn’t always so simple in practice. Getting both sides of the newly extended family to play for the same team from the beginning is a simplistic strategy to ensuring a smooth wedding planning journey from “Will You?” to “I Do”. Talking through expectations, rather than allowing assumptions and miscommunication to fester almost certainly alleviates the stress you’re anticipating!
Choose the Right Support System
Your vibe attracts your tribe. You have heard this saying before, and maybe more than once. Maybe, just maybe, there is some truth to it. So, this is what I think..the beautiful people with whom you choose to surround yourself with on the lead up to, and on, your wedding day will make or break how joyous your experiences will be. You want to choose a wedding party that will be there for you, through thick and thin, who will support you and your best interests whilst having the compassion to understand, listen and truly hear your feelings and concerns. Your ride or die. When you begin to feel stressed or anxious, which you will, (remember, we are exploring methods to reduce stress, but you will learn to embrace feeling comfortable, whilst being uncomfortable), you will want to feel that you have a safe space amongst your wedding party and support network, that you can turn to them for help.
Wedding Planner’s - We Love Them
You are a busy professional. You are balancing family responsibilities, personal relationships, your own well-being, on top of your full-time jobs. You are time-poor and you know that your priorities are off-centered attempting to balance wedding planning with your demanding lifestyle. Wedding planning is an enormous challenge and commitment to plan on your own. We get it. I get it. Judgement free zone, remember? A wedding planner is a strategic investment, both financially but also for improving your time affluence.
Hiring your full service wedding planner will alleviate the wedding stress, and allow you to prioritise your time and energy into enjoying the wedding planning experience. From guiding your non-negotiable’s list we touched on previously, to bringing to life your values, vision and aesthetic in every detail of your wedding day, to selecting and contracting your A Team of suppliers, your wedding planner affords you the luxury of finding time to manage your busy lifestyle alongside enjoying the beauty of your wedding experience.
If hiring a full-service planner isn’t for you, there are a plethora of options amongst the wedding planning community who offer bespoke packages, tailored to your specific and unique requirements. From Event Management (typically called Month of / Day of Coordinators), to Design Management, or Timeline Management, the beauty of the wedding planning industry is that you will always find an individual, with a business model / offering that works exactly for your needs. Investing in a wedding planner will provide you the return of the peace of mind you have been searching for in this entire blog!
Set Aside Time for Self Care
Remember to date yourself. Date yourself stressed. Date yourself confused. Date yourself happy. No matter what, promising yourself that you will make time for your well-being and inner child is critical to finding your balance as you navigate through your wedding planning experience. We all have something in life that we enjoy, whether that is taking your favourite gym class, booking a massage, drawing a bubble bath or trying a new hot drink at your local cafe. Find an activity which you not only enjoy but that you know will decrease your stress levels! I hate to be the bearer of a reality check so deep in this blog, but, to actually reap any therapeutic and stress reduction benefits, you need to be present whilst you engage in improving your well-being. Consistency with curating rituals in your weekly well-being check-ins will become your new go-to, as your chosen activities that you do for stress reduction, will also act as a preventative to improve your coping mechanisms when stressful situations do arise. Self-care is not a one-time thing. This isn’t your spin class membership!
Continue to Date Your Partner
Getting carried away with focusing on the wedding planning stress without remaining grounded together, in a united front, can result in a disconnect of partners, which in turn can exacerbate tensions and stress. When this feeling of disconnect occurs, pause for one second and remind each other of the reasons why your wedding day is happening: because you both get to commit to the promise of loving your partner for the rest of your lives.
Prioritise spending quality time together, outside of wedding planning activities and routine activities, so you can continue to maintain and build your meaningful connections together. Find a book club, attend a cooking class to destress in the excitement of the kitchen, or go for a hike to see a beautiful sunset. Remember that you both love each other, and this special event is only happening because of your love. Celebrate your Cosmic encounter and don’t take each other for granted! When the wedding day ends, the excitement and celebrations cease, it will be just you two beginning your journey in marriage, for many years to come! Take the time before your marriage to talk about growing your relationship together in marriage, making those baby steps forward in growing together before your big day. These talks don’t have to be intense, or overwhelming, you have enough on your plate by now; but, remain vigilant in prioritising each other and your future throughout the planning experience!
So, there you have it. Wedding planning stress is now wedding planning bliss for you and your partner! Stress is an important element in getting your wedding planning tasks done, just not in large doses. By harnessing your anxious energy and prioritising your planning tasks into manageable goals, it is just down to how you navigate the balance of working to prioritise versus working in a blind panic. It always sounds really simple in theory! Practice, practice, practice your preventative strategies to reducing stress both in yourself and in your relationship with your fiancée, and if you are time-poor, struggling to balance your busy schedule with the rising demands of a picture-perfect Instagram influencer wedding day, lost in the darkness of your next steps, I would love to have a chat with you (here) and discuss our next steps to bringing your unique aesthetic and vision to your wedding day!
Bíodh lá Beannaichte Agat,
Madeline x