The reality: Your engagement will actually be one of the most up-and-down times of your life; your wedding day will be one of the happiest days of your life.

Why? Planning one of today's elaborate weddings can drive even the most organized type A bride-to-be to pull her hair out. But it's a piece of cake compared to the psychological changes a woman undergoes before she gets married.

Most brides-to-be write off their "unbridely" feelings of anxiety, fear, and sadness to wedding stress. However, while wedding stress does in fact account for some of the angst, much of it is caused by the normal, natural psychological process that every woman goes through as she prepares to marry.

From the moment you say yes to the popped question, you are tossed into limbo, an unknown, in-between, new world in which you're neither single nor married, neither girlfriend nor wife. Your sense of who you are suddenly feels shaky as you close the chapter on your single life and begin a new one as a married woman.

Your relationships are changing as a result of your engagement, too.

Days or months ago, he was just your boyfriend; now, you're both wrapping your brains around the exciting, strange, and new concept of "husband and wife."

You're beginning to pull away from your family so you can create a new family with your fiance; it's almost as if you don't quite fit in with your folks the way you used to.

You're not one of "the girls" anymore, either. Out at a bar with your single girlfriends, you don't feel as connected with their Cosmos-and-cute guys lives. When a handsome stranger flirts with you, you feel guilty because you're now an engaged woman.

"I don't even recognize my own life anymore!" is a thought that crosses the mind of many brides-to-be.

Engaged women can bring order to their inner emotional chaos by becoming aware of the natural psychological process going on within then. (Just knowing that the "unbridely" feelings of sadness and fear have meaning and purpose often helps them release the pressure valve.

In my book, you'll learn how to work through your difficult feelings and grow from them, so that when your wedding day arrives, you'll feel like kicking up your heels to do, yes, even the electric slide. On your wedding day, you'll be smiling at your guests -- the same way those toothsome brides are smiling out at you from the pages of the bridal magazines today. But you've got a bit of emotional processing to do before you get there.

For the past 5 years, I've had a message board on my website. My hope was that it would be a place for all you brides to share, connect, create a community. Unfortunately, I turned into a huge spam- and porn-fest, so I decided to take it down.

In this space, I'm going to talk about all that I've learned since my book was published in 2005. For example.... What I've learned about the "seasonality" of brides' emotions -- i.e. what to expect when you're engaged, at what time of year. Or typical problems I'm hearing in my practice with brides -- anonymously, of course -- and how I'm counseling them to deal with them. And other ideas I can't even predict right now.

This is also a space for you. Are there topics you'd be interested in my addressing? Questions you have that you think would interest the general bridal population? If so, shoot me a comment here. I'm open to your wants and needs!

Here's to this new blog, a new space on my site, one that I hope is useful to you.

Warmly,

Allison