I'm glad he waited... my wedding report from 7th August 2010

How it all started...

When everyone said I would find my soulmate when I stopped looking, I didn't quite believe them. But what could be more perfect than a pimp and a bunny girl at a chance meeting out Student Union night out?

Bristol wasn't the first choice for uni for either of us, in fact it was a second choice. But I believe it was fate that brought us both to Bristol where we were to meet, fall in love and is where our story begins.

I'm glad that you waited...

I was in my third year at university in Bristol, moving into my fourth and final year desperate to fill my rapidly emptying house due to my friends being on 3 year courses (I'll come back to them later). Unfortunately for me I wasn't having much luck until I came across a poster on the uni accommodation forum who was looking for a room.

I sent a brief message, explaining the virtues of the house I was living in and luckily I got a brief but cheeky reply. The room never worked out, as someone else viewed and took it before P had the chance to see the room. But we kept in contact under the pretence of seeing how the room hunting was going.

By chance the following weekend it was P's birthday, and he was celebrating in style at the Student Union weekly Friday theme night - there had been emergency services, pyjama parties but this week it was the %&*$# Party!

Suitably dressed in my finest bunny outfit, and the party already in full swing. I was looking forward to putting a face to the name and witty banter. Unfortunately by the time that happened I had already had a few drinks, but P persevered. As the gentleman that he is, P offered to buy me a drink and I disappeared off to the loo to check that I looked ok...

As usual, there was a massive queue in the ladies, I saw a few friends, had a quick chat thinking that I hadn't been too long. With a new coat of lipgloss and butterflies in my tummy I emerged from the toilet and decided I had better check my phone noticing the time was almost an hour and a half later than it was went I went in!

Suddenly I didn't just have butterflies, I now felt sick - I'd definitely missed my chance there was no way P would have waited that long for a girl he had only just met.

As I looked around I saw that P was not in the spot that I had left him in, he assumed that I had taken one look and left as soon as possible, but it wasn't the case. Instead I found him sitting quietly at a table with an almost finished Vodka and Orange in his hand - which was suppose to be my drink. He told me that he had decided to wait until he had finished the drinks before he was going to give up and leave. So I think I was pretty lucky as it turned out there was quite a long queue at the bar, but he was still there...and I was so glad that he waited!

From that night on we were together, we were honest with each other early on with what we wanted from each other and where we wanted to go.

P moved into my room in my shared uni house a few months later - so he did get to live there in the end, but it was far from ideal. So we moved onto find out first little love nest together a little one bedroom flat not far from the university, a perfect little flat for two!

Soon university was finishing and we were moving from the student life to working life and so another move was on the cards. This time two a two bedroom rented house, it was quickly turning into domestic bliss. Coming home from work to relax in our little garden or snuggle on the sofa. And it was in this house that P made his proposal.

After several conversations about where our future was headed would we buy a house, would we get married. We both discovered the marriage was a high priority for both of us. With lots of talk of weddings due to one of my best friends getting engaged, we started looking in jewellery shop windows but not wanting to get my hopes up too much, I put it to the back of my mind.

It took P almost 6 weeks between buying the ring and when he actually proposed. I had a sneaking suspicion that he had already bought a ring and a trip to Athens for a family wedding seemed the perfect opportunity on the roof top terrace of our hotel.



The ring had travelled all the way to Athens with us, but it wasn't here that P made his proposal. P finally made his proposal on 28th August 2007 after a home cooked romantic meal of Green Thai Curry in our front room and I couldn't have been happier.

It was then that the planning started...

The date was set for 3 years time. We celebrated our engagement with friends at the Avon Gorge in Clifton, toasting our engagement whilst overlooking the sparkly night lights from the Suspension Bridge.



Our families were pleased, but with 3 years to plan the wedding there was no immediate talk of the details other than setting the date for Saturday 7th August. But it was definitely a shock that after only 3 months of being engaged I found my perfect dress. After going to the National Wedding Fair at the NEC in Birmingham as support for my friend who was getting married in the following summer, the last thing I expected was to leave with my wedding dress!

It was the first and only dress that I ever tried on and it was perfect. A beautiful limited edition Maggie Sottero couture gown called Marcelle, in diamond white, an A-line, Rhapsody Taffeta gown featuring a sweetheart portrait neckline and corset back. The neckline is dramatically embellished with bugle beads, glass beads, crystals, and pearls. The bodice pleats cross asymmetrically and a beaded brooch accents the side waist. The skirt features a fluted overlay.It also had a cathedral length train.

After the dress other decisions soon followed. We decided to get married in Bristol, it was neither of our home towns but after meeting here at uni and we soon decided we wanted to make it our our permanent home and bought our first house together, everything seems to be going so well until P started to feel unwell

P couldn't sleep due to pains he was experiencing in his back. Over a period of about 6 months wedding planning obviously went on the back burner whilst we tried to work out what was causing the pains.

After 10 months different scan, specialist assessments, blood tests, more scans and private hospital referrals as we didn't seem to be getting very far. P was deteriorating more and more only averaging about two hours sleep a night due to the pain.

