wedding day chaos

MOH Betrayal, Secrets Uncovered, & a Full Bridezilla Meltdown with Jubilee Dawn

My new book Here Comes the Drama: A Ferris and Sloan Story is live!

This bride didn’t want a friend, she wanted free labor.

This week’s listener submission delivers peak bridezilla chaos: free bridesmaid dresses turned into unpaid labor, public bridesmaid demotions, and a cold cutoff once the wedding was over. A painful reminder that pleasing people can invite the wrong kind of power.

This week, Christa sits down with Jubilee Dawn to unpack a story that cuts even deeper. A 17-year friendship that unraveled after a wedding alcohol “reimbursement” exposed money scams, blind loyalty, and manipulation buried for years. From betrayal to boundaries, this episode proves weddings don’t change people, they reveal them.

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Must-Hear Insights and Key Moments

Maid of Honor Betrayal – A 17-year friendship collapses after a wedding alcohol “reimbursement” exposes manipulation and gaslighting.
The Receipt That Changed Everything – Credit card statements uncover a pattern of financial abuse far bigger than one wedding.
Forced Forgiveness & Gaslighting – Confrontation is met with defensiveness, religious pressure, and zero accountability.
Losing Half the Bridal Party – Setting boundaries reveals enablers unwilling to face the truth.
Bridezilla & Free Labor – A listener story exposes kindness exploited for unpaid dresses and wedding work.
Public Humiliation on Display – Bridesmaids are demoted, helpers yelled at, and friends treated like staff.
When Weddings Reveal Character – Weddings don’t create drama, they expose power, patterns, and priorities.

Words of Wisdom: Standout Quotes from This Episode

“ Weddings bring out people’s true colors. How people are people.” – Christa Innis
“Being sensitive doesn’t make you weak—it means you notice when something’s wrong.” – Christa Innis
“ I think learning to put up boundaries in a healthy way has been a big part of my healing.” – Jubilee Dawn
“You don’t owe anyone access to you just because you’ve known them a long time.” – Christa Innis
“Forgiveness without accountability isn’t healing, it’s just more harm.” – Jubilee Dawn
“Being a bridesmaid is not payment for free labor.” – Christa Innis
“If everyone’s ex is ‘crazy,’ maybe it’s not the exes.” – Christa Innis
“I spent years believing everyone was good. Healing taught me that boundaries matter more than optimism.” – Jubilee Dawn
“After 17 years, I realized I never actually knew her.” – Jubilee Dawn
“You’re not dramatic for noticing patterns, you’re paying attention.” – Christa Innis
“Walking away was the hardest and healthiest choice I’ve ever made.” – Jubilee Dawn
“Losing half my bridal party hurt, but losing my peace would’ve hurt more.” – Jubilee Dawn
“Being kind doesn’t mean being available for exploitation.” –Christa Innis

*This conversation is for entertainment and informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional advice. Please seek a licensed professional for your specific situation.

About Jubilee

Jubilee Dawn is a prominent content creator, advocate, and storyteller known for sharing raw, honest conversations about religious deconstruction, purity culture, and healing from toxic systems. Through her platforms on TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube, Jubilee opens up about personal experiences, survivor stories, and the complicated realities of setting boundaries, especially when it comes to relationships, faith, and family dynamics. She hosts two podcasts entitled “Healed-ish” and “The Overshare Hour”, where she blends vulnerability, humor, and hard truths to help others feel less alone and more empowered.

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Blog Transcript:

Note: We use AI transcription so there may be some inaccuracies

Christa Innis: Hey guys. Welcome back to another episode of, Here Comes The Drama. I’m your host, Christa Innis, and starting off today, I wanna ask you guys a question just to set the scene, get the mood right. How would you feel if someone you had trusted, someone you had known for over 17 years and ask to be a part of your wedding day if you found out that they conned you?

How would you feel? Because that’s exactly what happened to today’s guest. I have Jubilee Dawn here and she’s gonna share her own wedding story of how her maid of honor, who she knew for over 17 years conned her on her wedding day. And it is just a very shocking story. Um, jaws were dropped many times. My, uh.

I just couldn’t, I couldn’t contain what I was feeling inside. Um, so I’m gonna allow her, allow her, I’m gonna have her tell her story. Um, starting off, we’re just gonna jump right into it because it is very drama filled, very shocking, and a lot of details you wanna pay attention to. Um, of course, in addition to that, we are gonna share some, uh, red flag, green flag kind of scenarios.

And then of course. A wild wedding story from one of my followers here. So we are gonna get into it today. Enjoy this very detailed, very shocking episode. Um, yeah, without further ado, enjoy this episode. Bye guys. Oh, take that part.

So without further ado, here’s that very wild episode. Enjoy.

Christa Innis: Hi Jubilee. Thank you so much for coming on.

Jubilee Dawn: Oh, thank you so much for having me.

Christa Innis: I’m so excited to have you on. I follow your content pretty regularly, and someone had sent me your wild. Maid of honor story. But before we get to that, I want you just to introduce yourself, talk about what you share on social media, all that good stuff, and then we’ll get into, uh, your wild story.

Jubilee Dawn: Yeah. I am Jubilee Dawn. I share on TikTok and Instagram, and I have two podcasts and I share a lot about religious deconstruction, so I talk a lot about purity culture. Crazy youth pastor stories. And then also I’ve done many story times about the maid of honor situations.

Christa Innis: Okay. I love it. Yeah.

Jubilee Dawn: All healing stuff.

Christa Innis: How do you, okay, so what are your two podcasts and how do you find the time to do two podcasts? I’m like, with one, I’m just like, oh my God. It’s, a lot of times

Jubilee Dawn: I honestly don’t even know how I’m doing it. I just went part-time, thank goodness. Um, at, ’cause I still have a job. Job Okay. On top of doing content.

But, uh, my podcast that I do like, my main podcast, I would say is Heel Dish, and that’s where I do any survivor stories. And yeah, I have an editor, so that helps for that one. And then my other podcast is the Overshare Hour. And on that one we do advice. So it’s an advice column podcast, and it’s with my best friend.

We both joined religious cults at the age of 17 and 18 and she actually married my brother and they are have since divorced, but her and I are still best friends, so Wow. Yeah, she’s also a content creator, so we have a lot of fun on that one as well. And then we like switch off editing those, but yes, I feel very busy.

Christa Innis: I love that. So were you guys friends before she married your brother or that kind of made you guys connect?

Jubilee Dawn: I knew her from youth group, so I met her when I was 14 and I think she was 15 and she started to date my brother, but we became friends through their relationship, so they were together for about 10 years and she is the mother to my two nieces.

So I mean, she’s family, she’s

Christa Innis: always involved. Yes. Yeah, she’ll always be there. I love that. I love when you like get connected, like through marriage, whether it works out or not, and then you just like find your person and you’re like your best friend, so that’s awesome that. You have that outlet too, to be able to like, give advice and share stories.

I love that you’re using your platform for that because it’s such an important thing to highlight. So many people have, um, stories of youth group or how, you know, they grew up, I guess you wanna say. But um, yeah, I think it’s really important.

Jubilee Dawn: Thank you. Yeah, I’m always shocked by the stories, so that’s like one of the main things I do is just read stories and, uh, they’re wild.

So that’s why I love what you do here too. I’m obsessed with wild stories

Christa Innis: and I feel like we can relate. It’s funny because people will comment on these stories that I share on YouTube and you know, of course, like there’s no way to triple check, like if everything’s a hundred percent true, right? It’s through the eyes of the person that sent it to me.

But I’ll get comments sometimes when people are like, there’s no way this can be real. This sounds made up. This is, and I’m like. These maybe, maybe part is exaggerated, we don’t really know. But the fact of the matter is these things happen and we, if we don’t allow people to share their stories, then it, it creates a space, like an unsafe space.

So I feel like opening the doors up to be like, Hey, this happened to me. And it allows other people to share their stories, to relate or be like, wow, that was really weird because someone did that to me too, and now I can stand up for myself. And I think it’s, there’s so much power in storytelling.

Jubilee Dawn: No, absolutely.

And I get comments like that too, where people will be like, there’s no way these stories are real. And I’m like, well go to the comments and see the five other people that said that the exact same thing happened in their, uh, church or wherever they grew up. I mean, no, it’s real for sure. Yes. Crazy things do happen.

The Maid of Honor You Thought You Knew

Christa Innis: It’s so wild. So jumping into wild stories, you, and this is like the first time I think I saw your content was when you were talking about your maid of honor conned you at your own wedding, which is just shocking in that sentence alone. Um, so let’s just dive in. What happened, and I’ll probably just ask questions along the way.

’cause this is just shocking for many people to like, comprehend.

Jubilee Dawn: Yeah. I, I feel like a lot of questions that people have when I say that is, oh, she must have been someone new in your life. ’cause you know, sometimes you hit it off with somebody and you ask them to be in your wedding after like a year, you know, uh, that was not the case.

So I was actually close with her for 17 years and 15. Wow. Yeah. So we became best friends when I was 12 and she was 19. Uh, which is weird in hindsight, but. At the time, I just thought I was mature for my age and, uh, basically we’re connected. I try to be vague because, uh, I just try to be vague about how I know her, but yes.

Yeah. Um, yeah, I knew her for 17 years. She was always my best friend. I am divorced, so I also got divorced because of a Walt Disney World Burger. That’s like another crazy story

Christa Innis: because of a Walt Disney burger.

Jubilee Dawn: Yes. My, my ex got, he was very abusive and okay. He got very mad when I shared a bite of my burger with my cousin at Disney World.

Um, and I didn’t even give him the burger to buy it. I took a fork and gave him a bite of it, and my ex said that that was disrespectful to him as the man at the table. Um, it was so crazy. Was this the

Christa Innis: first red flag or the final red flag?

Jubilee Dawn: The final red flag. And thankfully I think it made me. Address the situation for the first time because family members witnessed it and he ended up threatening to strain me in Florida and it was like a huge fight in the middle of Disney World.

Like those viral videos that you see of people fighting in Disney, it’s like so cringey. That was absolutely the case. Oh my god. Um, so yeah, after he was abusive, after that I finally ended up leaving. So this best friend who I call Crystal, she was my maid of honor for that wedding as well. So I just really didn’t think that there was anything I needed to be worried about with her.

Obviously after 17 years you really think you know someone, but mm-hmm. Um, all that to say on the wedding day, there was a situation where her husband had said, I want to be the bartender for the wedding. Uh, he said, this will be our gift to you. I really want to bartend, because he was like a very big drinker and he was always.

Making drinks. And um, it was also gonna be at a family member’s house. So it’s not like we were at a venue, it was at my grandma’s house.

Christa Innis: Right.

Jubilee Dawn: So as the night is going on, he had told me how much alcohol to buy and it seemed like the right amount of alcohol. I mean, I bought a lot of wine, a lot of tequila, and it wasn’t a huge wedding, it was maybe 80 people.

Mm-hmm. So throughout the night, my maid of honor crystal ended up coming up to me and she was like, Hey, this is, I’m so sorry, but we are running out of alcohol. There is no more alcohol left and um, I can send my husband to go get some more. And I was like, oh, well, um, yeah, definitely like go and do that.

Thank you so much. I so appreciate that you guys are willing to go and do that. Because it was on New Year’s Eve too. I wasn’t even sure what would be open. Right. You know? Um, so yeah, I told them that I would reimburse them for whatever they spent on this alcohol. So he came back, he had all of the alcohol and it was great.

Like, I had a great time on the wedding day and I didn’t know that anything weird had happened. Mm-hmm.

The Wedding Alcohol Scam

Jubilee Dawn: So the next day it, it, we are at the airport on the way to our honeymoon, and I get this text from her and she said, Hey, I just wanted to let you know you owe us $373. I think it was, and I, that surprised me that it was that much because I knew I had bought so much alcohol, uh, for this wedding.

But I was like, okay, sure. Um, I don’t know. What do you think about this, like texting the day after the wedding? Like I feel like personally I wouldn’t have

Christa Innis: no, like, that’s like, Hey, send me the

Jubilee Dawn: money.

Christa Innis: Yes. That’s like their time. Like I feel like I wouldn’t bother the couple right after the wedding.

Jubilee Dawn: Right. I know.

And I’m like very good about paying people back. So, I mean, I probably would’ve texted her on my own, but I. I think if it was just that it wouldn’t have mattered. But given everything I know, I feel like that was odd. So I ended up ven mowing her husband, the money, we went on our honeymoon. It was great.

And when I came back I was working for a family business and one of the things that my family had delegated to me was just to pay this family member who had dementia pay their mortgage. So, um, on top of that I was also supposed to somewhat look at the credit card statements just to make sure the balance didn’t get too high.

Mm-hmm. I wasn’t told to look through it or verify purchases or anything like that. They just said make sure that it doesn’t get too high to the, the credit limit. Mm-hmm. So I’m going through it and I noticed that the balance seemed kind of high that month. I was like, okay, well let me look at what is on here.

So as I’m looking over this family member’s Bill, I see that there was an alcohol charge on our wedding day for $373, and that is the exact amount that I had paid my maid of honor. And I was like, wait, that doesn’t make any sense because I reimbursed her husband. But it looks like, I mean, there’s like my family member with dementia, they do not drive, they did not go buy this alcohol themselves.

Right. Obviously someone took their card. Mm-hmm. And people would often use this person’s card to go pick up their groceries and stuff like that. So it would not be without like outside of the realm of possibility that Crystal or her husband would have known where the card was to find this card. Mm-hmm.

Because there was just a lot of trust in these circles that people would do the right thing. Yeah. Like,

Christa Innis: here, take my card and get groceries or, yeah.

Jubilee Dawn: Yeah, exactly. Because I mean, they were relying on people to take care of them and pay their bills, and we all kind of had our own responsibilities. So mine was the mortgage and that, but all sorts of people were helping with their care.

So I was really confused about that. And I ended up going and speaking with another family member, the one who had tasked me with going through the sheet. And that is when he noticed, he ended up going through their checkbook, the family members who has dementia’s checkbook, and seeing that a check was written the day after the wedding for $500.

And in the memo line it said wedding alcohol.

