Your First Sober Wedding
You've been dreading this since the Save the Date. Let's fix that.
You’re dreading it.
Not the wedding, exactly. You’re looking forward to being a witness to love.
It’s the open bar.
It’s the champagne toast when everyone lifts a glass and suddenly you feel like the most visible person in the room. It’s the cocktail hour where drinking is the activity. It’s the reception that doesn’t end until midnight, and then the after party where the drinks keep flowing into the morning.
Here’s what I want you to know before you go: a wedding is just a BBQ in a prettier dress. You’ve already done the hard part. You know how to show up sober to a social event. You know how to hold a drink that isn’t alcohol. You know how to deflect the question. You know how to leave.
The wedding just has a few extra moments that we’ll go over…
Let’s walk through your first sober wedding
BEFORE YOU LEAVE THE HOUSE
Decide now. Don’t wait until you’re pulling into the parking lot, or standing at the bar as the bartender looks at you expectantly. Right now, today decide: you are not drinking at this wedding. Make the decision in the safety of your own kitchen and don’t question it.
Eat before you go. A real meal with protein, not just a handful of crackers. Eat a real meal.
Know what you’re ordering at the bar before you walk in. Sparkling water with lime. Club soda and cranberry. Your favorite N/A option if the venue carries one. Have your order ready so you won’t have to think about it.
THE COCKTAIL HOUR
This is the hardest part of the night, and it happens first, which is actually lucky because you’ll get it over with while you still have energy.
Almost everyone is drinking, but no one is tipsy enough not to to notice that you’re not drinking. The waiters are circling with trays of champagne.
Someone named Linda might hand you a glass of champagne without asking and maybe you’ll take it and hold it because you’re caught off guard. That’s OK. You don’t have to drink it. You don’t have to explain it. Set it down on a table and go find the shrimp cocktail.
The people who notice you’re not drinking are drinking and will keep drinking, and they’ll forget you’re not drinking by the entrée.
Find your person in the room, whether it’s your husband or partner or friend from yoga or family member who knows you’re not drinking, and stay close to them for the first twenty minutes. You just need to get your footing. Once you do, you’ll settle in the same way you did at the BBQ and the concert. The first twenty minutes are always the hardest.
THE CHAMPAGNE TOAST
Here it is. The moment you’ve been dreading since the save-the-date.
Everyone picks up a glass. The best man clears his throat. You feel every eye in the room and you are certain that everyone notices you and your glass of sparkling water.
They do not. I promise.
Pick up whatever is in front of you. Raise it. Smile. Toast. And then keep it moving.
You’re here and you’re present and you will remember this toast, which is more than you could have said a year ago.
Clink your glass. Take a sip of your water. And that’s it. It’s over. You did it.
DINNER
This is the easy part. You’re seated. You have a glass of water. The food is coming. The conversation is flowing and you realize somewhere around the salad course that you’re feeling fine. Maybe even more than fine. You might even be having a good time.
This is the part where the old version of you would have had three glasses of wine and started to blur around the edges. This version of you will remember the toasts. You’ll remember who sat at your table and what they said and how it felt to be in that room.
THE DANCING
Here is a gift sobriety gives you that nobody talks about: you will be the best dancer at the reception.
While everyone else is at least 4 drinks deep before they step foot on the dance floor— their faculties overridden by alcohol, their coordination vanished, looking like Elaine from Seinfeld— you will have your wits about you.
Dancing sober is terrifying for the first 30 seconds, and then one of the most exhilarating things you can do. You’ll realize, mid “Mr. Brightside,” that you’ve healed a part of yourself on the dance floor.
Get out there. Shake that booty. Feel free.
THE EXIT
Leave before it gets weird. You know when that is. It’s around the time the tie comes off and someone requests “Don’t Stop Believin’” for the third time. That’s your cue.
Say your goodbyes. Hug the couple.
And then get in your car.
THE DRIVE HOME
You’ll have the windows down. You’ll replay the ceremony and the first dance and that thing your friend said that made you laugh so hard your eyes watered. Your feet will hurt from dancing the night away.
And you’ll think: I didn’t miss a single thing.
Keep going.
💛
—Suzanne
New here? Catch up on the series:
Hi! I'm Suzanne Warye. I write about the myth of moderation, the lie of rock bottom, and the bright side of sobriety. My book, The Sober Shift, is the book I needed when I was facing my first sober summer.
If you read this and thought I want to do this with other moms who get it, that’s why I created The Sober Mom Life Cafe.
It’s a private community of sober and sober-curious moms doing exactly what you’re doing this summer. We have 6 Peer Support Zoom meetings each week (including one I host on Friday mornings), a book club, a private Facebook group.