Once the initial excitement of your engagement passes, it is time to get down to the most stressful part of a wedding—planning. Between invitations, venues, finding the perfect gown, and the seating chart, wedding planning is not for the faint of heart. It takes a lot of hard work, patience, and time to give life to the picture of the big day you have in your head.
For this reason, it is essential to take time to get yourself ready for your wedding so the memories remain positive. While planning is important, relaxation is also vital to your overall wellbeing. If you are a busy and stressed-out bride, here is a self-care checklist that will help you feel your best throughout the planning process and look your best before you say, “I do.”
1. Schedule Time to Relax
Wedding planning is often just a series of schedules you are trying to juggle. Don’t let it overshadow the reason for the wedding; you are tying the knot with the person you love. Make time to relax with your new partner in the process.
It’s easy to let the wedding take over all the time you should be spending on yourself. So, make some effort for self-care. Put together a non-negotiable schedule with days free from wedding planning talk, and allow yourself some time to rest. Consider creating a self-care routine and stick to it throughout the week.
2. Make Wedding Dress Shopping an Event
At the dress appointment, you want someone to help you fasten your buttons, make you feel comfortable, and help you make decisions. So, it is only right that you bring along a few of your family members and bridesmaids. Alongside finding the perfect attire, shopping for wedding dresses can be a fun experience for the bridesmaids and family members to bond.
Nevertheless, only invite those people who you know will be supportive. You don’t want a family member who will likely say something that gets under your skin or a mean-girl bestie known for unnecessarily making a scene. Instead, choose soothing people who are careful with their words, but at the same time honest in a loving way.
Find a space where you feel comfortable and have many styles to choose from. Also, plan to go to a brunch or do a fun activity afterward, so the entire focus is not on the dress all day. This allows you to relax and recharge after a mentally taxing process.
3. Prioritize Mental Health
While physical workouts are essential for your body, you should also start good mental health routines during the wedding planning phase. Let’s face it, it’s a busy time, and your mental health may take a hit. Stress and exhaustion can flare up existing depression and anxiety issues or bring about new ones. For this reason, it’s crucial you make mental health your top priority.
Consider practicing meditation, yoga, or maintaining a regular exercise routine to elevate your mood even in those dire moments you feel the need to run off and elope. Meditation is great to clear your mind and bring yourself some peace while wedding planning. In fact, it will also help you tackle greater planning issues while keeping your cool. If all else fails, you might want to turn to mental health counseling.
4. Nutrition
Typically, brides become extra aware of what they eat leading up to the wedding or go on crash diets and miss hitting vital nutritional marks. Others barely get time to cook healthy meals and thus scarf down fast food. Nutrition is essential to your overall well being. If you aren’t getting the proper nutrition you require, you are setting yourself up for more stress.
Ensure you are eating balanced meals and hitting the targeted food group and portion sizes regardless of what your life looks like. If you want to look fit and trim but find meal prepping inconvenient, consider a healthy meal delivery service option. Lastly, don’t forget to treat yourself every once in a while.
5. Spend Time Alone
Planning a wedding can mean lots of meetings and constant calls with wedding planners or the wedding party. Things can get quite stressful and tiring; therefore, some me-time is imperative for brides. Spending time alone will allow you to focus on anything you need to get done.
Regardless of your favorite way to relax and decompress, spend some time alone to regroup and shut out the noise of notifications or social media, even if it is for just a few hours. Additionally, ensure you are doing it regularly. If it means crossing an item from your bridal to-do list tomorrow, make peace with that so you can be at peace with yourself first.
6. Don’t Forget to Breathe
With the world recovering from the pandemic, it is even more stressful to plan a wedding. However, that doesn’t mean you have to abandon self-care. Self-care can be simple and easy to put into practice, and it should be everyone’s priority.