Christa Innis: So there’s another check,

Jubilee Dawn: another check, oh, for wedding alcohol. And I’m like, wait, what? Why? Why would they have? And it was to my maid of honors husband. It was

Christa Innis: directly to him?

Jubilee Dawn: Yes.

Christa Innis: Yeah. Did they know, sorry if this is a jump in the gun, but did they know this couple that you managed or like looked at this person’s money?

They, so they kind of, they didn’t think you would ever see it?

Jubilee Dawn: I don’t think that they knew that I was getting the statements. No. I think they knew that I helped a bit with the family. Like I would coordinate the, um, lawnmower to go out there and, you know, take care of their home. But I don’t think that they knew that I had access to these statements and then they definitely didn’t know that I would go and talk to another family member and be able to see that this check was written to Crystal’s husband.

Christa Innis: And what was their connection? Crystal and her husband to this family member? Anything or just they just knew them through you?

Jubilee Dawn: I try to be vague.

Christa Innis: Okay.

Jubilee Dawn: Um, yeah. But you can put two and two together.

Christa Innis: Yes. Yes. Okay.

Jubilee Dawn: Mm-hmm. So, um, yeah, so I was kind of very confused at that point because I did not know how else to see it because I, it very much seemed like they had gotten reimbursed for something that they didn’t pay for.

Mm-hmm. So I ended up texting her and I said, Hey, um, this is what I found. Can you help me understand what this is? Mm-hmm. And she ended up freaking out. She like, started blowing up my phone. How dare you after everything I have done for you, after everything I have done for this wedding, um, like, how dare you question me, essentially.

And, uh, like, you think we need money. We don’t need money. You think that we care enough about $300 to do something like this? And. I kept asking, but you’re not explaining. Yeah. Why are you so defensive? You’re very defensive and you’re also not explaining how that happened. Um, so it was just this big blow up fight and then all of a sudden I get a Venmo from her husband and he sent me $500 over Venmo.

Christa Innis: Oh. So he took it because if you’re not guilty, you’re not gonna send it back.

Jubilee Dawn: Yeah. He, which I’m like, I never even gave him the 500, but I think he was just trying to make a point. So he ended up sending it and was like, uh, here, here’s this money. How dare you? You’re horrible. And he was just very mad that I would dare question them.

So at that point I was just fuming and I don’t want their money at this point ’cause I’m like, Ugh, this is just gross. I don’t understand what’s going on. So I Venmo him the $500 back and then I blocked him on Venmo so that he wouldn’t keep sending me money. Um, they did end up paying me back a little bit later on, which I’ll get to, but.

Um, yeah, I was very confused by that and I started to talk to other family members to see what they thought and some people who were closer to her were kind of defensive and they didn’t wanna see and they didn’t wanna hear about it. And that was strange to me that they were not interested in looking at the facts.

’cause I, I said if you guys have another way to see it, let me know because I just don’t know how else to take this other than it seems like they kind of scammed to get money. And one thing that she did say was that he had used some of his personal alcohol on the wedding day. Um, I never asked them to do that though, ever.

Right. So basically he said, well, I used some of my personal alcohol and that’s why she gave me $500. So

Christa Innis: a lot of alcohol to like, yeah.

Jubilee Dawn: Yeah. And there there was only maybe 80 people there. A a lot of people, it was a New Year’s Eve wedding. A lot of people didn’t stay till midnight. And a lot of my family members don’t drink.

And also, there were a lot of children at this wedding, so it’s not like we were dealing with a ton of heavy, like 80 heavy drinkers. That’s not what the situation was. So, um, later on I ended up finding that there were over 15 bottles of unopened wine, which is insane. Um, at my family member’s house, it was in the, the pantry.

And I, I don’t know. ’cause she had told me that we had run out of alcohol. So I said, Hey, we didn’t even run out of alcohol. Why, why did you send people off? And she said, well, people didn’t want that alcohol. Um, and I kind of get that, but I also feel like we’re not rich. And I do think that sometimes at weddings, you know, you see people, they’ll just have red wine, white wine and beer and there was tons of beer and wine leftover.

So it’s almost like, well we just, in theory, I don’t even know if this is true, we ran out of tequila and then he wanted to go buy $370 worth of other alcohol. Um, I wish they would’ve asked me and said, Hey, we only have wine left. Do you want us to go get more liquor or should we just tell the guests that there’s wine and beer?

Um, right. But anyway, I mean, it wouldn’t have mattered that much if it wasn’t for the scam. Yeah. So it’s like they

Christa Innis: wanted you to reimburse them for money. They put on someone else’s credit card in addition to another $500. So we’re talking over $1,100 Now if I’m doing the quick math Right. ’cause everything was added up and they didn’t actually pay out of pocket for anything.

Jubilee Dawn: Yeah, exactly. They didn’t pay out of pocket for anything. So this whole thing blew up. And then this is when things got really crazy. Um, one of the family members who worked at the business who found the $500 payment, I was just in shock and wheeling and didn’t know how to handle this and was kind of just wondering.

A Pattern Buried for Years

I mean, this is my best friend in theory and this is my wedding day. I can’t imagine that she would do this. And that is when he decided to let me in on the fact that this was not the first time that something like this had happened with Crystal.

Christa Innis: Oh.

Jubilee Dawn: And it had gotten buried. So basically there was a time where I was living in Atlanta with my ex, and I was not around the family during the time that this all blew up.

But basically Crystal had been living with this family member with dementia. And she had been taking care of her along with her husband, and they were living in the house. But my, my, uh, family members, they were very wealthy, you know, so it’s not like they were suffering, you know, they’re living in this giant mansion, rent free and taking care of them, which really just meant, I don’t know, bringing them take out sometimes.

You know, I, it wasn’t that hard of a job. And apparently during a span of three, maybe three to four years, they had spent, um, around 300 to $400,000 of my family members’ money. I know. And it, it’s absolute insanity. And okay. To this day, when I confronted Crystal about all of this, she says, well, they wanted me to spend it.

They, they wanted me to spend this money. They told me to go buy whatever I wanted, and absolutely not. There’s no way. On top of that, she had drained every single one of their bank accounts. So my, my family member had had a good amount of money and it, I mean, crystal absolutely knew what she was doing because she would take every account to zero and then we have record that the checks were bouncing and then she would switch to the next account.

What? And to the next account. And during this time she was going on extravagant trips. Um, they were, yeah, going on cruises. They were going to DC doing whale watching. He was getting new tires on his car. They even used my family member’s card to pay around $7,000 in taxes to the IRS.

Christa Innis: Oh my gosh.

Jubilee Dawn: I know.

And the thing that I’m like, this is nail in the coffin. The same day that they put those taxes on the card, they also got a, um, in. A check for almost the exact same amount from the family member. Uh, so they got paid for it twice and mm-hmm. I guarantee what happened was Crystal went to this person and said, oh, we owe this money.

I’m so stressed, would you please pay it? And so not only did she kind of like manipulate somebody who has dementia, she ended up actually putting it on the card and then taking the check and making money off of that. Um, that’s wild. Yeah, it was horrible. So the, the reason I didn’t find out about this was there was a huge blowup where it, it caused a lot of drift in the family at the time.

And when I was in Atlanta, I received this call from Crystal and she was crying and I mean, this is my best friend, you know, and you, you feel like you always want to have your best friend’s back, so mm-hmm. She called me crying saying, I’m being accused of stealing. And I didn’t do this. And they’re, they just see that a lot of money has been spent, but they don’t realize that the reason that the credit card is so high is because I’m paying all of the bills.

I’m paying the energy bill, I’m paying the mortgage, I’m doing all of this. This is why the bill seems so high, but nobody wants to listen to me. Mm-hmm. Um, and they just are want to misunderstand me. And she also said, and I did spend a little too much at Dillard’s one day. She said. She said, but you know how this family member is, they’ll tell you to go get anything you want sometimes.

And I just spent too much one day at the mall. Um, but she had told me that I could. And honestly, that kind of tracked my family member was like that. She was very giving. There would be times where before school would start, she would give me her card and say, I want you to go get at least $500 worth of school clothes.

You know, and she was just a very giving person. But that is very different than three to $400,000. Um,

Christa Innis: yeah. I can’t even comprehend that.

Jubilee Dawn: No, I’m like, that’s, that’s an outrageous amount of money. And I mean, it was honestly just crazy spending. It was daily Starbucks, uh, they had so many subscription, like chewy boxes.

They had clothing subscriptions, uh, getting mailed to them. Yeah. They were also getting a maid service get sent to their personal house. They eventually moved out and a maid was coming and cleaning their house on my family member’s card. Um, and they eventually moved to Baltimore for her husband’s work.

And while they were even living in a different state, they were still using her card and living off of her.

Christa Innis: So it was just like a matter of like, yeah, maybe a couple times. This family member, family member was like, yeah, you can use this to buy the car. Like, use my card for whatever. But then it started taking advantage of it and like really just like taking it for whatever they needed and.

Lying, esp knowing that this person has dementia. Like, oh, they’re, they’re not gonna realize they’re not gonna look at this and then completely blowing up in their face.

Jubilee Dawn: Absolutely. And the reason that it finally ever came out was, uh, somebody had, or my family member, her husband had asked, can you look into our money?

I feel like people keep telling us we’re broke. People keep telling us we need to be careful with our money, but we don’t leave the house. Why, why are we broke? So finally somebody looked into it and then they uncovered all of this theft and there was an hour long conversation that we actually have recorded.

That’s why I feel so safe talking about it too, is we have my family members recorded saying we never gave her permission to, to spend like that. We thought that she was only spending for us. We didn’t understand that she was spending like this on the card. So, um, yeah, realizing that I had been lied to that entire time.

I think because I was in, in Atlanta, people just didn’t wanna get involved and tell me, in hindsight, I wish people had told me, I had no idea that it was that bad. I was under the impression that, oh no, she went on a shopping spree and people are mad, but nobody told me, Hey, that’s not true. Actually, she stole a lot of money and mm-hmm Um, it ended up coming out okay.

Going back to the wedding. She also pulled another con on my bachelorette, so it’s so ridiculous. Like it’s just a pattern of behavior. So there was another situation where we went to Hell, the Moon, which is this really fun piano bar with Bachelorette and it’s always super packed and it’s hard to get a table on the weekends.

So we wanted to reserve two tables and I think it was around $260. Mm-hmm. And it was gonna be split between five girls. So my maid of honor Crystal had sent out a text saying, here is. How much it’s gonna cost if everybody can Venmo me. I think it was around $56. Everybody Venmo me $56, uh, for your portion of this.

And then once I found the wedding alcohol scam, I started going back to all these other statements and I saw that that was also on the card and that she had never paid for the hell at the moon. So she’s

Christa Innis: trying to make money off of it. Yeah. But she didn’t pay herself and she

Jubilee Dawn: did, she, she made money off of all of my friends and family because, uh, we, we sent her money for that and she pocketed it.

So, um, it was just a pattern of behavior. So then we started looking into it even more and found out that not only had she done that all those years before, but she was still doing it now, not to the same degree. Wow. Because she had been caught before. So I think she was trying to be a bit more careful, but there were so many times where.

For example, there was one where it was like zoo reimbursement and the receipts added up to $300 and she got a $400 check in reimbursement. So trying to get like little

Christa Innis: increments to like cover it up. Yes. And they were

Jubilee Dawn: buying gift cards that I, I went full investigator mode at this point. This was my entire personality for about six months because I was like, this is my friendship on the line.

Yes. I wanna know what type of person this is. So I, I, yeah. Went full investigator. I ended up going to Walmart. I went to Target, I went to Lowe’s, and I asked for receipts because I could see how much was being spent, but I didn’t know what was being spent. Mm-hmm. And when I did that, I found that they were buying Visa gift cards.

So it was a way for them to get cash and it looked like a legitimate purchase for groceries and it wasn’t so. They, they came up with all sorts of creative ways to scam pretty much.

Christa Innis: That is wild. I feel like someone like that is always looking at, at opportunities to like con or make money off of people.

Like as soon as you said the bachelorette thing, I was like, I’ve heard similar stories where people not quite like that where they have someone else’s card, but it’s like maybe they, um, it wasn’t as much as they said. It was like maybe it was only 30 a person, but they’re charging everyone 50 a person.

They’re like, oh, well they’re putting in tip and all this stuff. And that’s why it’s so hard to like trust people. And I’m sure that’s why you kind of then racked your brain and you’re like, wait, this is someone that’s been in my life for so long. What else have they lied about? Like, I feel like you probably would just go through all these memories and being like, okay, what can I trust with them?

Jubilee Dawn: I know, absolutely. That is what it was like. And honestly, the more I looked into it, like there, there’s so much more, and it’s darker, you know, um, that I did discover things about her that she had lied about for years and years. And yeah, just realizing I never knew her was really quite crazy. And she was just very defensive.

Losing Half the Bridal Party

Jubilee Dawn: She refused to apologize and I went to therapy. I wrote her, you know, ’cause at the time I was still a pretty strong Christian and I was trying to really believe in forgiveness. So I was like, okay, I’m gonna write her this letter with my therapist and I’m going to say, Hey, I could forgive you if you admitted all of this.

Like, maybe you feel backed into a corner. Maybe you feel ashamed, maybe you feel all of these things. So I wrote her a letter and I said, you know, the only way I could ever move forward because I am the godmother to her son too. I mean, it’s, wow. It’s very sad, you know? I would need you to admit all of these things and actually apologize for it and stop making excuses.

And she wrote back this very gas lighty letter saying, well, it’s not my fault that I was her favorite.

Christa Innis: Oh my God. It

Jubilee Dawn: was crazy. And it was like, oh, well you just don’t understand her like I do. And I’m like, I do actually. I, I do. So, yeah. Um, that’s, and we have her on tape saying that she had no idea, never AAL along with her husband who didn’t have dementia as severely as she did, you know?

Mm-hmm. So, um, yeah, it was crazy. So at that point we had to cut ties

Christa Innis: and it’s way different than like the, it’s all bad, but it’s like way different than like someone, you know, giving the, the, um. The credit card and she going to buy some stuff and sneak some stuff in for herself or whatever. But then also blatantly lying and trying to double up on that and being like, you owe me this for the, you know, so it’s like to never admit that.

’cause that’s, that was gonna be my next question is did she ever actually admit to like being wrong or doing something or she just in denial that she’s innocent?

