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I had a doctor’s appointment last Tuesday. Thankfully, I was put on new birth control (the new chewable kind, Femcon Fe), and also given a new prescription for something else… anti-anxiety medication. I assume everyone who ever knew me is thinking they were right: I do in fact need medical attention. 
Anyway, I’ve had a hideous case of hives on my chest for at least a few months. It’s disgusting, really. So I’ve been stressing and worrying about my gross chest, possibly scarring and not looking pretty in my dress… I’ve also worried about money, family crap and everything else. So, I have been prescribed anxiety meds to be taken only at night, as they make me slur my speech and get all woozy. To all my friends, if you receive an email after 10pm, I’m on my meds, and that’s why it doesn’t make sense.
Anyway, so far no sign of the rash clearing, but I am sleeping very well! What’s the deal with pre-wedding ailments? Mrs. Bluebell and her ulcerative colitis, me and my hivey anxiety… What the hell, man?? It’s a scam, I tell you. The wedding industry and the pharmaceutical companies are getting together. Much like the greeting card people and the holiday makers! It’s all a conspiracy!!!!!!!!!!
you know my aunt planned her wedding in two months (in order to make a date that was family tradition to marry on) and she got *very* sick on her honeymoon.
the doctor said it was due to stress. (even though she said she thought she wasnt stressed and had it all under control)
its a real problem, i agree with you. a little nuts, eh? that planning the happiest day of your life can stress you out so much!
Thanks for sharing Miss Kiwi. Your post gave me strength bc I’m finally going to see someone today about my anxiety. I’ve struggled with it for years and wedding planning seems to have brought out the worst in it. I’m finally seeking help so thanks for your post– definitely gave me some comfort that I’m not alone.
My wedding is in a month and I woke up yesterday with half my face completely swollen due to teeth problems. I am having 2 root canals tomorrow. Ick! I guess the good thing is to get it out of the way now instead of looking like a squirrel on my wedding day!
My sister came down with Bell’s Palsy a few months before her wedding… it’s partial facial paralysis!!! Her wedding portraits show a crooked smile, ala Mona Lisa. The cause was stress.
So far I haven’t had any ailments, knock on wood, but I have had a complete lack of focus that has not gone unnoticed at work. sigh.
Anyway, are you sure it’s hives? I once thought I had a raging case of hives but it turns out my fiance’s apartment had BED BUGS! Not to scare you or anything.
Oh goodness! I started planning for a November wedding in May of this year thinking–ahh, no big deal! We’ll just keep it simple. Yeah right! It’s way more expensive and complicated than you could ever imagine before you get stuck in the middle of it. A couple of days ago my fiance was intent on moving the date 6 months–after we worked so hard to coordinate the church, officiant, reception place and I bought a dress with November in mind, not the same dress I would wear in May! I almost lost it. Seriously, stealing a girls wedding date is not the way to destress her!! 
Anyway, it was a wake-up call of sorts and we’ve decided to stay with November but to just not freak out and work together and ask for help when we need it. Maybe we need a stressfreeweddingplanningbee blog! We’ll see how it goes!
It’s funny how there is so little written on how to survive this STRESSFUL, albeit happy time! Suddenly, we’re faced with so many decisions we never even had an opinion on (i.e. how do you want your napkins folded, should the guys wear white or ivory dress shirts, etc). I think for everyone at some point it all gets to be too much.
I myself have had anxiety attacks where I feel like my throat is closing up after looking at too much wedding stuff - after never having had one in my entire life. I’m honestly thinking of visiting the doctor to get some backup anxiety medicine for the week of the wedding just in case (it’s a destination wedding).
Summer - a good friend of ours got Bells Palsy at the beginning of her honeymoon! She’s back to normal now, but they had to come home early because of it!
I agree 100% with tipperella. It is amazing how little is written about this. The stress caused me to grind my teeth at night (which I had never done) which caused a lot of pain. I ended up having a cavity filled the week of the wedding (dumb, dumb idea) and was taking motrin & ambesol pretty heavy to numb the pain left over after the novocane wore off. The filling hadn’t been sanded down properly and I was still grinding my teeth horribly. I could barely eat at the rehearsal dinner or our reception! My mother was very anxious- she wanted me to relax as much as possible so that I wouldn’t be sick on my honeymoon (she was sick on hers!)
A friend of mine had to be checked into a hospital because of a stomach ailment before her wedding too.
Yiiikes, I’m sorry!!! I guess all the advice I have is that…it’ll go away eventually? I’m not stressed out anymore post-wedding! But yeah, hopefully your meds will get you all cleared up loooong before your wedding!!!
After I had a meltdown over my skin (where I’m also carrying my stress), I think my fiance is finally starting to grasp that brides tend to feel a lot more pressure, stuff that the groom never even imagines. Even doing non-traditional things like not spending $2K on a dress doesn’t eliminate stress — it just morphs it.
gosh, I hope you feel better soon!!!!! I’ve been thinking I need anti-anxiety medication, but just in general, I’m a total spaz.
I have had a slew of strange pre-wedding ailments. First, I was having lower abdominal pains, which freaked my doctor out — I had to have both a CT scan and a colonoscopy (gaaah!). Everything checked out as normal and the pain is gone — I chalk it up to stress.
Then, the lymph nodes on one side of my neck became huge, swollen and painful. I took antibiotics and am much better, but they’re still a tiny bit swollen. I’m seeing an ENT tomorrow.
