Justina Sharp is helping over 20,000 brides-to-be have the big day they want. The content creator and advice columnist founded the community Brides with Boundaries to help engaged women stand up for themselves when planning their wedding. Many frequently cave to loved ones’ requests to keep the peace. That level of agreeability costs.
“This is something that sort of stems from just being a woman,” Sharp tells ESSENCE. “We are accustomed to being nice to people, and to being friendly to people, and to being like, ‘Oh, of course,’ and then you end up with a wedding where you were supposed to have 150 guests, and now you have 300, and you’re trying to figure out how to pay for it.”
She ensures the bulk of your budget isn’t dedicated to people who haven’t seen you since you were a toddler or just happen to be on the same Slack channel. “The consequences of the niceness that society has sort of trained you in come down to you and your fiancé and your joint bank account,” she says
We asked Sharp for tips on setting boundaries on the way down the aisle. These are her recommendations.
Before choosing a venue or picking honeymoon plans, agree with your partner about non-negotiables. Determine what is most important to you as a couple. Envision what your big day looks and feels like, together. “Sit down with your partner and make a priority list that you both agree on a hundred percent. That’s my number one thing,” Sharp says. “No matter what the situation is, that is the number one thing you need to do. You and your partner need to be on one page before you do anything. They are the ultimate teammate for you in every single way. They are your number one backup. They are the sounding board. They are the only person on this earth going through this exact experience with you.” Her group is full of people facing frustrations after failing to define roles. “A lot of conflict that at least I see, especially when it comes from family dynamics, is there is always sort of like an underlying thread of the partners not being on the same page about something,” she says.
“Usually what I tell people is stop being scared of the person you want to spend the rest of your life with,” Sharp says. She doesn’t believe the non-confrontational communication style popular during dating works well in wedding planning. Honesty creates room for clarity. “You are going to be not just with this person but with their world view, with their religious practices, with their family, ideally for the rest of your life,” she says. “Get into conversations with your partner about boundaries where assumption overwhelms reality. You need to remove assumptions from the conversation.” This helps address relationship issues. “I have women in my group who are like, oh, I’m really passionate about whatever XYZ aspect of the wedding planning process, but my fiancé thinks it’s stupid. And I’m like, well, that’s kind of the first problem,” Sharp notes. “We can’t fix the florals until we fix that man.”
Decide who will face which family members when it comes to certain issues. Don’t leave it up to your partner to clash with a loved one they don’t understand and aren’t close to. “I firmly believe that everyone should deal with their own family. If, for instance, my family does something, if my mother says something that oversteps our boundaries as a couple or during the wedding planning process overstepped our boundaries around our wedding, it’s my responsibility to speak with my mother,” Sharp says. Make it clear that the partner who is the face of the decision speaks for both of you. “I know her best. I know her communication style but that decision is coming from and endorsed by both of us.”
Wedding traditions are such a staple of our culture that we can forget to pause and ask if they are right for us. Sharp recommends avoiding what she calls tradition by osmosis. “You just start absorbing stuff because we grow up surrounded by wedding media, especially as women,” she says. “Then it’s actually happening to you. And you have all these weird little ticks.” She adds, “You need to understand your own reasons for making a decision.”
No matter how careful or considerate you are when planning your wedding, there’s a chance you will hurt someone’s feelings. “You are going to make decisions in this process, especially as you establish boundaries for yourself and your partner and your relationship and your wedding, that are going to upset people,” Sharp says. “That is, of course, never the goal. I’m not waking up every morning going, ‘Ah, I can’t wait to make some people mad,’ especially not the people that I love and care about, but the reality is that’s what’s going to happen when your boundaries bump up against what other people are wanting to do and how they’re wanting to behave. You just have to be okay with that.”
“I think it is so important to find ways to include the people who are important to you, and that might not always look like a traditional format,” she shares. For example, you might not want someone in your official wedding party, but you might want them to play another special role.
“These days, brides are posting TikToks from the morning of their live-streamed weddings. They’re posting all of their photos, and everybody wants to be part of the show,” she says. “I think that it’s made it oddly okay for strangers and co-workers and all these other people that you really don’t interact with to just be like, oh, ‘When’s the wedding?’” Looking for where to draw the line on the guest list? According to Sharp, it is okay to ask yourself, “Do you ever really talk to this person?” Preparing a plan helps to deal with their FOMO. Sample scripts and language help prevent you from scrambling for something to say at the moment. Sharp’s group provides phrases you can use to shut down inquiries for wedding info. “My personal favorite is, ‘We can’t wait to celebrate with you at another time,’” she says.
Letting the wedding planning fall on one person can cause friction. “When the wedding becomes all-consuming for one person, it almost generates this mania for you where you’re like – all you can think about is napkin types and chair colors,” Sharp says. “It eats your brain. And this other person is just not involved at all.” She encourages brides not to automatically assume all the work involved. “I think that that’s really unfair, and I think it’s a burden that is unfairly placed specifically on women not just in society but by the media,” she says. Split the responsibilities by choosing what matters most to each of you.
Don’t just focus on setting boundaries outside of the relationship. Set up guardrails that keep every conversation with your betrothed from barreling towards wedding central. Go on a trip or staycation. Keep up with date nights. Plan a 48-hour period where the W-word is off-limits. As Sharp says, “You need to create regular points in time where you are not talking about the wedding.”