Jubilee Dawn: Yeah, she basically said, well, she wanted me to have these things. And she also, she acts very, uh, I don’t know if you’ve ever met someone like this who acts kind of childlike.

They like kind of play dumb, like, oh my gosh. So she, she would just say, I’m just so bad with money. I’m so bad with money. And you know, I think when I knew that that was not true and I absolutely knew that she was being diabolical, was when I saw that every single bank account had been drained. Um, you know, ’cause she had kind of claimed, well, I just thought that they were super rich.

I, I thought that they were okay with me having this and that they wanted to spoil me. Um, but we know that that’s not the truth because every bank account was going to zero. And actually before they moved to Baltimore, they specifically drained every single account before their move. So that was the final account that got drained and it was timed to the week that they moved So, so calculated, obviously you knew what you were doing.

And then when they moved to Baltimore, they were still using, um, their income that would still come in, you know, for themselves. Wow. But yeah, no, she never, she never apologized for, for that. Just saying, you know, I’m sorry, I’m bad with money. I, I’m,

Christa Innis: yeah.

Jubilee Dawn: I’m like, I don’t think that’s good enough.

Christa Innis: You’re well into your thirties, I’m assuming, or something, you know, four, maybe forties.

But at that point, it’s like you can’t just use that as an excuse. You have to be able to own up to that. Like you can’t, you’re not like 15 years old or in elementary school, you know, whatever, where you’re like, oh, I really don’t understand how money works or how credit cards work. It’s like, no, take responsibility.

You know what you are doing.

Jubilee Dawn: Yeah. But I think a lot of it came down to the fact that there were so many enablers around her, because I lost, and that was what went viral in my post, was the fact that I lost half of my bridal party in this situation because they were closely connected to her and they didn’t even wanna hear it.

I said, you know, I have binders of evidence. I will break down for you every single thing. And if you look at this binder and you look at this evidence and you tell me that she did nothing wrong. We’ll agree to disagree, but they wouldn’t even look at it. They said, I’m not, I’m not interested in seeing what you have.

Christa Innis: That’s wild.

Jubilee Dawn: I know. And just be curious. Line loyalty, uh, was so crazy. And that’s when I started to realize that a lot of people had been profiting off of these family members for years. And it, it’s actually, this is a very depressing, I mean, it, it’s sad that it ended this way, but both of them have since passed.

Weddings and Funerals Reveal Everything

Jubilee Dawn: And, um, right before she passed away, they actually tried to get a fake will signed.

Christa Innis: Oh my gosh. They’re ruthless.

Jubilee Dawn: Ruthless. And it was a collaborative effort. It wasn’t just my maid of honor crystal, it was these other people who were in my bridal party. They all knew about it and they’re

Christa Innis: helping.

Jubilee Dawn: Yeah. I mean, yeah, it was, it was crazy.

And in this will, you know, they had written an original Will about 20 years ago, uh, because they have businesses and it’s a big deal, you know, and they had spent time with lawyers. This will was, oh my gosh, huge. Mm-hmm. Super thick. Will, uh, very detailed. And these people, and Crystal tried to go and find a will off of Google.

Like it looked so fake. And it was a couple pages long and it gave them the house and it gave them, I think, an extra $500,000. And they had her sign it when she was, so at that point, they actually had her sign

Christa Innis: it.

Jubilee Dawn: They did, they brought a notary to the house, like, and were there lawyers,

Christa Innis: like, no, this is bs. This isn’t a real thing.

Jubilee Dawn: I mean, they did have a notary go out there and do all that, but they thought about that in court. The, the siblings, you know, they thought about that in court and it got thrown out. The judge was like, that’s not a legitimate will, especially when we know she had dementia. And especially when we have a very legitimate, thick will over here that they obviously put a lot of time into.

Mm-hmm. And for you to have them sign it, you know, it, it was pretty much, you know, they really didn’t fight to have their will verified either. They kind of realized, okay, we tried, it didn’t work, nobody’s buying it. And yeah, they dropped it. But it just shows that so many people we’re willing to take advantage of these people.

And, um, yeah, so that’s how I lost half of my bridal party. That is so, um, including the person who married us, which was very sad. One of our groomsmen actually performed the wedding because he was my best friend and, uh. We don’t talk to him. So we have all of these wedding pictures and now half of these people I don’t even talk to anymore.

Christa Innis: That is crazy. So it’s like, it’s crazy to start off by like, the maid of honor did this and, but it’s, the other people are so easily convinced. ’cause it’s like, did she promise them money too? Did she promise all these things? So they’re like, they’re like, oh, what are you talking about? She’s great. I’m not even gonna like look at the evidence or the facts.

I feel like I’d have such a hard time, like trusting after that. You know, it’s like all these people that you’ve like, have memories with, you have relationships with and then they just like lie. And we always talk about on here, like how like, you know, the focus is like wedding stories and stuff like that.

But when you talked about how they had since passed, we talk about how weddings bring out, you know, people’s true colors. How people are people. The stress gets to people. People power over, like others, you know. But so do funerals. Death brings out the true colors in a lot of people too, because they see it as dollar signs or What am I gonna get from this person?

I think it’s so sad when fights happen at like funerals because it’s like, all they care about is what does, what did this person leave me? And it’s like, that’s not what we should be focusing on right now. But someone like that, that’s the first thing that comes to their mind.

Jubilee Dawn: Absolutely. And I mean, there were so many times this made me so upset.

Crystal would say, um, she told me that she wanted me to have the house. And I’m like, you’re not her child. I, you know, like, that’s so inappropriate. I don’t know why you think you’re, you’re owed this. But she really felt like she was owed all of their money. And she would say things to me like in hindsight, I think I was.

You know, that’s some of the darker stuff, but I was groomed by her. But there are things that she would say growing up that I start to realize were not okay. Where she would say, you know, I’ve realized if you spend time with this family member, they give you more money. She straight up said that to me when I was younger and I, I understand that that is her personality to, to do that.

So it was very hard going to the funeral. I agree that weddings and funerals really bring out that in people. I had to sit in the front row and watch her give a eulogy for this person

Christa Innis: knowing all this.

Jubilee Dawn: Yeah. We both gave eulogies and I had to sit there and you know, at this point, okay, well half of the people here are defending ’cause they’re also profiting and I just have to sit here and respect my family member’s funeral and.

Try to avoid this person as much as possible, but my hope is to never see her again. That, yeah,

Christa Innis: that was probably the last kind of event that you had to both be at, right? Hopefully.

Jubilee Dawn: Yeah. Yeah. We live in the same city though, so I get scared. I mean, when I go to Barnes and Noble or when I go to places where we all lived on the same side of town, so it doesn’t feel outrageous that I might run into some of them at some point.

And it does give me a lot of anxiety.

Christa Innis: Yeah. Yeah.

Jubilee Dawn: Because they’re not happy that I’ve shared on social media,

Christa Innis: I’m sure, because people like that wanna live in their, like delusions that it’s what they did isn’t wrong. Like they, and they’ll convince themselves till the day they die that they’re not wrong.

They, they deserve what they did. And um, it’s like you said, like they, they make up stories. They’re like, I deserve this house. They told me I deserve the house. And they’re gonna keep telling themselves that. ’cause that’s what’s gonna make them feel good about it.

Jubilee Dawn: And I’m like, she might believe it. I don’t know.

She’s so delusional. I, I don’t know. I don’t know what she really thinks, but it’s, it’s definitely wild.

Christa Innis: Wow. That that is one of the top

Jubilee Dawn: wild

Christa Innis: stories I have heard on here. Oh my gosh. Thanks for sharing that. Oh my gosh, that’s, that’s, yeah. Wild. It’s a

Jubilee Dawn: lot for sure.

Religious Manipulation & Forced Forgiveness

Christa Innis: Well, I’m glad to hear too that you’ve like gone to like therapy from it and like hopefully have like healed from some part of that.

I’m sure that’s like a lot because I can’t imagine like someone treating me like that, that you had so closely in your life. Um, and so I’m, I think talking about it too and sharing your story, I’m sure has helped many people relate and connect as well.

Jubilee Dawn: It has because. I think hearing so many of their excuses and them not even wanting to look at it, you feel like you’re going crazy.

I felt like I was being so gaslit like, you guys, this is insane. This is a lot of money. This is not okay. And sharing on TikTok and seeing people defend or I don’t know, back me up and say, no, you’re not crazy. That is wild. And um, there was like a lot of religious manipulation as well from them saying that I should just forgive and move on without her even like apologizing or admitting what she did.

Like we, we just need to move on. Jesus would not want us to fight, you know? Which, um, it’s just crazy, you know? Uh, the fact that they would like to use that. And I have nothing against Christians in Jesus. I actually don’t share what I believe personally, if anyone was wondering. Um, but. I don’t know. It was just crazy to see religion kind of weaponized in that way.

So it is nice going on social media and people telling me, Hey, that’s actually okay, that you never want to see her again. That is valid.

Christa Innis: Yeah. I feel like that’s, that people pleaser mentality too. Like, um, I, not to get like too deep, but like I, I grew up going to the Catholic church and stuff, and this, again, not shaming the Catholic church or anything, but, um, I grew up such a people pleaser because it was like, you want, like, you just have to forgive everybody no matter how they treat you.

Like, and, and it was like, you could never just be like, Nope, cut that person out. No. Like, they didn’t mean it that way. And so I would always try to see the good in every person. And I still, I believe in seeing the good in people, but there are just some people that are inherently like not good and we shouldn’t waste our time trying to.

Build them up when they’re just gonna be like, bad to us. You know what I mean? Like, I know I kind of said that kind of weird, but, um, no, I, I feel like so much of my like childhood was like, no, they’re good. They did this and this and this to me, but like, they’re still a good person. It’s like, no, you don’t have to like believe that.

Jubilee Dawn: No, there are bad people. I think growing up I always thought that too. I just thought everybody is a good person. Everybody’s doing their best. Sometimes people make mistakes and unfortunately I feel like the older I get, I realize, you know, there are wonderful people in this world. Most people are good people, I hope.

Um, but there definitely are people who just don’t care. They, they just really do not care. And nothing brings that out more than social media. Uh, seeing comments and stuff. I’m like, wow, there are some just crazy people in this world who, they just wanna hurt people. And I think learning to put up boundaries in a healthy way has been a big part of my healing.

Red Flag, Green Flag

Christa Innis: Yeah. I love that. That’s, that’s, um, boundaries has been huge. We talk about that a lot, a lot here. Okay. Let’s, let’s get into, um, I do have a story submission. Are we still okay on time? I know we’re going a little, yeah, yeah. Okay, cool. Um, sorry, I’m like losing my voice.

Jubilee Dawn: No, you’re good.

Christa Innis: Okay. Um, this is better than a couple weeks ago.

I like actually lost my voice and by the end of like recording a podcast with someone, I was like, I’m so sorry. I was like, straining my voice, so this is way better than that. Of course. Now I’m like, it’s gone. Okay. Hopefully.

Jubilee Dawn: No, I totally get it. I recorded, um, 10 and a half hours of podcast stuff in the last like six days.

I’m so tired. Oh my gosh. Because I think I was trying to prep because we’re going out of town for the cruise and then my interviews went three hours long with three different people. Um, like three hours each. And I was like, I’m so tired, girl. How do you do that? No. I was like, this is great. This is a short, a short podcast.

I love it. ’cause most of mine are like an hour and a half to three hours.

Christa Innis: Oh my gosh. I, I used to be able to like, listen to like longer podcasts and then like, I was like, I love being able to chat a long time, but now I’m just like, I, I can’t, I can’t squeeze it, squeeze it in. But I love that. Totally fair.

Okay, so before we get to this week’s follower submission, we’re gonna do a little, um, red flag, green flag. So I’m gonna read a statement, this is wedding party edition. And just say if it’s a red flag or a green flag. Okay. Ask if they can bring a plus one you’ve never met.

Jubilee Dawn: Ooh. Um, oh no. I’m gonna be like a yellow flag.

I think it depends on your relationship. I, I think if this was my best friend. I would probably say maybe we could have a game night in advance. That way you could meet them, you know, especially if you feel like it’s gonna be a long-term relationship. But I guess in theory, a red flag if you’re just a casual family member or a distant friend.

Yeah. I don’t think you should bring us one. Yeah. Or insist on it. Yeah.

Christa Innis: And I feel like I’ve always heard too, like I, I agree with the relationship thing ’cause you kind of know like how close you’re with someone. I’ve always heard like not to ask for one. ’cause like, I remember being invited to weddings like young, like early twenties, where like I wasn’t dating anybody and I didn’t get a plus one.

I never would’ve been like, Hey, can I bring a plus one? You know? And then other times I would be going to a wedding, not expecting one. I would get one. I was like, okay, I’ll ask a friend or something, you know? So, um, makes passive aggressive comments about the bachelorette cost.

Jubilee Dawn: Ooh. Red flag. Red flag. I, I think if you have issues with the cost or if you genuinely can’t afford it, there are ways to have like healthy communication as far as like, Hey, I’m actually broke.

Can I pick some of these activities? And not all of them, unless you know, somebody’s willing to help with the cost. But passive aggressive comments definitely a red flag.

Christa Innis: Yes. Let’s just communicate. Um, tries to change the vibe of the bachelorette weekend.

Jubilee Dawn: Ooh, red flag. Yeah. I think you have to go with what the bride wants, you know, whatever their vibe is.

There was that guy who pulled the con with the, uh, the wedding alcohol. He was at the Bachelorette. We did a joint one, and he ended up like doing this weird drinking game where he took a deck of cards and he would say, do you think it’s gonna be a red or a black card? And then we would do it and he’d say, wrong drink.

It was so weird, like the. We’re not, those kind of people we’re not like, take a shot kind of people. And he was trying to change the vibe and we were very uncomfortable. So red flag,

Christa Innis: you’re like immediate red flag. Yeah.

Jubilee Dawn: I was like, this game isn’t even fun.

Christa Innis: Um, post wedding details before the couple does.

Jubilee Dawn: Ooh. Red flag. That is for the couple.

