What My Bridal Shower Taught Me

This past weekend, I was showered with so much love from my new family, my mum, who came all the way from Australia (and helped us SO MUCH for the last 3 weeks with cooking, organising, interior design (she did my NYC apartment and has fully done this house), and wedding things), and new friends in Atlanta.

In my wedding Q+A, I discuss this more ... but this journey leading up to the wedding has truly put me IN a portal. I'm shedding one part of myself as I go into this new chapter of my life. It's that feeling of an ego death constantly (if you know, you know).

Before my Sydney Bachelorette with my longest friends, I was quite emotional, and I felt the same this past weekend for different reasons....

Many of us base our 'wedding journey' on what we see others have and on social media. Best friends celebrating all together, whole weekends for bachelorette trips, bridal showers with your lifelong friends. It can make you unconsciously compare what you're missing out on (even though you're still fortunate enough to have a bridal shower, etc.) because, at the end of the day, this is a VERY special (and emotional) time of our lives!!

Whilst it may look like our wedding journey is perfect, it's been far from that. True colours in friends are shown. I'm not able to have all my friends in one place (hence two bachelorettes), and none of my best friends were at my bridal shower. (I'm not being a victim here; this is just real talk for the other brides.) 

Instead of thinking that the journey to getting married has to be one way, you need to be flexible with it being YOUR way. 

I truly believe that we get to have it all, but just not at once. And you do sometimes have to pick and choose. I chose to leave Australia, so it means that I don't always get what others have, and THAT'S OKAY!!!! 

I get to have my best friends with me for our wedding weekend, and that's the most important thing for me. Yes, it's a bummer I didn't get to have that bridal shower that others have, BUTTT I also had a room full of women I don't know who were making time for ME. 

That's what really got me .... that all these women that, in the grand scheme of things, don't know me that well, spent their Saturday afternoon away from themselves, their children, and their long ass to-do list to come and celebrate me. 

So, whilst your bridal journey may not look like others, I know there are plenty of things to be eternally grateful for if you can RECEIVE the love around you. 

Something I've had to learn to be okay with is not having this perfect friendship circle. My friends are scattered everywhere, and they can't all come to these events. Instead of being bitter about it, I've accepted that it's just part of reality and part of the dream life I signed up for. 

For those of you who are finding that your uplevel is lonely sometimes, I get it. 

AND, there are plenty of people out there who want to be your friend ... you just have to put in the effort. 

For all of my new Atlanta friends that came this weekend, you have no idea how much it meant to me ♥️