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Ryan Richardson Photography is an editorial/fashion inspired wedding and portrait photographer based in Southeastern Massachusetts and serving New England. Massachusetts Wedding Photographer.

Logging Off and Self Care: Surviving Wedding Planning

Wedding planning can be very stressful for a variety of reasons - you’re faced with a myriad of decisions, financial stress, and all kinds of pressure from friends and family. Couples caught up in the midst of planning their Boston wedding can also wind up putting a lot of pressure on themselves.

It’s very easy to delve too greedily and too deeply into the world of wedding planning and find some Balrogs waiting for you at the bottom. If you’re spending a lot of time gathering up ideas on Pinterest, scoping out wedding blogs and cutting things out of magazines, it’s very easy to start seeing things less as jumping off points and more as mountains that have to be scaled or else your wedding won’t be any good.

But your New England wedding is going to be great.

Even if it’s on a rainy Tuesday in a VFW Hall while you’re wearing a dress you happened to find at a thrift shop and your partner is in some number they got off the rack at Marshals that just happened to look a bit bridal (although your Boston wedding photographer will be super rad, because you hired Ryan Richardson Photography). Why? Because it’s your wedding. It’s not going to be the best day of your lives, it’s just one milestone on the path that you’re waling down with your partner. A wedding is one day, a marriage is a lifetime.

So with that in mind, while you’re planning your wedding take plenty of time off to take care of yourself and your relationship. Don’t feel like you have to be taking another step toward your wedding with every free moment, a lot of those things will wait for you, and your wedding won’t be measurably worse if you didn’t consider another six options for napkin folds, it probably won’t be as fun if you’ve torn all your hair out from frustration and you’ve erased your cousin from history because he suggested succulents for centerpieces.

So what are some things you can do to help you log off?

Schedule Your Wedding Time: It’s very tempting to devote your free moments to your wedding. But when you’re far enough out, try just setting aside specific time to work on wedding projects to try and keep it from over-running the rest of your life.

Board Game Nights: Invite your bridal party and friends over to a regular game night where wedding talk is forbidden. As an advanced move, anybody that talks about the wedding has to put a dollar in the wedding jar to cover pizza and snacks for the next get together. Wedding planning stress can be infectious, it’s important to give everyone in your party some space from it (and remember why they’re excited to be at your side on the day).

Date Nights: Try a new restaurant or activity with your partner. Make regular time to get together and have some fun without worrying about the wedding or anything else.

Self Care: Make plans to take care of yourself while you’re planning for your wedding.

Get Busy: If you feel like the wedding fever is getting worse, consider taking on some more structured activities away from the wedding. Taking an art class can be a fun, low stakes activity, that can help take your mind off wedding (and you can do it by yourself, as a couple, or with friends). Volunteering some of your time is always a great way to give back.

What are you planning on doing to give yourself a break from planning your Boston wedding?

Ryan Richardson is a wedding and engagement photographer serving Boston and beyond; including Cape Cod Weddings, New England Weddings, Massachusetts Weddings and Rhode Island Weddings.