To add to all the “oh my God, am I going to be sick for the wedding?” stress, I found out that the new “acting manager” at my workplace forgot to pay our insurance. So I’ve had all these tests … with no coverage. It’s supposed to be taken care of, but I just had to pay full price for a prescription. I so don’t need this now. I just keep telling myself, “Breathe.”
The weird thing? Before the wedding planning, I never, ever got sick. It’s so bizarre. Gaaah.
Hang in there! It will all be OK (right?).
wow. glad to hear i am not the only one. i actually just got married about a month ago. in the spring i was studying for the professional engineering exam and planning the wedding. i came down with a virus that eventually became bell’s palsy… doctor’s diagnosis bascially was if i wasn’t stressed, would have been nothing like what it turned into. i was fortunate to have my facial paralysis clear up in a month or so, plenty of time before the wedding. then the week of the wedding i came down with hives starting at the base of my ear down my neck/shoulder area. turns out this is a family wedding tradition no one talks about, my grandfather had them on his wedding day!
this is a great post! I have had chronic hives all of my life, triggered by stress, but ususally they last about 2 days. Since getting engaged in December, I have had continuous hives which travel all over my body, including my face, the soles of my feet, and the palms of my hands! I’ve been prescribed prednisone which has taken care of the hives in the past, but i’m not taking them because the side of effect of them is panic attacks!! ARGGG! I am so frustrated. It feels great to know I’m not alone.
my question to everybody is- do you *feel* stressed out?
because i’ve been having abdominal pains as well, i went to the dr and she had no idea what it could be. she said either a pulled muscle or indigestion and prescribed me some medicine (which made me nauseated but what can you do?)
i dont *feel* stressed but i got my pains right after i came home from houston, tx which is where we’re having our wedding (we live in biloxi, ms) and realized how much work i’ll have to do from such a far distance.
im just wondering if i’ve stressed myself out and dont know it. i’ve had the hives attack before - and i knew for certain it was due to stress then. maybe i’m prone to this as well..?
this post has been really helpful. my symptoms are more like inability to breathe deeply, and it worsens to where my chest feels suuuuper tight and my heart will stop beating for a couple of beats before it resumes normal beating. i totally felt like i was having a heart attack one day.
what are we to do to resolve this? without going on meds, i mean?
aoedorothee, that sounds like a panic attack. Luckily I don’t suffer from those (yet), but I DO suffer from major asthma attacks where my lungs close. If I were you, and you’d rather not take drugs, I’d think just spacing out for a few minutes would help. Maybe marginally, but whatever!
Take a bath, read a good book (HARRY POTTER), get immersed in something you love that isn’t wedding related. Have FI do something nice for you. I honestly think you’re having stress-induced panic attacks. The key is to STAY CALM. Just blank out.
i wasn’t planning a wedding but i had stress-related hives for a couple weeks that finally subsided with medication. i was so upset with how my skin looked that i would cry whenever i looked at myself…which didn’t help the condition at all. i don’t remember why i was stressed, which is really rare - my bf thinks it was an allergic reaction to some flowers i bought and he’s banned me from buying them ever again - but thankfully i’ve been fine since. its really scary the effects stress has on us.
Thank you for this post! I’m so sorry everyone is feeling stressed and crappy. But I can’t tell you how relieved I feel reading all of these posts. I’ve got health issues too, I won’t get into it. I just keep reminding myself how grateful I should be that these issues are (hopefully) temporary and will go away (post wedding) and how lucky we all are to have our health, even if it doesn’t feel like it at this moment.
There really should be more on how to deal with this and how to avoid it. I feel like I’ve brought this on myself for choosing to have a wedding instead of eloping. Then I snap myself out of it and get over feeling sorry for myself.
Plus, what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. I feel that once the wedding is over, and I’m not so emotionally wrapped up in it, then future events won’t affect me as bad because I will reflect on this and grow. That’s the closest to zen as I can get.
I’ve handled stress all my life and thought this wedding this would be do-able. So far so good I thought until an unexpected unpleasant non-wedding related situation surfaced. Now I’m looking at my schedule and it’s totally stressing me out since this other situation is going to require a lot of time and will be ongoing through the wedding. I don’t think my blood-pressure has been this high ever!! My attempt to re-store balance: I booked a spa day with my FI this Sat to force us to relax. A bit pricey but totally worth it to preserve our sanity.
Stress, positive and negative, is a fact of life. And, it’s neither a good nor a bad thing - it simply IS . . . .
The best things I’ve found to keep perspective are: meditation, green tea, and hiking (or other exercise) — do the things that bring you joy, and remember that not even your wedding day is worth becoming a complete ball of stress . . . .
No matter how much you plan, how well you plan, how well you articulate your plans to your vendors, family, and wedding party, things will not, under any circumstances, match your vision. There’s comfort in that — the sooner you can learn to let the things you can’t control go, and focus only on the things you can, the more you’ll enjoy your wedding.
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Mrs. Kiwi, Los Angeles Age and Occupation in 06: 27, Bookkeeper Fiance's Age and Occupation: 27, P.E. Teach/Coach @ private schools in LA Engagement Date: March 31, 2006 Wedding Date: November 3, 2007 Venue: Radisson Hotel About Me: I'm a bookkeeper who failed high school algebra. I'm currently living in Los Angeles, literally a street over from where I grew up with Mr. Kiwi, my honey of three years. We have a jumbo mini-dachshund (seriously, he's huuuuge), and we're planning an autumn themed wedding on a shoestring, paid for by ourselves. The wedding date is my late grandma's birthday, I needed her there somehow, and that seemed like the best way for us. I can't believe I'm a Bee! I couldn't be more proud!
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