It’s not my wedding and I’ll cry if I want to

A friend of mine got married a couple weeks ago. Halfway through the short and sweet nuptials, I leaned toward the friend seated next to me and whispered “Did you bring any Kleenex?” She turned to look at me, saw pools welling up in my eyelids and said “No… so for god’s sakes, pull yourself together!” 

We giggled. Thankfully.

Her half-serious bossy reprimand was the red light that stopped me on the road of sobbing I had been speeding down. 

I don’t often cry at weddings. I may have, once before. But I couldn’t say why, or even who was tying the knot.

Yet, that day, I found myself overcome with an insatiable urge to bawl. I had to make a conscious effort to, as my friend ordered, pull myself together.

We joked about it after my friend sealed the deal with a kiss and was officially a Mrs.

I don’t know what happened! I explained, laughing. 

But I did.

I do.

I’m over the moon happy for my friend. I know – because she and I had many, many heartfelt (sometimes tear-filled) conversations about being alone – how much this means to her, and how happy she is.

We both longed for marriage and children; the fantasy future we had banked on since we knew what a future was. We were the last two left standing, single. If I needed to vent about my lack of a plus one at an event full of duos, I called her, overcome with self pity, because I knew she would get it. When another family holiday spent solo marked the passage of time, she called me, and I listened and empathized as she let her pain, disappointment and fear find comfort in mine. She knows how it feels – how I still find myself feeling at times – because we waded that swamp together. So make no mistake when I say my heart sings for her.

Still, in that moment at the town hall, where the only sound was of two people pledging their love for another, and while my friend laughed with what I guessed to be both nerves and delight, I felt my own heartbreak climb up my throat.

As I smiled with happiness for my friend, tears still managed to appear for myself. Having decided to raise a child on my own, there are moments when I’m acutely aware of that decision, and why I’m doing it; what I’m missing. Where the longing for what I had hoped for swims to the surface, settling in my eyes and on my cheeks. 

While I know that having a child does not mean love and marriage are off the docket – single parents find partners all the time – it currently feels like a distant maybe teetering on never. 

It goes without saying that when you see something you want, you not only want it more, but the awareness of its absence becomes more profound. That’s what happened while my friend promised to love, honour and cherish her new husband. I saw, for a moment, not what she had, but what I did not. It’s a sad, shameful, pitying thing to admit. But if anyone would understand, it would be the bride herself.

So, momentary tears. A temporary pang of self-despair.

I’m quite certain I’ll experience more of these fleeting moments as I move forward on this journey, as well as more tears.

Okay, many more tears, perhaps!

Did someone say hormones?

But I’m also certain I’ll handle it all. And when I feel like I can’t, I’ll call on my friends, be they married or not.