Wedding Albums

I gave my first unhappy marriage album to my eldest daughter she appreciated it.

Presumably there are other family members in the album and it could be of interest to your DC, especially if anyone wants to start researching family history.
They may not want it now but they could in the future.

DD and her friend had a bonfire to burn all the personal stuff from DD's marriage including the photo album. This event was accompanied by several glasses of wine
I have a CD with all the photos on and was going to destroy it but have kept it for the same reasons others have given.

My daughters 2 and 3 each destroyed all photos of their ex husbands, including wedding photos, but I still have all my copies, and will never destroy them, they`re part of our family`s history.

My photos are really quite odd when I look at them now. The wedding day was wet and I do mean wet. One of those days where the rain fell so hard it bounced off the pavement. No photos taken outside the church except for ex and best man. All the others are at the reception. I must have had the most inexperienced photographer as the pics there are all against the same wooden screen with no more than 4 people at a time. I think I will hold onto my dear parents photo plus my sister no longer with us. I remember crying at the altar that day. A premonition of my future perhaps (it was hard being in a one sided marriage) but my children were worth it. Maybe not the North Sea but the shredder for some!

had this very conversation today with my MIL who was about to throw out my D's first wedding photographs.I think they have to be kept for the childrens sake ...after all isn't it better if they can see for themselves their parents WERE happy togther at one time and they came from a loving relationship.Otherwise they might have a very one sided version of their parents relationship

I still have my wedding album from my first marriage. If you have children they will probably want to see the photos and there are pictures of family members now gone. I threw out my wedding dress and gave away my wedding ring after I divorced.

Thank you for that paddyann as I really needed to hear that. Disposing of all of them would not be fair to my children. I suppose when I first came across the album today my feelings were totally one sided, never considering them at all. Rather selfish really. I may even transfer them into a digital file and tell them if they ever want a copy it's there. My children were and are loved.

I gave mine to my daughter, who is "the keeper of the family treasures". If nothing else she got a good laugh from the 1971 fashions, and she saw her father's parents as young-ish people which was an eye-opener for her.

Kept it, not because I m sentimental, but it’s my history

I kept the ones featuring me, cause I was way gorgeous that day and so I should! but out with the X when I could...kept all of X later with children and so on as that is history.
How about the rings? What did you do with yours? I gave a ruby/diamond to my daughter who shares my birthstone. The band went to the church, so they could cash it out. Better than pitching it is the river.

Not having been through a divorce I'm only looking at it from the point of view of history. I don't have a wedding album as such - just a few slides which we had printed years later - we were only just turned 17 and look like children!! I do feel that whatever has happened in later years to a couples marriage the photos are part of family history and should be kept. If you don't want to keep the album could you pass it on to one of your children? Their own children and great grandchildren will one day want to know about their ancestors and will probably be happy to see pictures of them.

NanaNancy, the rings! Now I do regret what I did with those. They were wrapped up well and sent off to the address where my ex was living with his new lady. I realise now how stupid that was. What on earth was I hoping to achieve? The result of being in such a dark, angry place at the time. Looking back I wish I had sold them and treated myself to something nice like a short break or some other experience. Passing them onto my children would have been too painful, even now. See how my selfishness kicks in again? I did however pass my mother's rings onto my daughters when she died. They were filled with, honest, loyal and faithful love.

I kept just the one wedding photo of each of my DDs first marriages and have attached them to the family tree. If only my ancestors had done the same. Please offer them to your DCs it’s their history too.

My niece told her cousin(my DD) who told me, that niece was really angry that her DM (my sister) still displayed a wedding photo of the 'happy' couple, although they had been divorced for some years. Niece was determined to say nothing to her DM, preferring to seethe quietly until her DM realised how inappropriate this was.

So off I went to visit my DS on a pretext and on leaving casually remarked that it was high time she replaced the picture with one showing just the Bride. Next time I visited the picture had been changed to one showing the bride with her father, who had died since the wedding. Job done.

My DM took mine when she went to live abroad, then cut herself off from the family. After her death, I have no idea what happened to her stuff. Binned probably.
Fortunately I have 4 enlargements that are carefully preserved.

I know there were photos taken, not officially but by some relative - but we never got them! At the time I regretted it, but since we parted in 1976, not now.

My sis still has hers and never looks at it similar situation. Get rid and enjoy your new happy marriage! Good luck to you. X

Gave mine to my eldest daughter she was very pleased.

Anniepops like you married 1978 and divorced by 1987 got rid of the wedding dress but felt the wedding album was not mine to destroy. I feel its wrong to destroy photos of the past so have left it to my sons to decide what to do with it.

I have been married 3 times. My second husband made me cut my 1st husband off photos but I refused to cut up my wedding photos (never had an album)
I still have my 2nd wedding album and I am so glad I kept it as there are some lovely pictures of my Mum, Dad and of one of my sisters who have since died.
I am happily married to my 3rd husband and I love that album as it was such a happy fun day.

Who would want to hold onto something that held nothing but bad memories?

No-one probably, but the memories of the children could be quite different to those of an ex-wife.

I have a video recording of the wedding of my DN and her ex-husband, (tempted to write some rude there) but we still have it because my mother is on there, smiling and chatting, along with other loved family members who have since died. DN may have destroyed her copy, I don't know.

sorry, 'something rude'