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A woman has ignited a heated debate over her decision to keep her engagement from her friends until they received a wedding invitation.
The now-viral TikTok sparking the conversation has amassed 7.7 million views, 1.5 million likes, and 3,100 comments. TikToker @sometimessierra, who has more than 180,000 followers, shared the post on June 23.
"And my phone is popping off #wedding #chaoticenergy," the post is captioned.
The 18-second video began with the TikToker filming herself speaking to the camera. "Tell me you live for chaos without telling me you live for chaos," the TikToker said in words displayed in text overlay as well.
"I'll go first," she added as the song Love You So played by The King Khan & BBQ Show.
"For the past two years, I have avoided talking about my relationship with my friends just so I can see their reactions when they open their mailboxes and find an invitation...To my wedding," she added while smiling.
Engagements happen year-round and at many different ages. However, according to Statista, in 2019, the most popular month to become engaged was December with a 19 percent proposal rate.
Proposals are special moments for the couples involved, and it's oftentimes a carefully planned endeavor. Wedding Pro's annual engagement and jewelry survey found that one in three engagements happened on a trip that was planned out, which is an increase of 7 percent from the previous year.
Some people plan to capture the moment as 1 in 5 who are proposing are getting assistance from a vendor to help them with the planning or photographing of the moment, which has increased from the previous year by 8 percent.
Many couples choose to share the news of their engagement publicly on social media, and 90 percent end up doing just that. In addition, 78 percent announce the news on Instagram and 77 percent use Facebook.
The woman added her friends had received the invites that day, and in a follow-up video, she added some "context" to the situation. She explained that due to the pandemic, she hasn't seen most of her friends in around two years.
Her fiancé is also in the military and stationed in Korea, so he hasn't seen their friends in a while either. In addition, she's been with her fiancé since they were "wee tots," adding that most of the people are both of their friends, and they just didn't know they were engaged for some time because she chose not to tell anyone.
In a comment, she also clarified that her friends knew they were dating the entire time.
In addition, a third video featured some of the woman's friends' reactions to learning the news of the engagement as well. A few seemed happy for the couple, while one person saw the situation play out on TikTok. In addition, her older cousin asked how she was an adult before her.
In the original video, numerous people weighed in on the woman's choice to keep her plans about getting married from her friends until they received wedding invitations, and people had wildly different opinions on the matter.
Some viewers seemed on board with the move. "This is a mood," a user chimed in. "I wanna see reactions."
Others had pulled similar stunts before as well. "I announced that I was pregnant after I had given birth," a TikToker said. "Twice! Highly recommend."
One person congratulated the woman, insisting, "You just saved your relationship from unwanted bad advice, which friends give a lot."
Another TikToker admitted they did the same thing. "Except we eloped, and posted a link to our wedding being live-streamed and turned our phones off," they wrote.
However, not everyone thought the choice of keeping that information from friends was a good idea. "Yeah nah, I probably wouldn't continue the friendship tbh," a viewer said.
Another user admitted they would "feel so sad" if their "close friend" did that. "I'd feel like they cut me out of a huge part of their life and didn't like me," they added.
The creator replied back: "Lol it isn't like that. The pandemic really made all of my friendships long-distance."
While a user revealed if they were the woman's "close friend, I would low-key be upset that you didn't care enough to tell me yourself." Another TikToker called the move "such a massive red flag."
TikToker @sometimessierra told Newsweek: "For some more context, I met my fiancé in high school, and we shared the same friend group. After high school, he joined the military, and I moved to New York City for college. We kept in distant touch with these friends, as we were on different schedules, and in his case, a totally different time zone. We decided not to tell our friends immediately that we were getting married (or anyone but direct family for that matter), because we knew we were going to have a very small wedding and weren't sure who we could end up inviting. Plus, we are pretty private people and don't enjoy other people's input [into] our pretty strange situation. However, we knew our friends would freak out (in a great way) if we just sent them invitations to our wedding instead."
This isn't the only viral moment involving wedding-related drama. A groom was fuming over his time-off request for his wedding day being rejected. A woman found support for keeping her wedding news from her dad who left her over a vase. In addition, a groom was bashed for making the bride babysit kids at her own wedding.
Updated 06/30/2022, 4:42 p.m. ET: This story has been updated with comments from TikToker @sometimessierra.
Updated 06/30/2022, 5:00 p.m. ET: This story has been updated with a verified video of the incident.