Christa Innis: Yeah. I just read a story where the, um, bride’s boss announced that they were, the girl was engaged before the, before the girl did and started like inviting herself to the wedding. I was like, I can’t wait to meet this

Jubilee Dawn: very presumptuous for like a coworker or boss to think that they’re invited because I don’t think I invited any of my coworkers to my wedding.

I do mind you, I have my own like office, so we don’t work that closely. I probably would if we, you know, work. I

Christa Innis: think it depends on the, on the job for sure. Because when, yeah, when I got married, like my husband I think only invited one person from his work because he at the time was a general manager of a restaurant.

And so like, he’s like, we have way too many people, some I never work with, some I work with, you know, different industry or different areas. So he only invited one. And then I worked in a small office where we were like all close knit like family. And so I invited like 20 with their plus ones. But yeah, I think it really just depends on your job and you should never feel like you are gonna automatically be invited to a coworker’s wedding.

’cause just depends on your relationship.

Jubilee Dawn: And micro weddings are a thing, you know, I feel like weddings are getting smaller and smaller because we’re all broke, you know? Um, yeah. So I would never assume that I’m being invited, even if we’re like decent friends, you know? Yes. Because who know?

Christa Innis: Yeah. And I, I feel like that’s one thing, like in my early twenties, again, when I wasn’t dating anyone seriously, that I did not understand, like, like I had friends that would just get like married with just family.

And I was like, I don’t, what? I don’t get it. Like, ’cause every wedding I’d been to were like these big weddings or like, a lot of people invited and you almost were like, you can’t take it personal ’cause you’re just like, no, like, like my one friend that did it. Like she was just never wanted to be like, all eyes on me.

Please do not, I just wanna get married and be on with it. And I was like, okay. That, looking back, I’m like, that makes sense. Um, it’s her personality. Yes. Um, Mrs. The, the rehearsal, but shows up hungover on the wedding day.

Jubilee Dawn: Oh, red flag. That’s so mean. Yeah. I, I, I would understand if you had something going on, but if you were out partying instead of going to the rehearsal.

That’s not nice. And honestly, the rehearsal is such a beautiful time. ’cause a lot of the time that’s when they do the toast. It’s very heartfelt. And I would feel very sad if anybody in my bridal party missed my rehearsal. Yeah. If they didn’t have a reason.

Christa Innis: Right. Yeah. I think we had a couple that couldn’t, let’s see, I think we had a couple that couldn’t make the rehearsal because of like, one just had a new baby and then one’s flight was like delayed.

But other than that, yeah. I think most everyone came. And I just tell people too, I’m like, it’s not the end all be all, like if something came up. But yeah, you always try to be there. Um, every turns, every group chat convo back to themselves.

Jubilee Dawn: Ooh, red flag. I’ve known people like this where it just goes back to them.

It’s like you, you try so hard to involve everybody in like, let’s talk about this person now. And it’s like, no. It just somehow gets turned back into like their life or their drama 24 7.

Christa Innis: Yes. Yes. All right. Let’s see. Last one, um, says, I’m just being honest before being rude.

Jubilee Dawn: No, I hate that so much. Red flag.

That is not an excuse for, that reminds me of, uh, Taylor Swift, casually cruel in the name of being honest, you know? Yes. Not, okay.

Christa Innis: It’s that or the, I was just joking after saying something.

Jubilee Dawn: You’re so sensitive. Oh my goodness. Ugh. Gosh,

Christa Innis: I, that was probably like one of the most common things I’ve heard to me growing up.

You’re just sensitive. You’re so sensitive

Jubilee Dawn: to be fair. I am so,

Christa Innis: no, I’m like, but yeah. Then you learn later. You’re like, I’m proud of being sensitive. I’m, I’m, I’m path, I’m in tune with my doctors.

Jubilee Dawn: I would like to think I’m a good person because I’m very sensitive.

Christa Innis: Yes. I know. I’m like, why were we taught that?

It was like. A bad thing to be like emotional or sad. I feel like that’s just like one of those like patriarchal things where it’s like, where it’s like, oh, don’t show your emotions. Like you need to hide it. Don’t cry, don’t do this. So whenever like if my daughter like who’s almost three, like when she shows emotion, I’m like, it’s okay.

Be sad. Are you frustrated? Are you angry? Do you need space? Like trying to be that like overly like I think that’s one thing you feel your inner

Jubilee Dawn: child.

Christa Innis: Yes. I think that’s one thing. Millennial parents are like doing better than like the generation, again, not critiquing the previous one, but I feel like it was very just like, we always try to like improve the previous generation and I feel like we were told a lot like, don’t cry, don’t be emotional.

And I always try to like hide my tears if I was upset and I’m like, no, you own that emotion. It’s a fi, it’s fine. Let’s name it.

Jubilee Dawn: I know I was such an emotional kid. Um. I don’t even know why I was so emotional, but, uh, I think when I was in first grade, my teacher actually came up to me and said, I’m going to make a calendar and mark every day that you cry and show it to your mom.

Oh my God. To be fair, I was a very emotional kid. Um, but I was like, oh, okay. Don’t cry anymore. You know, or else she’s gonna go tell my mom.

Christa Innis: Was she saying it like in a mean way or like

Jubilee Dawn: Yes. Yes. In a mean way. Like, I’m gonna mark it down. Just to be fair, I was bullied because I had an afro when I was a kid and the kids used to call me cotton ball.

They were so mean. Kids are, they are ruthless. Yeah. But it’s okay. I forget that they were children, but, oh

Christa Innis: my gosh. I had a kid one time. Um. Tell someone that I looked like a chipmunk because of my big front teeth. Oh my gosh. No. But I was so proud of myself. ’cause looking back, so like in elementary, I was really shy and this was in high school and I was friends with a girl that was like cooler than me.

Like she was like, she was like friends with everybody. And I was just like, I was like, oh my gosh, I’m friends with her because I was like really like shy and she was talking to these boys and this boy said it to her, like something about like chipmunk. And she came and told me and I go, you think I look like a chipmunk?

And I like called him out and then he was embarrassed, so I was like, yeah, so don’t do that.

Jubilee Dawn: Good for you. That’s like the epitome of what an odd thing to say.

Christa Innis: Yes. Yeah. What a weird thing to say out loud.

Jubilee Dawn: Yeah. Repeat it.

Listener Submission: The Bridezilla Who Used Her Friends

Christa Innis: Yeah. Oh my gosh. Okay, let’s get into this week’s, uh, follower submission. So these are real stories people send me, so let’s just react as we go.

Okay. I met the bride through mutual friends, the kind of friendly magnetic girl who seemed to pull people into her orbit. She was newly engaged, excited, and quickly invited me to be in her inner circle. Her fiance and their two best guy friends, Matt and Bill, before long were all hanging out constantly.

Somehow, without realizing it, I became the person she relied on the most. She knew I sewed and weddings are expensive, so when she admitted she was stressed about her budget, I offered to make her bridesmaid dresses for free. I genuinely wanted to help. This is like the, the case of the people pleaser with the per like, like the, I don’t know what you would call the other person.

Like the energy, like vampires.

Jubilee Dawn: Thicker. Yes. Oh my gosh. That’s so much work. I can’t even imagine.

Christa Innis: I can’t even imagine making one, let alone however many bridesmaids she had

Jubilee Dawn: and tailoring all of those. To the bridesmaids. Wow. Yeah.

Christa Innis: Yeah. Oh my gosh. She must have brought it up a lot in front of this girl to be like, okay, I’ll make ’em, I’ll make all these dresses.

Jubilee Dawn: Oh, you so, oh, well, I’m having the hardest time. Yes. What am I gonna do? You know, which, I mean, hey, that’s kind of how Crystal was. Crystal was the type of person where she would like, um, the, going back to like the, the theft and everything, she would say, well, she would offer, and it’s like, yeah, she has dementia and if you go up to her and say, oh my gosh, I have no money, I have no, whatever.

You know, it was very much that type of situation where if you go and like whine about your problems, like loud enough, then obviously her being like a good Christian woman, she was going to offer to give you,

Christa Innis: right. There’s those kinds of people that. That’s how they were raised is like, you help someone in need.

Right? And so like, then there’s the people that take advantage of those people. ’cause they’re like, oh, they’re not gonna tell me no. Like, yeah. Ugh.

Jubilee Dawn: I’ll have a convenient breakdown around the person who has something I want.

Christa Innis: Uhhuh. Oh yeah, she, um, okay. So then within days the warning signs started popping up.

Her aunt who had flown in from overseas suddenly decided she wanted to take over making the dresses, despite not knowing how to sew properly, shocked to absolutely no one, the dresses fell apart. How did that work? Like if the one girl’s like, I’m gonna sell these dresses, and the, and it’s like, jk, like, I’m gonna do it like.

Jubilee Dawn: It’s like, why would you volunteer for that? To me, that sounds like a nightmare. If I found out that somebody else was handling that, I’d be like, thank you for doing that. I don’t wanna do that. Like

Christa Innis: a control thing or something. But I’d also as a bride be like, no, my friend’s got it. Like, she knows what she’s doing.

Yeah. Oh, this is weird. Um, the bride came back to me in tears begging me to fix everything, and then came the kicker she said as a payment for making all the dresses. She’d make me a bridesmaid. Wait, she wasn’t even a bridesmaid at this point

Jubilee Dawn: because people are dying to be bridesmaids. Okay. I don’t know like that.

That’s the thing.

Christa Innis: I thought this whole time she was a bridesmaid.

Jubilee Dawn: I know. To do all of that work and not even be a bridesmaid.

Christa Innis: Yeah. Wow. I

Jubilee Dawn: feel like when you accept being a bridesmaid, you understand that you’re gonna get delegated something, a couple tasks, you know, or something like that. But to do all of that when she hasn’t known her that long.

Yeah. She’s an owner that looks all the bridesmaid. That’s like not even something I would ever be able to do. I, I would rather help pay Yeah. For the bridesmaids dresses than to make them myself. Oh,

Christa Innis: a hundred percent. You, yeah. You don’t want me making a bridesmaid dress. That thing would fall apart. Also, like the whole thing is kinda odd to me.

I mean, there’s, I’m, there’s more, but, um, the, like anyone that says as payment, you can be a bridesmaid is in my mind, already gonna be a bridezilla because they think it’s an honor to be a bridesmaid. And yes, like close friends of mine would say, you know, like, oh, I would love to be by yourself. Of course, like if that mutual relationship.

But if someone says it as like a gift, like you’re, I’m doing you a favor to be a bridesmaid in my royal wedding, that just says red flag to me.

Jubilee Dawn: Yeah. And it also implies that your relationship was not good enough in the first place for you to be a bridesmaid. And you’re getting this as. Payment. Like I don’t understand how that’s supposed to feel good.

Christa Innis: Yeah.

Jubilee Dawn: Feels bad to me.

Christa Innis: Right. It’s like you can’t even pay her for the cost of the fabric. She’s getting her time. Like, I don’t know. That’s, yeah. Horrible. I told her that meant she, okay. I told her that meant she’d have to pick only one of her guides guy friends to be a groomsman, which I thought wasn’t fair, but she shrugged and said, I don’t know why that would be, but, um, she shrugged and said, oh, that’s fine.

I never wanted Matt in the wedding anyway. So you have to say yes. I should have run then, God, I should have run a few weeks later. She wouldn’t stop complaining about not having a venue for her bridal shower. She knew my parents lived on a one acre property and she dropped a hint after Hint after hint until I was uncomfortable.

I feel like I see a lot of similarities with the person that, you know, I just feel like trying to take advantage of somebody to get what they want.

Jubilee Dawn: No, that’s so uncomfortable. Like it, it sounds like she made her the bridesmaid so that she could get all this stuff from her. Mm-hmm. Honestly, you know. Okay.

Going back to Crystal. I mean, she, I wish I had picked up on it sooner, but she would often have friends for about a year or two, and then they would have a falling out and it was always, oh, she was crazy or, okay. I, I can’t believe I didn’t even get into how crazy Crystal was. Okay. She would also say that, um, everybody was in love with her.

She used to be very careful about like being around men because any man would cheat on their wife with her. Oh

Christa Innis: my gosh. She

Jubilee Dawn: also said that if she just tried, she would be able to be a Peloton instructor, which, uh, okay. Um, and then she was like, I would, I’ll be a little,

Christa Innis: a little D as d Lulu as Crystal.

Jubilee Dawn: I think we can, yeah, she would say, um, I would try out for American Idol, but I would win, you know, uh, so, but, and I don’t wanna be famous, you know, so she was just a very high sense of self and I think like growing up with her, after knowing somebody like that, since you’re 12 years old, you just kind of think that that’s normal.

And I honestly think that’s why I ended up with my crazy narcissistic ex was I was so used to grandiose, odd behavior, um, from people around me that it just, like, he was the same. He thought he was gonna own Disney. It’s a whole thing. Um. All of that to say like, these people, oh my gosh, they’re, they know how to get their way.

You know?

Christa Innis: Yeah. And it’s like, it’s that same kind of mentality of like, here’s this like week. She sees her as week over here. If I can make her a bridesmaid, make her feel included, she’ll gimme all the things I want for my day. And just seeing her as a dollar sign or seeing her as an opportunity. And you see that with like weddings and, and just friendships in general.

I’ve seen where it’s like, you know, they, they use you for when they, what they need you for, and then they move along to the next person and Oh, absolutely. And what you said too about Crystal saying like, all these friendships, oh, they were crazy. Same goes for like, if you ever meet a guy and all their exes were crazy, probably not the exes just saying

Jubilee Dawn: Absolutely.

My ex said the same thing. He told me his ex was absolutely insane. And when we got divorced, I mean this was just. I did a series, uh, did I marry a psychopath on TikTok? And throughout the series I ended up reaching out to his ex and I found out the true story and he was horrible to her and was abusive to her.

So like these people, they will lie. So, oh, that’s why I brought up Crystal saying that like her friendships would only last a year or two. I’m wondering if this bride is realizing that none of her friends are like coming through or if they’re helping her and she’s needing to recruit people to help her.

Yes, because I mean, she might not be that nice and maybe her friends don’t wanna help. They’re all and everybody else is fed up, but you’re new, so

Christa Innis: Yes,

Jubilee Dawn: she’s gonna try.

Christa Innis: They’re in the honeymoon friend stage where everything’s perfect and she’s great. Um. She said, I finally, finally offered to ask my parents, and they being lovely, said yes.

