Wedding planning can be stressful; I get that. As someone who is still in the early stages of coordinating her wedding, I have been offered a glimpse into how much work brides put into making sure their wedding day is as close to perfect as possible. However, I realized early on that it is humanly impossible to be able to control and dictate how everything will unfold on the day that I officially become a Mrs., and I’m okay with that. Of course, not every bride-to-be is on that “let go and let God” wave when it comes to her nuptials.
One night while I was commuting home last month, I overheard a woman complaining to a friend about her maid of honor’s tattoo. From what I could gather, the MOH’s tattoo was fairly new and on the larger side. The bride was pretty pissed off about it because it would be highly visible in the dress she selected. For nearly 15 minutes, this woman ranted on and on about the “hideous” body art and how inconsiderate it was for her MOH to get inked up prior to the wedding. Meanwhile, her friend, who I assume is not in the wedding, cosigned her Bridezilla-type antics every step of the way. The friend eventually suggested that she “put her foot down” and demand that said bridesmaid have the tat covered for the ceremony and reception. The bride seemed to agree that this was a good idea, and that was the end of that.
I’m sorry, what? First of all, it’s a terrible idea to “demand” that a grown adult who is volunteering her time, money and resources to be in your wedding do anything. And even if you do ask nicely, there’s a big chance she’ll be offended—in addition to the fact that she reserves the right to say no.
I was reminded of this conversation when I came across a resurrected post on Wedding Bee this morning about a bride who wanted to know if she should “confront” a bridesmaid over a tattoo. After skimming a few other wedding boards and websites, I realized that this is a pretty common issue. While not all of them are as demanding as my fellow Long Island Railroad passenger, many brides are out here losing it and under the impression that this type of body art will take away from the elegance of their weddings.
“During our dress fittings, I found out that two of my bridesmaids have tattoos. While I fine with whatever they want to get on their body in their personal life, I am not really a tattoo person and don’t know if I want them to show on my wedding day,” one bride explained in a post on Wedding Wire earlier this year. “I don’t mean to be snobby about this, but I am more conservative (and my family and my fiancé are 100 times more conservative) and would just rather they were covered up. One bridesmaid has a tattoo on her back and short hair, and one bridesmaid has one on her arm. How do I ask they nicely if we can cover them up without sounding like a demanding Bridezilla?”
If handled with care, I guess making this suggestion would be okay; however, I would imagine that these types of conversations also have the potential to go left rather quickly. Ladies, do you think it’s rude to ask bridesmaids to cover their tattoos?