A diagnosis was finally made, P had Ankylosing Spondylitis (AS) which a debilitating auto immune disease affecting all the major joints in his body, it made P feel really down with him expressing thoughts about him now not being good enough for me and not being able to give me the future we had discussed - but nothing was going to stop us. 6 months later after P had tried several different types of anti inflammatory, he was put forward for some new treatment - humira a biological Anti TNF drug that he would have to inject himself with every fortnight.

After numerous more assessments and measurements he was put forward for a new treatment. The only down side was that it was relatively untested with no long term studies on the effects and which eventually the body could reject, or due to the expense of injections around £250 each one, treatment maybe stopped if funding was to run out. Fortunately it is still working and treatment is continuing and so we began to look to the future and continued planning our wedding once more.

What a fab report, can't wait to read the rest!

And so the wedding planning continued..

As we had already set the date when we got engaged, we still had over a year to plan before the big day. I had already asked my best friends if they would be my bridesmaids and fortunately received a resounding 'yes' from my 3 best friends, we also asked P's sister to be a bridesmaid too.

My 3 best friends and I looking gorgeous!


So on with planning, we started looking for venues, armed with several hundred wedding magazines - well not quite that many, but you know what I mean, I started looking at all the different options for the various aspects of the wedding, moving from being a lurker on YAYW to posting more regularly and asking other marrieds and b2bs their opinions on my wedding planning.

Suddenly the wedding was creeping closer and closer with hen night and stag nights being organised and all the final details being taken care of.

Rehearsal...

Now on to the night before the wedding, it still wasn't feeling real, although I was running around doing jobs almost every day in the week leading up to the wedding, it still felt like any other school holiday with me doing wedding jobs.

We had our rehearsal at the church and everyone kept telling me how excited they were, but it all still just felt surreal to me.



We ran through our vows, how we would have to stand and where and what time, it was only when our readings were practised that I became a bit tearful and so I knew this is where I had to hold it together during the ceremony. Our readings were going to be Genesis 2:18 and On Your Wedding Day by Anon:

Today is a day you will always remember
The greatest in anyone’s life
You’ll start off the day just two people in love
And end it as Husband and Wife

It’s a brand new beginning the start of a journey
With moments to cherish and treasure
And although there’ll be time when you both disagree
These will surely be outweighed by pleasure

You’ll have heard many words of advice in the past
When the secrets of marriage were spoken
But you know that the answers lie hidden inside
Where the bond of tru love lies unbroken

So live happy forever as lovers and friends
It’s the dawn of a new life for you
As you stand there together with love in your eyes
From the moment you whisper ‘I do’

And with luck, all your hopes, and your dreams can be real
May success find its way to your hearts
Tomorrow can bring you the greatest of joys
But today is the day it all starts.

After the rehearsal everyone had come went out for dinner which enabled those that didn't already know each other to get to know each other a bit better. It all got a bit much afterwards for me as we ended up with over 20 people coming back to our house, it all got a bit too over whelming for me and I just needed some space and time with my Mum, Dad and my chief bridesmaid. So after a tearful goodbye, P left our house to go and stay the night with his best man.

I stayed up with my chief bridesmaids talking and getting things tidied or ready for the next day, she had been back to America in between the hen do do and the wedding so we had lots to still catch up on! And just after 1 o'clock I managed to fall asleep after reading a bit of Twlight (which I've read several times before, but was a bit of a comfort read lol). Here's us the night before:

I woke up around half 7 but forced myself to go back to sleep, but I couldn't so after laying awake for about half an hour I finally went downstairs and from then on it was all go! My hair and make up lady arrived at 9 am, it was bridesmaids first, then my Mum and finally me, we had a few mishaps - one of my bridesmaids set my grill alight whilst trying to heat up some croissants and my chief bridesmaid put her foot through one of our floorboards - we have a Victorian terrace and it was original flooring, whilst trying on her shoes. But we all seemed to get ready just about on time with me leaving the house roughly on time.

My arrival...

Finally at ten past one, the house was pretty much empty with just my Mum, Dad and myself left in the house. I started to get very nervous waiting for the car to come back after dropping the bridesmaids at the church.

My mum took some last minute photos, then the car was back and we were in the car on our way to the church!


The boys patiently waiting for my arrival



There had been some rain over the course of the morning, but it seemed to have briefly stopped as we travelled to the church, as we arrived it turned out that some of my family, in particular my Grandma had got caught in bad traffic and were not there yet. So we had arrived on time, but waited outside of the church. My Grandma had only told us she was able to come the week before due to her ill health and my Granddad being in a home due to having dementia so it was important that to me that we waited for her to arrive. Once all the guests were inside, it was my turn, it started raining a little so we got inside as quickly as we could.

The ceremony...

As soon as the ceremony started all my nerves were forgotten, as I walked down the aisle, all I could focus on was getting to the end to meet my groom.



P had already told me that he wasn't going to turn and look until I was at his side, and he didn't!