She was elated and even told me, you’re welcome to invite your family to the party at their own house. Can you imagine saying that to somebody?

Jubilee Dawn: Your, your parents, out of the goodness of my heart, don’t have to flee their home. Yeah. That’s crazy. That’s horrible. That is. That’s insane behavior. Bridezilla.

Christa Innis: Yeah. See, and that would give me a red flag right off the bat. But like, I, I don’t know. Just in general, I’d be like, no. Like, something’s up.

Jubilee Dawn: It’s like you’re in so deep at this point.

Christa Innis: Yeah. Um, that should tell you everything you need to know about her. The night before the shower, I was supposed to finish the dresses instead.

She and half the wedding party spent the night at my house decorating the yard. I didn’t sew a single stitch, and somehow she yelled at me for not finishing the dresses. I’d be like, do ’em yourself. Bye.

Jubilee Dawn: What? She’s your servant. This is so atrocious. This is, um, cut off the French. I assume that that’s where the story is going, but I hope

Christa Innis: so.

Jubilee Dawn: Wow. The audacity

Christa Innis: wild. The next day she forced Matt and Bill to act as waiters at her bridal shower, which was weird. Then in front of the entire room, she made an announcement. She was changing her maid of honor. Her sister was now her maid of honor. Her childhood best friend Sarah, who had already been asked, was moved to the very end of the bridesmaid lineup.

She’s doing this in public, in front of everybody. One that’s terrible. Two, I think the whole bridesmaid lineup thing is weird to be like, okay, you’re number four now. Like I just, I did mine by like height or how long I knew them for, like, I was not, like, I felt

Jubilee Dawn: very uncomfortable trying to line people up.

Luckily, a lot of my brides. Like my bridesmaids were family. So I felt kind of okay putting the family first, you know, because I thought my other friends would understand. But it is awkward trying to be like, it’s, and you here and sorry, or No,

Christa Innis: I feel like I ultimately went by like how long I knew them.

’cause like my maid of honor was first, then I had my sister, a cousin, and then yeah, it was like, and then I of course had my like husband, like sister-in-laws and you know, like towards the end just ’cause of like length of time plus like, we just wanted to like them to like walk with like their partner or their husband and yeah.

Yeah. I, but I have heard of that where people are like, okay, well I’m closer. I’m her best friend. Or I don’t know. That’s just, that’s to

Jubilee Dawn: demote somebody who was the maid of honor that’s so evil.

Christa Innis: Yeah. And publicly like.

Jubilee Dawn: Did I miss? Why do we know? Why?

Christa Innis: See, she didn’t say it yet.

Jubilee Dawn: Okay. She goes,

Christa Innis: and I, I was bumped to girl number three, so she’s like, basically like ranking them literally in front of them.

So Maid of honor moved to number four, I’m guessing number four. She just says at the end of the lineup. And then the girl that wrote in was bumped to girl number three. So weird.

Jubilee Dawn: Oh, so strange.

Christa Innis: I watched Sarah’s face fall. She held it together until later when she called me sobbing. I listened, comforted her and texted her afterwards.

I’m so sorry you’re going through this. If things get too stressful, you can always talk to me. Harmless, supportive, kind. This is gonna backfire. I just know it except the bride somehow ended up with Sarah’s phone and saw my text message. She called me screaming of accusing me, of trying to steal her friend, demanding to know whose side I was on, saying she needed to reevaluate whether she even wanted me in the wedding.

I would be like, bye.

Jubilee Dawn: No. I mean, what am I getting out of this dynamic right now? Yeah. Like nothing at this point. This is so toxic. This feels like it’s, this is some Regina George stuff. Yeah.

Christa Innis: Yes. Oh my gosh. Totally. I was like, this does sound familiar. It’s, it’s Regina George. You’re always on highway. It’s like, I’m always on your left.

Well now you’re on my last nerve. Get my, you know, whatever.

Jubilee Dawn: Yes. It’s like the calls, like the three-way calls where you’re trying to trick each other. It, that is so toxic.

Christa Innis: Oh my god. We should have changed the names to like mean girl names. Perfect. It really is. Oh my gosh, that’s wild. Um, unfortunately for me, she decided to keep me and even more unfortunately, I said yes.

On the big day, she transformed into a full diva, rude to everyone snapping at vendors, insulting bridesmaids. This is like, so this girl knew how to turn on the switch of like, I’m so fun. I’m your new friend, let’s hang out. Like I’m awesome. And then I feel like people like that can just,

Jubilee Dawn: yeah,

Christa Innis: flip.

Jubilee Dawn: I’m like transformed into a diva.

I feel like she’s been a diva, but I guess just turned up a ton. Like

Christa Innis: didn’t hide it anymore or even try to, yeah. Oh

Jubilee Dawn: my gosh, this groom. Can you imagine being married to this woman? I can’t.

Christa Innis: I always wonder like, ’cause I feel like we don’t hear about the grooms a lot in these stories unless it’s like focused on them.

So either, they usually either take the backseat, like they’re really like quiet or just like whatever their door thing. Or I wonder if they’re just as like terrible and they’re just like part of it. But I don’t know,

Jubilee Dawn: maybe.

Christa Innis: Um, her mother then informed us that we had to pay for our own hair and makeup, even though I had made all the dresses for free.

Um, after the ceremony, her gown ripped, guess who had to get down on her hands and knees and sew it? Me.

Jubilee Dawn: She should make the wedding dress right.

Christa Innis: Right. No, as far as I know. Oh,

Jubilee Dawn: gosh.

Christa Innis: And like I get like having, like, like most weddings I’ve been a part of, like, there’s hair and makeup there, and if you want it done, you pay for it.

But I feel like as the bride, if I knew my maid of honor or like a bridesmaid made all the dresses, I’d be like, let me pay for this. Let me, you know, how can I pay you? But it sounds like this woman just treats her as like a servant. Horrible. After, um, okay. Her sisters-in-law yelled at me to hurry up because I was holding up the reception.

It’s not her fault. The dress ripped. Holy cow. Be like,

Jubilee Dawn: fine. Go out there. Have fun. Yeah, go do

Christa Innis: it. Yeah. If you can do it faster, you go ahead. Like, my God. By the time evening fell, Sarah and I ended up locked in the bridal room crying in her speech. The bride didn’t mention Sarah at all, and all she said about me was she made the bridesmaid dresses.

I don’t know why the bridesmaids are in the speech, but, or what the speech is, but interesting. Yeah. Um, after the wedding, the invites to hang out, the invites to hang out with the group became fewer then non-existent. One night I literally ran into all of them out together without me. I’d be like, good.

When I finally confronted her, she screamed, I’m not married to you. I don’t have to invite you to anything. This lady, woman, like so evil. She knew what she was doing. She got what she wanted out of her, and that was dresses. That was it. Uh, she said, and that was it. Friendship. Over months later, I heard she ended up doing the same thing to Matt and Bill.

I have no idea if she and Sarah ever recovered their friendship but me. I walked away and honestly, that was the best decision I ever made.

Jubilee Dawn: Oh my gosh, what a blip in your life. I’m like, what a horrible, I cannot imagine like being around somebody who treats people like such dirt and the fact that nobody stood up to her or really said like, I feel like there is this vibe with weddings where the bride can just do whatever she wants because it’s her wedding.

But I feel like at a point I would like to think that people in my life or I would’ve. Stood up to this person because Yes, that is insane. You can’t treat people like that.

Christa Innis: Well, and the fact that the mom seemed to have like some attitude too on the wedding day sounds like that’s where she gets it from the entitlement.

But yeah, I just never get that. Like, it’s my day. Like it’s all about me. Like I just don’t get that. Like, I was just telling someone, I’m like, like for my wedding morning, I made sure my bridesmaids were taken care of. Like I had breakfast for them, mimosas. Like, I remember running around making sure like they were good.

Like, what do you need? Because I was like, I if, if you’re not here with like, I just want you here with me and I want you to enjoy yourself. Um, but I’ve definitely seen both sides of it where it’s like people, like there’s brides that wanna take care of their wedding party and there’s brides that are like, it’s my day.

You just, you just stand by my side.

Jubilee Dawn: Yes.

Christa Innis: Oh my gosh. That’s why they’re

Jubilee Dawn: pretty much props. I mean, she was a prop and a way to get. Dresses, which, I mean, those are so, like, that is so much work, you know, and it’s, it’s not even how much are bridesmaids dresses, like maybe 150 or however much, you know, on top of that, it’s handmade, you know?

So it’s worth so much more than that, you know, because of all of the hard work and the hours that she put in.

Christa Innis: Yeah. That

Jubilee Dawn: is, ugh. So toxic, so glad that she does not talk to her anymore.

Christa Innis: Yeah. I think I’d be the most mad about making the dresses, because I think if I were like a bridesmaid for a wedding where this happened, I would just look back and laugh at it.

I’d be like, that was wild. Okay, moving on. But the fact that she spent so much time and like really thought this person was like a friend of hers, she let her parents lent the house, you know, to them that’s just Got it. Yeah.

Jubilee Dawn: It’s like she was trying to find ways to cut costs.

Christa Innis: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Because

Jubilee Dawn: also, how do you not know where your bridal shower’s gonna be?

Christa Innis: Yeah.

Jubilee Dawn: Like leading up to it. You know what I mean? Like it feels like she was scoping out locations pretty much. Mm-hmm. How can I get somebody to gift this to me?

Christa Innis: Yeah. It’s like she had something planned somewhere else and then it was like she messed up that relationship or something.

Jubilee Dawn: Right. I wouldn’t be someone else.

Christa Innis: Yeah.

Jubilee Dawn: I feel like this so often though, where friendships don’t make it past the wedding or friendships just fizzle out. I was in, um, yeah, so I was in that religious cult. It was not just Christianity, it was called Bethel School of Supernatural Ministry. It was super weird. People Okay. Thought they could raise people from the dead and it was like, oh, pro prophecy.

It was insanity. But I met a girl there and she invited me to be in her wedding and it was like I hadn’t seen her in person in over a year. We had gone back to our home states. We were not close. We would talk once every four months. I mean, we were not close, but I really feel like she just needed somebody else.

On her side. Mm-hmm. Um, so I literally flew to Utah and I, I went and I was in her wedding and during that time I ended up getting engaged to my ex. And I felt like I had to ask her to be in mine because I was in hers, but I didn’t view her as a friend, but I was in her wedding and we were engaged at the same time.

So it kind of felt like, well, I can’t be her bridesmaid and she not be in my wedding. So we literally were in each other’s weddings and we have never seen each other again. Like, like it’s so, it’s so random, you know, there’s no bad blood. She still follows me on social media, but it’s like we, I mean, it was very strange and there was really no reason to be in each other’s weddings.

Christa Innis: That is so funny. That is really like common, I feel like where you, where if like you’re in someone’s wedding, you feel like you have to ask them to be in yours. Yeah. Um. I know, like my husband and I had those talks like before getting married because we were, we were like considered like the wedding couple for so long.

’cause we were, we were both in so many weddings. I think we were each in like 10 weddings or something. And we both had that discussion about like, okay, should we have this person because we were in their wedding and vice versa. And the end of the day I was just like, I’m gonna have who I want on my side.

But again, like if I, I think if I would’ve gotten married like in my early twenties or something, I think it would’ve been way different. I think I would’ve been like, yes, yes. Include everybody have this person or, or if he’s having his friend, I should probably have his like wife or girlfriend in it or partner.

But like, at the end of the day, it’s just like, no, people understand. Yeah. But yeah, it’s, it’s awkward when you feel like obligated to like have someone in your wedding that you’re not that close with. I definitely feel like I’ve been asked to be in weddings where. And I’ve said yes. And then I’m like, later I’m like, was I just asked because of blank reason without giving away too much?

But, and I’m like, I just asked because of something. And then I’m like, I don’t know. Maybe I shouldn’t have said yes. But I don’t know, because I love, I love being a part of weddings. I find stuff to do. I’m very handy. I always offer to help. And so I feel like that’s seen, you know? Yeah.

Jubilee Dawn: I’m like, I’m a good bridesmaid.

I’m I’m a good one. You know, I put in work, so I mean, yeah. I get that.

Christa Innis: Yeah, for sure. Awesome. Well that was a wild story. I always like to end these with, um, confessions that people send me on Instagram. So I’ll just read a couple of those and then we go, okay, these are our biggest wedding regrets people sent me.

Okay. Our photographer, he had a digital camera, but acted like he only had film, took forever to get pictures, and he missed so many. We wanted because he took forever to set up. Um, each shot ended up, oh, he would set up a shot, take forever for a shot and ended up taking only one photo each time. So frustrating.

I’d say time and time again. Your photographer is like one of the most important vendors. If you have a bad photographer, ugh. It just, it could ruin it.

Jubilee Dawn: I know. I’m like, to me, that is one of the most important things. I’m so thankful. I had, um, a friend who I had done photo shoots with out in Atlanta, and I actually flew her out and she gave us such a, a deal on it, but she’s a wedding photographer, so thankfully she was incredible.

But it’s like once you find a good photographer, stick with them. Just yes. Keep using them, you know?

Christa Innis: Yes. Don’t say don’t just like, agree to have someone, be it because they’re giving it to you for free or something, or, I’ve seen a lot of those too. It’s just go with your gut. For sure. Um, let’s see. Um, making my sister-in-law, my matron of honor years later, she said she never even liked me.

Jubilee Dawn: Oh, ow. That would really hurt me.

Christa Innis: Yeah. Yeah, that’s, yeah. Um, hiring the hairdresser I did, she made, she made me an hour and a half late for my own wedding.

Jubilee Dawn: Oh, that’s another one that is super important. I, I got my hairdresser. Yeah. I, I probably should have done more research on my hairdresser. I did a trial with her and it was okay.

And then on the wedding day, my hair looked completely different. And I had even, yeah, the back of it looked totally different. Like the way that it had was pinned and all of it. Um, so I showed she had to redo it, you know, and I kid you not, I looked like snooky, like I had a bump and I was horrified because that was not there in the original trial.

And I was like, I’m gonna walk down and look like so insane and not like myself. Yes. Literally. And I also look like a, a southern beauty queen a little bit. It was very weird vibes and thankfully they fixed it, but I was for sure panicking on my wedding day.

