October 10th, 2009 to August 14th, 2018
The photo on the left was taken on my wedding day. It’s not my favorite photo from that day, but it’s one of the few I can post publicly (my wife is in nearly all of those photos and doesn’t wish to appear here). My wedding was simultaneously the happiest and most painful day of my life. Happy because I was marrying this absolutely gorgeous woman who I was madly in love with, and our wedding was beautiful. Most painful, because I was ludicrously dysphoric for the entire day.
Content warning, folks, this one doesn’t have a happy ending yet.
Katharine says she could tell that something was wrong with me that day. I was as joyful and exuberant as I should be, but it was all dampened. I was very reserved, restrained, like my mind was somewhere else all day (it was, I was massively disassociating). Our photographer had us do a first reveal shoot, where I waited with my face away from her as she came out behind me, and then I turned around and saw her for the first time. She was stunning, the most beautiful I had ever seen her in my entire life, and her dress was gorgeous. But deep down I was screaming in agony, because all I wanted at that moment was to be her. I wanted to be a bride, I wanted to be in a wedding dress.
I hated that suit, passionately. Even tho it was the best fitting suit I’d had in a very long time (the only suit I’d had in a very long time), it felt completely wrong on me, binding and squeezing me in uncomfortable places, and was far too warm. I’m standing awkwardly in every single photo because I was incapable of relaxing. My anxiety was through the roof and my body confidence went into the toilet, because I KNEW just how fat I looked in that suit, and I KNEW that it wasn’t what I was supposed to be wearing at my wedding day.
I had been very detached from the entire wedding planning process. Oh, I was involved, I provided my feedback where it was expected, but I had been indoctrinated that the wedding was the bride’s day, and I wasn’t a bride, so it was not my place to want anything. Thankfully, Katharine’s choices fairly well echoed my own wishes, but it still left me feeling like this wasn’t my day. It wasn’t my wedding. It was his… the man whose face I wore.
Kat and I have spoken a few times about organizing a second wedding, where we would renew our vows as wife and wife. It probably won’t happen for our tenth year anniversary, but it will eventually, and then I will finally have wedding photos that don’t hurt to look at.
