I keep getting asked "how wedding planning is going" and "when is it?" I'm expected to be planning a wedding and happy about it, all the while wishing like hell that I could convince my significant other to just privately elope. (We've discussed it, and he really wants friends and close extended family there.) I want to be married to him, but talking about a prospective wedding event makes me feel very sad and alone.

I hope it's OK if I write out my thoughts/invite feedback here; I have been pretty lonely for a while and "the wedding" has added another layer of complexity and anxiety to that.

I'm at this stage where my life is tiny and keeps shrinking. I do not have many close friendships as is, and those I have are now married and mostly with kids, are extremely busy, and most do not live nearby. What I've found is that their lives are very, very full and busy with family and close-by friends, for a good reason, but the upshot is that I have very limited contact with each of them, and I've become more of a casual friend where we check in a couple times a year and that's it. I am not part of groups of friends who get together anymore, save for one group of former colleagues who reunite about once in a while, and now they all have young kids so the meetups don't happen. This year I have had several months at a time go by where I have had zero face to face contact with anyone outside of work, my immediate family, sporadic and casual interactions at stores and dog parks, and Facebook. My fiancee's parents have moved out of state and so we've dropped off the radar of his extended family unless his parents are visiting; we've tried and failed to form connections/extend invitations to the extended family. After a few turned down invitations there's little point to keep asking. It's not really reciprocated.

My only normal social opportunities are to see my fiancée's friends, and I've largely dropped out of that group by choice. There are still a couple of my boyfriend's old friends that I enjoy being with but I've found most of the current crowd has become somewhat cold and clique-ish. I realized I was feeling more lonely going to those events a few months ago, and got so sick of the perpetual cold shoulder and having zero interests in common with those "in charge", so with a few exceptions where it's a smaller group with the people I find actually welcoming, I've stopped going.

My social life is mostly nonexistent, whereas my fiancée sees his friends, the same people, multiple times per week and goes on trips with them regularly. (He's gone to less trips this year than in the past and has dropped one of 2 season tickets to a sports team; if he wanted to there could be one out of town trip out each month and season tickets to various sports all year with the same people.)

I see my immediate family a couple times a month and people at work, and every once in a while a friend has time to meet or to talk on the phone. That's very rare. Unless I choose to go out with my fiancee's friends, I'm largely alone for most of the year. If fiancee's friends are out of town-like this upcoming 4th of July-we are alone. When I have a difficult or painful time, and I've had quite a few this year, I do not have anyone close to I can talk to about it aside from my fiancée, parents, and sister. My support network feels very thin.

We discussed this in pre-marital counseling. Tried to issue invitations to my friends/his family, but everyone is still, always, too busy. There are things I can do to start over and try to meet new people, but it takes time to find anyone who wants to connect regularly, let alone build quality relationships.

I don't blame anyone for that, because clearly kids, husband and family SHOULD come first; it's just that it's everybody, all at the same time, so I'm alone. I wish I had someone who I could have cried with when my grandpa and pets died, or who wants to get together more often than once a year.

I don't want to spend this much of my life alone. Since we are more and more decided that we aren't drawn to having babies/kids, are we just going to be forgotten when everyone else moves on who hasn't already started reproducing?

Regarding the wedding, why plan an expensive party (and even though we are planning to be very small and simple and low budget, you still have to plan to feed and accommodate space for 50+ people) mostly including guests whose lives I am not part of the rest of the year? Our prospective wedding doesn't feel like a joyful event with love and support; it feels like a sad reminder of how isolated and small my life and support is. That's not how I want to begin my married life with B.