Christa Innis: Oh my gosh. I’ve definitely been a part of a lot of weddings where like, they just hired someone, like they didn’t do like the trial.

And when the person comes in, it’s just like, there was one wedding where I was in and I said no to hair and makeup. I was like, I’ll just do it myself. I was glad I did because everyone ended up washing off their makeup because it was like someone that had like, hardly any experience and like everyone’s hair kept falling off and their eyelashes were falling off and I had just done them myself and I’m no professional.

I’m like not great at makeup, but I just like, I don’t know, I just was like, I don’t wanna spend a lot of money. And um, everyone’s like, eyelashes were falling off. They’re like, it was not making it to the wedding at all. So it’s hard sometimes. You don’t know what you’re gonna get until wedding day. But yeah,

Jubilee Dawn: I prefer, especially my hair, I prefer to do it myself.

’cause I have like such thick, curly hair that Yeah. Uh, they botch it most of the time.

Christa Innis: Yes. Oh my gosh. Wow. Well thank you so much for coming on. It was so great chatting with you and sharing your story and just. Diving through this wedding drama.

Jubilee Dawn: Yeah. Thank you so much for having me. This was so much fun.

It was like such a happier topic than what I’m used to,

Christa Innis: you know? Yes. Um, well for everyone listening, can you again share where they can find more of your content, anything fun you’re working on and, um, anything else that’s coming up?

Jubilee Dawn: Yeah. I am at Jubilee Dawn on TikTok and on Instagram. I also have a YouTube and my two podcasts are Heald Dish and the Overshare Hour.

Christa Innis: Awesome. Well, thanks again for coming on.

Jubilee Dawn: All right. Thank you.

by Christa Innis

Vegas Vows, MIL Meltdown, and Uninvited Guests with Saron Olkaba

What happens when a mother-in-law hijacks your wedding and makes it all about her? Absolute mayhem.

This week on Here Comes the Drama, we dive into one of the most outrageous MIL meltdowns ever. From insisting on a 500-guest wedding to uninviting the bride from a wedding dinner, this story is a rollercoaster of entitlement, manipulation, and jaw-dropping audacity.

Saron Olkaba, a pop culture commentator, reality TV aficionado, and queen of hot takes joins Christa for a brutally honest take on wedding chaos, pop culture madness, and why cash bars should be banned. They’re spilling all the drama—from surprise proposals gone horribly wrong to the great debate on whether kids should even be at weddings.

Trust us, you don’t want to miss this one. If you love wedding scandals, unfiltered opinions, and stories that will make you gasp, this episode is for you!

Join me on Patreon and get bonus content every month!

Episode Chapter Markers

00:00 Introduction

01:13 Pop Culture and Reality TV Talk

05:15 Wedding Hot Takes and Trends

14:43 Crazy Wedding Stories

19:25 Wedding Drama Unfolds

19:59 Mother-in-Law’s Overbearing Behavior

21:57 The Wedding Day Chaos

25:15 Post-Wedding Reflections and Confessions

Must-Hear Insights and Key Moments

A bride shares how her MIL tried to double the guest list, uninvited her from a wedding dinner, and threw a fit over boundaries.
Should you ever make guests pay for drinks?
Should we retire the bouquet and garter toss tradition?
A best man ambushes a wedding toast with a proposal—without asking the couple!
Kids at weddings: Are they cute guests or chaotic distractions?
When the groom actually attended a wedding-related event that excluded his bride…
MIL’s final meltdown: Blocking, crying, and dramatic exits—this wedding story escalates to a shocking ending.
Will the couple cut ties for good? Should this bride run before it’s too late?

Words of Wisdom: Standout Quotes from This Episode

”If you can’t be away from your kids, just don’t come, it’s fine.” – Saron Olkaba
”Some hills are not worth dying on and others are. You just have to trust your gut.” – Saron Olkaba
“Cash bars, certainly, never, it’s never okay under any circumstance. That’s a huge problem.” – Saron Olkaba
“Be creative. You don’t have to shove yourself into this box.” – Saron Olkaba
“ Let’s not surprise a bride and groom on their wedding day.” – Christa Innis

About Saron

Saron Olkaba is a pop culture content creator known for her sharp commentary on celebrity news, reality TV, and trending topics. By blending humor, insight, and real talk, she delivers engaging takes on everything from viral scandals to entertainment industry moments.

With a background in political consulting, Saron brings a unique perspective to the digital space, proving that smart women can love pop culture too.

You can find her sharing the latest buzz on TikTok and Instagram (@saronthings), and stay tuned for her upcoming YouTube series featuring deep dives into the hottest topics in media.

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Join the Drama with Christa Innis:

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A Team Dklutr Production

Blog Transcript:

Note: We use AI transcription so there may be some inaccuracies

Christa Innis: Well, hello. Thank you for coming on.

Saron Olkaba: Thank you for having me. I’m thrilled to be here.

Christa Innis: I’m so excited. I was saying before we started, I feel like I know you from watching, all your videos and your hot takes. I mean, you talk a lot about things in the media, I mean, right now it’s like Justin Valdoni and, I was gonna say Serena Van Der Woodsen.

Oh my gosh, aging. I haven’t watched Gossip Girl in so long. Blake Lively, totally a brain fart right there.

Saron Olkaba: Could not even think of the thing that people say about her, is that she plays the same person in every character she plays. So, like, Serena Van Der Woodsen and Blake Lively, kind of interchangeable.

Christa Innis: It’s fine. I do get a lot of news from you. I’m like, okay, when I see your video, I’m like, okay, I need to see what’s going on in the news. TikTok brings us all the good stuff we want to hear about.

Can you just tell everyone a little bit about yourself, what you do? and then we’ll kind of get into these crazy hot takes.

Getting to Know Saron Olkaba

Saron Olkaba: Yeah. So I make pop culture content on Instagram and TikTok. It’s content about like the zeitgeist things that are going on in the media, celebrity gossip. I think that, like most of my viewers and followers, are women. And I like to think that women contain multitudes, right? Like, I’m a political consultant in my nine to five day job, but, I also am obsessed with all things pop culture, and, you, Bravo and similar things. So I like to say that smart women Love this kind of sh*t as well. So I like to take it from a kind of Look at these things kind of from a higher level. I like to be fact based, but I also like to talk sh*t So it’s a fun little community.

Christa Innis: Yeah, I love it. I feel like it’s just a great Real Housewives, that kind of stuff, it’s great to just turn your head off, do your mind off, and just, watch some trash TV.

I haven’t watched Real Housewives in so long, like, that kind, but I was a big, like, New Jersey girl all the way. Loved watching it. So good.

Saron Olkaba: You have to, if you’re gonna watch the Housewives, Salt Lake City. Just watch that one. I urge you. To watch Salt Lake City. There are only five seasons. It’s immaculate. It’s horrifying. It’s. incredible, just please.

Christa Innis: Okay. I didn’t even know there was one. So I got to jump back in. I kind of like to hop around when it comes to reality TV. I was in bachelor nation for a little while. I wasn’t in it. I watched it.

Saron Olkaba: I missed

Christa Innis: Oh, yeah. No, definitely not. and then I would watch Bachelor in Paradise and I was like, I don’t know.

It’s all the same. Like I can’t get into it. So I like reality more. Like what’s going to happen is who’s going to fight with who? Right stuff.

Saron Olkaba: Yeah, I really got into The Bachelor because I feel like none of the couples really make it. So we’re just doing the same thing over again. We know how it is, they’re going to, they might be with each other for a little bit and then they break up or there’s two happy endings and 30 seasons. So, yes.

Christa Innis: Yeah. And it’s funny. I don’t know if you saw,, and by the time this comes out, this will probably be old news, but. Alex Cooper interviewed, I don’t even know if you know who Rachel Kirkholm is. Yeah, and they were one of the couples I was like, they’re holding on strong. They always presented themselves as happy.

And you see that and you’re just like, it was all a lie.

Saron Olkaba: Well, I think a lot of people are saying that he was just never gonna marry her if he didn’t want to get engaged at the end of this process where the end goal is to get engaged. What would make you think in the next four years something would change? So I’m excited to listen to that interview too.

Christa Innis: Yeah, I was listening to it last night, part of it and I was like, Oh my gosh, is she got her like quick. Let’s talk about it. So one of the reasons I was like, you would be perfect to have you come on this podcast is because you have so many great hot takes and I feel like just with these crazy, wedding stories, I get, um, proposal, engagement, all that stuff.

I was like, I need someone with some good opinions and we can just kind of banter through some stuff. So the first kind of category is crazy stories and wedding hot takes. So I have some different hot takes that people send me. And so I want to get your opinion on these. So what is one wedding trend or something that you’ve seen at weddings that you either absolutely include or you despise seeing?

Cash Bars, Garter Tosses, and Other Wedding Debates

Saron Olkaba: Cash bar, certainly, never, it’s never okay under any circumstance. That’s a huge problem. That’s a huge problem. Even if you don’t drink. Oh, alcohol free weddings. Even if you are sober, you got to provide, got to provide a drink or two and you can’t make people pay for it. I think it’s like the tackiest thing in the world. Period.

Christa Innis: Yeah. Yeah. I love it. I love it. No, I love it. I think it’s great. me personally. I agree. I feel like you need to have. Something there. I remember one time this actually just came to me. We’re talking about crazy stories. we’re at a wedding and it started off as a semi-open bar. So I think certain things were selected. It was fine. But then they switched to a cash bar without telling people and it was like people were getting their drinks. My now husband and I were up at the bar and he ordered drinks for us. And they were like, Okay, it’s this total. And he’s like, Oh, I thought this was open. Like, we didn’t have our wallets on us or anything.

And they’re like, No, switched to cash at 8 p.m. It was the weirdest thing. I would have said, Oh, I thought this was a wedding. Yeah,

I was like, Wait, this is weird. So then he ended up getting his wallet, buying the drinks. Then we left our drinks on the dance floor while we were dancing, and they cleared everyone’s drinks off the table.

So we’re like, they switched to a cash bar mid wedding, but didn’t announce it. And then we’re clearing the drinks off the tables when people are dancing. Oh no,

Saron Olkaba: That is absolutely unacceptable. Absolutely. You’re like providing an experience. People are coming out of their way to celebrate you.

They’re probably giving you a present. They might have flown out here. It’s not a paid experience. There’s already enough investment being involved in a wedding, just going to a wedding, doing all the events around a wedding. No, give them a good time if you’re gonna do it.

Christa Innis: Yeah. I totally agree with that. So, what are your thoughts on the bouquet and garter toss, because this is one of the ones I always ask Instagram followers, and this is like the one that comes up all the time to get rid of it, stop doing it. It’s weird. It’s gross. So what is your take on it?

Saron Olkaba: Yes to the bouquet, no to the garter. The garter is when the guy goes literally under her dress. That is a horror, that’s not okay. I can’t imagine. I feel like I’m at the wedding. My dad’s here, that’s so insane, no, please.

That’s not. I don’t feel particularly passionate about the bouquet as passionately as I feel about the garter knot, which should not be a thing, it’s fun, but I hope no one actually thinks that it means that you’re gonna be the one to get married next.

Christa Innis: I. Literally have been to so many weddings where the women get vicious and they like to push you. I’m like, we know we’re not actually the next one. Like it’s going to be okay. I’ve seen the videos too where they like literally push all the way and I’m like, it’s not that serious.

Saron Olkaba: Like full on shove her to the ground.

Christa Innis: No, not for me.

Saron Olkaba: Not for me at all. And then there’s the like, you throw the bouquet and then someone catches it or like she hands it to the woman so that she can get proposed to. That’s my list of no’s as well. proposals at the wedding.

Christa Innis: Yes, I’m so glad you brought that up because someone shared a confession with me last week saying at her wedding, the best man during his speech proposed to his girlfriend, who was also a bridesmaid.

And I was like, no one knew? The bride and groom didn’t know that was gonna happen? No one knew. She said she was mortified. Security. Security. Yeah, out of here. I was like, I need to know more. I messaged her and I was like, can you tell me more? And so she said they ended up pulling him away and being like, this is not okay.

And they didn’t understand why. But then he still came back, put the ring on her finger. She hugged him and said yes. In front of everybody. She’s walking around the dance floor showing off her ring. She’s like, yeah. I can’t even believe this happened. And she’s like, I always watched your crazy wedding stories thinking it would never happen to me.

And that happened. Were there any signs that this man was a psychopath prior to? They said they’ve been friends with him for a long time. And I, I don’t know. I don’t realize how Weird and rude that is.

Saron Olkaba: No, it’s so tacky. No.

Christa Innis: Absolutely not.

Saron Olkaba: Unless, you know, the bride is in on it. And I’ve seen videos where the bride is full on team, get proposed throughout my wedding, like here’s the bouquet, turn around, I was like, yay. And do you, God bless you. That’s incredible. right. Couldn’t be me, but incredible nonetheless.

Christa Innis: Right.

Saron Olkaba: So that’s fine.

Christa Innis: Yeah. There’s a lot of steps you should take before making sure that’s okay. Like no surprise. Let’s not surprise a bride and groom on their wedding day.

Saron Olkaba: Right? No.

Christa Innis: Okay. So these are just some fun, like picking a side on these wedding drama debates. These are other unpopular opinions that people sent me.

So this person said having kids at the reception is a good thing and they should come and feel welcome. What’s your take on kids at weddings?

Saron Olkaba: I think that just likeA declarative sentence, having kids at a wedding is a good thing, like, by what measure, you if the bride and groom feel like it’s going to be a safe experience for them and whatever, sure, but if they want to party and not have to worry about some kid getting trampled on the dance floor, that’s completely up to them, and you should absolutely respect it, It’s not up to you, so, I don’t understand why people get so upset about it, it’s a big deal for them, it’s the one event where they’re allowed to kind of do this, if you can’t be away from your kids, just don’t come, it’s fine, just RSVP, no, yeah.

Christa Innis: I know, that’s why I’m like, when people get so upset about it, I’m like, if you can’t go, just say no, wouldn’t be offended. Either way, I’m like, now that I have a toddler, I get it. If people do not want a toddler, day, night, either for me, or if we can’t get a babysitter, I will say no, because I would not want to.

A toddler there. Like, I get it. it’s just like, when people get so mad about it, I’m like, I don’t understand the philosophy.

Saron Olkaba: That being said, I told you I was engaged once and I almost got married. It was like a couple of months out from the wedding when it was cancelled.

But, having said that, I’m more than okay with child free weddings. We had set up child care for the people that were going to come and babysitters. And there was a difference, they were in a completely different place with their home. They would have been with their own food and their own people watching them.

And their parents could have gone back and forth to see whatever. So, If you’re going to have kids at your wedding, I think that’s a nice way to do it.

Christa Innis: I love that. I’ve been hearing that more and more. People have a separate area, a fun room for kids, or fun things, yeah. Padded walls. Exactly, yeah. Blocked, because that’s the thing. It’s like the biggest thing I think with kids at a wedding is, it’s the parents that aren’t watching the kids, or like, they’re at a certain age where they can get into anything. Like, I know if I bring my toddler somewhere, like, they’re, she’s gonna figure out a way to try to do something.

And so, like, there’s certain ages, too, where it’s like, you have to either be on them the whole time, or you can’t enjoy yourself. So, I feel like the extra room is great. Like, we had just, like, our nieces and nephews at our wedding, which was, like, so great. seven kids. And we, but we were provided with coloring stuff.

We had their own kids table. Plus we knew them well enough to where like, okay, we know they’re going to be well behaved there.

Saron Olkaba: So you said only like, I think that that’s perfectly fair as well. If you’re just like only the children that are related to us can come, like, and if people make a stink about not being able to bring their kids because, Oh, like, why can they come then? You know?

Christa Innis: Yeah. Sucks to suck. I know, because that’s something I hear too. They’re like, oh, but if you say no to my kids and I come and your nieces and nephews are there, I’ll be so mad. It’s like, you’re gonna be mad that like the bride’s niece is there versus like a co-worker’s son or something like that. I’m like, that’s so different.

Saron Olkaba: The entire drama is wild.

Christa Innis: They just don’t come. It’s fun. It is so wild. This person said, White bridesmaid dresses are weird.

Saron Olkaba: If the bride likes it, I love it. I’m not judging someone’s, like, aesthetic choices in, like, that sense. If the bridesmaid dresses are, like, stunning, gorgeous white, as long as they look good, I don’t care.

I mean, and, I don’t know if you’ve watched, like, Selling Sunset, Christine Quinn. She had, like, this black ball gown wedding dress. Oh, I did! Right? And so like, is it my style? No, but like, I don’t know. It’s 2025. We’ve been doing weddings for a long time. Like, let’s, I don’t know, let’s mix it up.

Christa Innis: I love, yeah, I love when people do like unique, crazy stuff.

I love when the bridesmaids all wear white dresses along with the bride. I think it looks pretty. But I saw this bride that had a dress that turned into a rainbow and like, like, she unbuttoned it and it turned into this rainbow dress. And I was like, that is beautiful. That’s stunning. That’s something I never would have thought of.

Yeah. Like, you go, girl.

Saron Olkaba: Be creative. You don’t have to, like, shove yourself into this box. Like, as long I mean, if you want to As long as you’re getting married at the end of it, that’s the end goal. Just like throw the party you want to throw and invite the people you want to invite. Like you’re spending a lot of money on this sh*t.

Have a good day, do whatever you want to do. Yeah.

Christa Innis: Do you black out all the haters? Pluck out the naysayers, provide

Saron Olkaba: booze, but provide,

Christa Innis: provide booze. Yeah. Provide some good entertainment. Good DJ. Yeah. Okay. Let’s jump into. This week’s story. It’s a long one. That’s all I can do. I have not read it. Just the beginning starts with the monster in law.

So it’s about to get kind of crazy.

Saron Olkaba: I love monster in law stories.

Monster-in-Law Alert: Wedding Drama at Its Worst

Christa Innis: It’s insane. I read these and I feel so grateful that I have a great mother-in-law. I reason I’m just like, these are insane. okay, so feel free to stop me at any point. And then I’ll kind of just pause and we can kind of just react as we go.

okay. I’ve been holding my tongue for a long while, but I’m angry all the time and I needed to get this off my chest. So who better than to tell you? Hopefully this will give some content, um, because I honestly don’t know what else to do about my monster in law. I got engaged in July 2024, and from the moment we announced it, my future mother-in-law started bombarding us with questions about the wedding.

She asked when it would be, how many people we were thinking of inviting. I told her around 250 guests and she immediately said, no, it should be 500, 500. Holy cow. Um, Right. I’m like, that’s the thing, too, is like you find the ones that are so opinionated are not even giving any money a lot of times.

Saron Olkaba: I would think that would be obvious, like, you can’t say you can double the wedding if you’re not paying for the wedding.

That’s insane. Okay, continue. Yeah.

Christa Innis: No, I agree. Um, I calmly explained that we only wanted people we were close to, family or not. I also mentioned it would be a kid-free wedding except for nieces and nephews. There we go. She lost it and started a fight. Okay, a few weeks later the topic came up again, and I mentioned we were planning a sober wedding since my fiance is two years sober. He’s like covering all the things we just talked about.

Saron Olkaba: I swear we did not cover

Christa Innis: Literally, I don’t even put these together because I don’t want to read them ahead of time, so I did not even know. My mother-in-law and future sister in law laughed and said it was fine. But my fiance would need to leave the reception because they would be drinking. Wait, but isn’t this his mom and sister?

Saron Olkaba: Why would they want your fiance? The groom would be leaving his own reception to drink elsewhere apart from the

Christa Innis: what? And this is confusing because I’m like, it’s the mother-in-law, you would think she would be not wanting to like you think she’d be up against the bride, but not the groom because the groom’s her son, right?

Saron Olkaba: I think that she’s probably positioning this as oh, he wants to have a good time and drink so he can’t stay at a dry reception all night. Like we got to go to the bar or some Insanity like that. I don’t know. Please. I can’t wait to go.

Christa Innis: What? Oh my gosh. Okay. Um, That is crazy. Okay. Eventually my fiance and I decided to get married in Las Vegas to avoid all the drama.

We kept the guest list to immediate family and one friend each because the venue could only hold 50 people. We thought this would make things easier. It didn’t. Oh yeah, someone like that’s going to come right in being like, You didn’t invite me.

Saron Olkaba: Continue. There’s no winning. Okay.

Christa Innis: Yeah, this is like two weeks before the wedding. Okay, so they still were going to have this big wedding. They just did like an elopement, just the two of them. So two weeks before the wedding, my mother in law started talking about my fiancé’s dad’s nephew. I’m like, fiancé’s dad’s nephew, okay?

Um, come back. Yeah. Oh yeah. I’m like, drawing a tree in my head. I’m like, where did this go? Um, I never met this nephew. In the 12 years I’d known my fiancé, I told her the guest list was set, and there was no room. She said that was fine, and he could just enjoy it, he could just join us afterwards. I agreed.

Five days before the wedding, my fiancé got a text from his sister in law, oh, from his sister. Inviting him to dinner. He asked if I was welcome and she said, no, family only. That’s weird. His mom chimed in, doubling down saying only immediate family. She cannot come. Okay. Don’t you think like a fiance kind of becomes that?

Okay, this was a dinner to celebrate my fiance getting married and I wasn’t invited what

Saron Olkaba: getting married

Christa Innis: to you and they didn’t want you to come. Okay, he went while I stayed home and then he went. See

Saron Olkaba: girl, this is why you can’t, I already know how I feel. You can’t marry this man. This is a crazy situation.

Don’t, you’re asking for misery for the rest of your f*cking life. Yes. Who will not, who will go to a wedding, a party about a wedding that you are the bride in, that you are not invited to. He said, chill, bet, like this sounds normal to me. This is how you want to start our union? This is insane. You can’t, you can’t do this.

You can’t marry this. No,

Christa Innis: I am. Yeah. What? I am shocked. Why would he go without you? That would be like a no for me. That would be like, sorry. Like, you, you’re choosing your immediate family, who, your fiance, new wife, should be your immediate family. No.

Saron Olkaba: Marry your sister then. Marry your mom. What?

Christa Innis: Okay, five, Okay, later, okay, so he went, while I stayed at home, later my mother-in-law made a Facebook post congratulating him and tagged me in it, which this is important later, she says.

The day before we left for Vegas, my mother-in-law asked me to lunch. Even though I had so much to do, I agreed. At lunch, she told me my fiancé’s little brother had invited a friend to the wedding. I corrected her, saying he asked Wait saying he asked but we said no. Okay, so that little brother had already asked them and she said no She replied.

Well, he invited her weeks ago, and I said it was fine. It’s too late to uninvite her now

Saron Olkaba: It’s not even too late to uninvite you b*tch. Okay, so what do you mean? It’s too late to uninvite her

Christa Innis: Like what is this controlling behavior? Like I’m already so like Angry for this person because I’m like he your fiance is not even on your side.

Saron Olkaba: I’m sweating. Okay,

Christa Innis: this is bad Yeah, I feel like hot

Okay, I was furious but decided to talk to my fiance first when I told him he immediately texted his mom explaining It was disrespectful to invite someone without asking us that she needed to tell the friend he couldn’t come This sparked a meltdown. My future sister in law started calling and yelling at him, but he stood by me, okay, finally, saying no one else was getting a plus one.

When we arrived in Vegas, my mother-in-law asked again, Okay, so the wedding in Vegas is where the mother-in-law’s coming?

Saron Olkaba: Did I? She’s coming to both. Okay. They did the wedding in Vegas first because they thought it would placate her. And they invited only the immediate family from both sides, right? But they’re still having this big wedding.

Okay. They thought it would shut her up to do the first thing.

Christa Innis: To do her own thing. Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Because I’m like There’s so much happening. Yeah, you’ve got me. Okay. When we arrived in Vegas, my mother in law asked again if the nephew could come to the wedding because he was already there. I reminded her there was no room and my fiancé backed me up.

On the wedding day, I went to brunch with girls from both sides of the family. My mother in law ignored me completely. Even when I greeted her, I brushed it off and enjoyed the day. This mother in law hates her. Like, this is, I would be like, you are, you can’t come. This is terrible. Like, why would you want to feel like a stranger or unwanted at your own wedding?

Like,

Saron Olkaba: I don’t, I’m like, you can’t have this. She just has the worst energy. She’s just gonna, she’s gonna try and ruin your day. Why would you, no, I would hire security, give them a picture and That would be it.

Christa Innis: Yeah, because it’s not her right to be at this wedding.

Saron Olkaba: Like,

Christa Innis: I’d be like You’re, you’re done. Sorry.

I don’t want you there. She’s a guest. She’s a guest. Yeah, you are nothing more than a guest who could easily be scratched right off. Um, at this ceremony, my sisters told me that my fiancé’s family had taken up the front rows on both sides of the pews. My mother in law refused to move, saying her parents can find another place to sit.

No, so now she’s rude to, like, her family.

Saron Olkaba: I, I’m, I, okay, like this would not be, go well

Christa Innis: for me, or, or, like, I, cause now you’re gonna be, like you said, you’re gonna be dealing with this mother in law for the rest of your life. Like, if it’s bad now, imagine like, if they have kids, or if they buy a house, you know, any step in there,

Saron Olkaba: I don’t understand why someone would, why anyone would sign up to deal with that forever.

Like, mm hmm. You’re asking to be miserable for the rest of you, what man is worth that? What man is worth having to deal with the devil day, no.

Christa Innis: Yeah, I really hope this ends with like, they cut her off. Like, they’re done with her, I hope. Fingers crossed. Uh, cause that’s like the only way this is gonna work, I feel like.

Um, okay. So she said she had to move. I had to ask the officiant to step in and remind everyone which side was for the bride’s family and which for the groom’s. This made my mother in law furious. After the ceremony, during photos, the photographer suggested moving one of my fiancé’s siblings to my side to even things out.

My sister in law loudly said, Hell no, I’m not going over there. I ignored it. At the bowling alley reception, my mother in law asked, “Who are these animals? Who

Saron Olkaba: are these beasts?

Christa Innis: I don’t know, why do they think they’re so much better than, like, her and her family? Oh, God. Jesus. It’s like I’m speechless. This is probably one of the worst mother in law stories I’ve read.

And I’ve read a lot. At the bowling alley reception, my mother in law refused to sign the guest book, despite me and my husband asking multiple times. When she finally did, she just wrote congratulations with no warmth, and she left without saying goodbye.

Saron Olkaba: Like why? That’s the nicest thing she’s done thus far.

That’s the most pleasant she’s been in this whole story.

Christa Innis: Yeah. The next day, my mom invited us to lunch before she left town. My mother in law didn’t contact us, but took my brother, my husband’s brothers to go go karting and sightseeing instead. When my husband asked why we weren’t invited, she said, you were busy.

We weren’t. Two days later, I made a Facebook post about the wedding and saw that my mother in law had untagged me from her earlier post. When my husband asked why, she said, it was a post only for you.

Saron Olkaba: Ew. Do you wanna f*ck your son? Like, what is going on here? Why? I’m sorry, can I, can I curse here? Yeah, you’re fine.

Christa Innis: A little late to ask that question, but. Redo! No. Yeah, it’ll be fine. I don’t know. That is, um, yeah, why? Like why? I don’t get these mothers-in-law that hate their daughters-in-law so much that they’re, that they have no, they don’t care like what they say, like, I don’t, like no one’s good enough for their son.

I don’t, I don’t know what it is.

Saron Olkaba: It’s an enmeshment. I think that’s the word. Or like, what is that, um, no, it’s emotionally incest, even worse. Yes. No, that’s creepy as hell. Right.

Christa Innis: There was this skit, I don’t know if you watch SNL. There was the, did you see, um, oh, who hosted the Timothee Chalamet one? No, I haven’t seen it.

This last weekend? Okay, you have to watch it, but there’s one about that, but it’s extreme, like the Oedipus Complex. It’s about like Mother’s Day and like the sun being like, hey mom. I don’t know, it’s like. I,

Saron Olkaba: I’m horrified that I’m going to be looking this up just immediately after we get off this.

You need to.

Christa Innis: It was like a cringe, but I was like. It’s like way over the top, but it was like some of these moms, yeah, I could see it. I find

Saron Olkaba: It’s like, once you meet this psycho mom, mother in law, right? How, and you see that this man sees nothing wrong with their relationship and kind of encourages it and won’t ask her.

How are you still attracted to this man that might want to f*ck his mom? Like, I, how do you not, how do you not get the ick immediately and run away from, like, self preservation?

Christa Innis: Yeah, like, cause this is, my thing is, this is not the first time something like this has happened. She had given signs before they got engaged, or when they first met, like, I’m thinking, like, first dinner at a parent’s house.

Every girlfriend

Saron Olkaba: had a book before

Christa Innis: him, before her. Yeah, yeah, for sure. Yeah, like, what were the signs before? Yeah, because it wasn’t like, oh, they’re engaged now, they’re serious, now my real, like, craziness is gonna come out. Like, I feel like she had to have treated her poorly before this.

Saron Olkaba: Right. And the sister in law is also a b*tch as well.

Christa Innis: Yeah, what’s the deal with that? Okay, three days after the wedding, she texted my husband saying she wanted to talk about my behavior at the wedding. What? He told her he wouldn’t have that conversation without me there, and she refused. A few days later, she blocked me on social media and deleted my husband?

So what her behavior was like having boundaries and like, No, expecting her

Saron Olkaba: parents to be able to sit in the front row. Yeah. And not allowing some, uh, the friend of a co-worker of her neighbor’s nephew to come last minute. Those were the things. Right. Those were the things.

Christa Innis: Yeah, it’s, it’s. Those are really harsh to have.

I mean, maybe blocking on social media and deleting the husband is like the best thing, because then you guys can’t see her on social media. I wouldn’t have said a thing

Saron Olkaba: about that.

Christa Innis: I would have

Saron Olkaba: said,

Christa Innis: great. I’m like, awesome. Yeah, you saved it. Saved, saved me from doing it. When I tried reaching out, she called my husband crying.

Here we go. The victim said she’d been crying every day because of how I treated her. When he defended me like a good, she hung up because she realized he was gone. He is not, he’s not backing you up anymore, crazy mom. He is now

Saron Olkaba: someone else’s husband. Not yours.

Christa Innis: Yeah. Not yours. Finally, my husband texted her saying she had two options.

Have a conversation or lose him. She replied, I guess I won’t be seeing you anymore then. I mean, I would say hallelujah.

Saron Olkaba: I would be like, I’m so sorry, babe. Yeah. It’ll be like, we’ll, we’ll get this. It’s just trying to keep my face straight. Okay.

Christa Innis: I know. I feel like the petty in me, I’d be like, I’d text her, I’d be like, well, have a great life. Best of luck. Yeah. Honestly, like I’m, I’m relieved, you know, and I really hope they don’t like to contact her.

And I hope it’s just like left that way because this, like we were saying, this mother in law would make her life a living hell.

Saron Olkaba: Yeah. But like do, like crazy mother in laws like this, like just like let it, like let things go. Oops. I know, did

Christa Innis: She came creeping back? It’s over, yeah, right. They’re not that easy to get rid of, I’m

Saron Olkaba: pretty sure.

Christa Innis: I wonder how, like, soon this, how soon she sent me this story after it happened. So, like, if this was, like, that day or, like, a week later.

Saron Olkaba: Yeah, we might need a, a, uh,

Christa Innis: Yeah, we might need her to like to follow. Yeah, we need to follow up. We need one of those episodes where it’s like you tell us like everything that has happened since.

Did she really not speak her word? Um, because yeah, it could be that victim mentality of like, fine, I guess I’ll never see you again. You know, so dramatic. Yeah. They show up at the front door. Let’s make up. But big

Saron Olkaba: romantic gesture.

Christa Innis: Yeah. Come back. Running back to them. Um, well that was a crazy story.

Um, really hoping that this, um, bride woman, um, got some stronger boundaries away from this mother in law because if she comes crawling back, you know, it’s, it’s going to be worse. I don’t think this, this woman’s not realizing what she’s doing wrong. Yeah.

Saron Olkaba: Yeah. Yeah.

Christa Innis: Yeah. There’s.

Saron Olkaba: I mean, honestly, this ended the best case scenario for me.

Like ideally if she, I mean, this is your best chance at peace, ma’am. So let’s just continue praying every night that she sticks to no content and contact, and you can live your life peacefully because she sounds. Absolutely horrible. But like, is your husband sad about it?

Christa Innis: I don’t, that’s not your problem.

Yeah. Yeah, I’m glad the husband I hope he kind of realizes like showing up at that dinner without her was kind of weird. Because it seems like later on in these stories, he’s defending her more. So I’m like, okay, maybe he went and was like, okay, the way my mom’s acting is weird. Yeah, it was

Saron Olkaba: weird for me to go to a wedding with, about, without the bride that I’m marrying.

Yeah, perhaps. That’s, that’s

Christa Innis: Yeah.

Saron Olkaba: That was weird. That was weird. Let’s do that. Jesus. Frig it. That was insane.

Christa Innis: That was, yeah. So, uh, props to you for keeping your boundaries up and I just hope it stays that way and, and uh, your husband realizes that. He needs to back you up first.

Saron Olkaba: Yeah, let us know if, um, if she stays out of your life.

I pray that she does. Yeah,

Christa Innis: yeah, I think I need to do, like, uh, there’s so many stories on here that I, like, need follow ups with, so I feel like I need to reach out to some of these people and be like, a follow up episode and, like, share what’s been going on since, since they sent it. Cause this was 2024, so we’re talking seven months later now.

Hopefully seven months of peace

Saron Olkaba: and quiet. So much peace and quiet. It’s like your first seven months being married. I would imagine you just want to enjoy that. You do want someone tainting every big life milestone. Every time you have kids, she’s going to make it a problem. Like, every holiday. Like, you’re literally signing up to never enjoy anything, almost, like, ever again.

Best case scenario is that she eliminates herself from the situation. Yeah.

Christa Innis: And she can feel like a victim all she wants and you can live your best life. So

Saron Olkaba: 100%. Yeah.

Wedding Confessions & Unfiltered Reactions

Christa Innis: Yeah. Okay. All right. So I like to end this with a weekly confessions game. So people send their confessions and we kind of just We can rate them.

Sometimes it’s kind of weird rating them because I feel like, I’m like, oh, your confession wasn’t great. So, um, we can rate them if we want. But, um, so people send these ones. Here we go. Um, my sister in law got mad she wasn’t my maid of honor and then questioned all of my wedding decisions.

Saron Olkaba: Uh, she sounds awful.

Uh, no wonder she was not your maid of honor. And you sound like you have discernment, ma’am. So,

Christa Innis: yeah. Sounds like she didn’t even know you knew why.

Saron Olkaba: You’re not allowed to. You’re not allowed to get mad at people for the choices that they make in their wedding, right? Like, if she feels that someone, she wanted to have someone be her maid of honor that’s not, like, her, what she did was her being honest.

Her changing her mind is just doing it to placate you. Why would you want that? Let her have whoever she wants beside her. If you’re her sister and you love her, whatever, make sure she has the day that she wants and it’s not about you. It’s literally not about you.

Christa Innis: Yeah, totally agree. Um, oh, this one tells a couple not to marry each other.

We begged, um, was begged by so many people up until the wedding to stop it. So I don’t know what the outcome was. I did see one similar, maybe this is the other part of it, but I did see one similarly where she said they still got married and she still regrets, like they still like regret, regret it or something.

Um, letting it happen? Yeah, yeah, she said she liked to tell a couple, yeah.

Saron Olkaba: You have to be okay with every possible outcome. You gotta play this every way, you know, like if I tell her and she is, Like, f*ck you, I never want to speak to you again. Is this worth me potentially losing my friendship? Is this, are his, are the problems with him big enough or dangerous enough that it’s worth risking her reacting poorly and me losing her and her being like, even more isolated with this person?

Like, you just have to think that through. Some, like, some hills are not worth dying on and others are. You just have to trust your gut. I know.

Christa Innis: Yeah, like, I’ve definitely been a part of a wedding where she Was very unhappy and you could tell it was, like, a bachelorette party. They were, she was very upset. Like, I don’t want to go through with this.

And we’re like giving her support, like, Hey, we’re here. Like, you don’t have to do it. Like I’m talking like the night before the wedding, like after the rehearsal dinner, crying in the car with us and long story short, they got a divorce. So like. It didn’t work out. And, um, Were there signs? There were lots of signs.

Lots of signs. I think you’re right. Like,

Saron Olkaba: literally weeping the night before your wedding. Yeah. Not of happiness is

Christa Innis: Yeah. Well, that’s the thing. It’s like, So we could have been like, no, you’re not gonna marry him. Like, we’ll beg, you know. But it’s like, ultimately, it was her decision. Like, she was worried, more worried about like, you know, vendors that they already paid and this and that.

And it’s just like

Saron Olkaba: Vendors? That’s like a couple emails and you just gotta be, okay, eating, believe me, I’ve done it before, eating like tens of thousands of dollars, not great, but like, but like that versus, divorces are more expensive, first and foremost. Yes. If you, if you have something worth losing and also like, just don’t, if you have the Ability to stop the train.

Stop the f*cking train.

Christa Innis: Yes.

Saron Olkaba: Yeah. As quickly

Christa Innis: as possible.

Saron Olkaba: Okay, like, don’t wait to get so far down the road.

Christa Innis: Yeah, did you see the girl who went viral because she was left at the altar? Like, literally the most terrible, like, humiliating thing, right? But she turned it into, like, this fabulous party and they documented the whole thing and I was like, you go girl.

Like, she like I don’t even know, like, she went viral of, like, sharing this, like, amazing video of herself dancing at the wedding, and, like, I was like, yeah, you know what? That’s what you do. You turn up, you have a great party, that’s what you gotta do. I saw

Saron Olkaba: That, and you’re 100 percent correct. She is, like, the strongest.

She’s, like, an inspiration. She completely turned it around, um, and, like, when something that, like, that happens, Like, two months before, like, with me, devastating day of, I can’t even f*cking imagine, I can’t imagine, and to be able to, like, to find some joy in that day, and like, actually Realized that, oh, there are a bunch of people here that really love me.

And this is like a very sad or scary moment for me. And I could either isolate myself and, and kind of immediately start dwelling in it. Or I would like to try and make the best of it with all these people who adore me and want to see me happy. And it was just, it was incredible to watch. And she’s an inspiration.

Christa Innis: Yeah, I love that. I’m like, I don’t know. I don’t know how it acted at something like that. But I’m like, she’s yeah, definitely an inspiration in that aspect. Um, well, that is all I have planned for today. Thank you so much for coming on. It was so fun chatting with you. Um, I love your content. I love all the stuff you talk about.

Like I said, I feel like I get all my like pop culture, like what’s going on in the world from you. Um, so can you share with everyone where they can find you any fun things you’re working on and all that good stuff?

Saron Olkaba: Yeah, um, you can find me at saronthings, S A R O N, things, um, on TikTok and on, uh, Instagram.

I’m going to be starting a YouTube series soon, um, two 30 minute pop culture breakdowns a week, so stay tuned for that, but yeah, I’m mostly on, uh, Instagram and TikTok.

Christa Innis: Awesome. Well, thank you again so much for coming on. Yeah, it was so fun. It was so great chatting with you. Right. Awesome.those, and hopefully those will come out sometime early 2025.

Christa Innis: Oh, that’s so cool! How awesome. You, like, you do it all. You’ve got a lot of projects. My brain doesn’t stop.

Cassie Horrell: It’s like I have an idea and I’m like, yeah, I’m just going to go for it. have no clue what I’m doing out here.

I’m just having fun and going with the flow.

Christa Innis: I love it. It’s that like planner mindset where you’re just like, okay, let’s just do it. Let’s get busy and find something. I love that. well, when those are available, definitely send me links and stuff and we can get it in the show notes. Well, thank you so much for coming on.

That was so fun having you react. Like I said, had some people tag you in like comments and stuff and now I follow your stuff and I like I love your content because you’re so involved in the wedding stuff that you’ve got stories for days so yeah

Cassie Horrell: but I feel like we have a very similar audience because we’re storytellers and like my whole page isn’t storytelling but Usually one a day, I try to tell stories and I get the same, like, people will be like, Did you see her story? And they’ll tag me, and I’m like, Oh, I saw it. That’s a juicy one. Yes.

Christa Innis: Yeah, it’s so good. I, can’t stop watching the, drama stories. They just, those ones just get me. Like, I love it.

Cassie Horrell: I feel like they’re like, a little bit of, like, reprieve from people’s everyday life.

Like, they come and they watch our stories, and it’s like, a minute and a half of like, totally Drama that they’re not in.

Christa Innis: Yes. And they get

Cassie Horrell: their little fix for the day, and then they’re like, Okay, I’ll come back tomorrow, like, see the next part, or whatever’s going on.

Christa Innis: Yes, yeah, it’s a good little, little break from reality, I think.

Yes. Awesome. Well, thank you so much again for coming on. It was awesome chatting with you. Thank you so much.

All right, guys, that was my interview with Cassie. I love chatting with her. It’s so fun to hear from someone that is so involved in the wedding industry. She’s got a lot of hot takes and she has. Honestly seen it all. So, thank you, Cassie, for coming on. Just a reminder, guys, if you love this episode or loving this podcast, please leave a review on Apple podcast.

It really helps more people hear the podcast. And helps me create more amazing content for you. so I really appreciate all the support that this podcast has gotten so far, and I can’t wait for more people to hear it and to create some more content. If you also have suggestions of who you want to see next on the podcast, feel free to send me an email, send me some submissions.

I cannot wait to share more stories with more people. All right, guys, thanks so much for tuning in and I will see you next time.

by Christa Innis

Blog Transcript:

The Maid of Honor You Thought You Knew

The Wedding Alcohol Scam

A Pattern Buried for Years

Weddings and Funerals Reveal Everything

Religious Manipulation & Forced Forgiveness

Red Flag, Green Flag

Listener Submission: The Bridezilla Who Used Her Friends

Blog Transcript:

Getting to Know Saron Olkaba

Cash Bars, Garter Tosses, and Other Wedding Debates

Monster-in-Law Alert: Wedding Drama at Its Worst

Wedding Confessions & Unfiltered Reactions

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