A wedding planner has gone viral for revealing the tell-tale signs a couple will get divorced—before they’ve even made it down the aisle.
Robin ‘Birdie’ Yarusso, from Lakeville, Minnesota, has worked as a wedding planner for 20 years, and has noticed “trends” when planning a couple’s big day that she now considers “signs” that the betrothed won’t make it.
She told Newsweek that while these trends aren’t “100 percent” an indicator that a couple will get divorced, “I would argue that I know plenty of people who stay in a marriage that is wrong for them or they are unhappy in.
“With that being said, there are clear behaviors that come out during the wedding planning process that indicate larger issues.”
Yarusso shared these signs to her TikTok account @birdie1216 in August, telling viewers “I can tell if they will divorce before the wedding happens.”
In the clip, viewed more than 2.6 million times, she explains she’s planned more than 100 weddings, and there are “certain things” she’s seen in the planning and wedding day that often leads to divorce down the line.
The first thing she noted was “smashing cake in each other’s face”, and “for some reason, none of my brides and grooms who did that are still together.”
Other issues followed more of a “pattern,” she went on. One person being respectful of the budget, but the other spouse-to-be ignoring it, and going behind their back to add more expenses, was a major red flag. As Yarusso said: “The ‘don’t tells’—those people end up getting divorced.”
The mother of a bride or groom “overstepping, and her child doesn’t check her, that usually leads to problems in the marriage,” she said.
Finally, she warned against a husband who “doesn’t care about the wedding,” as in he was given one job to do, and a week before the big day, still hasn’t done it.
She told Newsweek that “while these small moments may seem all part of the planning process, I’d argue that they are indicators of deeper issues.
“We all know there are common reasons for a divorce. Money, trust, contempt, boundaries. If I have a bride that is hiding the true cost of flowers from her future husband, that falls right into money and trust.
“If I have a mother of the groom that is overstepping and her son doesn’t correct her, chances are that is going to have an impact on his marriage long-term. How do you think it’ll be when they have children? It’s a clear lack of boundaries.”
When it comes to cake pushing, she said it “can be cute and playful,” but only if “both parties have agreed to it. Otherwise, it’s a strong indicator of contempt.”
Yarusso’s video, captioned: “Signs that the marriage will fail during wedding planning,” had a huge response, racking up close to 160,000 likes.
One commenter defended cake smashing, saying she and her husband have been married for 30 years, and “as long as [you] guys agree ahead of time and don’t get violent, I don’t see an issue.”
Another claimed: “I played in a wedding string quartet for over a decade. I could tell from the couple’s music choice and behavior who was going to stick together,” while one identified themselves as an officiant, and said “I’ve seen tell-tale signs as well.”
“I used to do makeup for weddings, and I could often tell if the marriage wouldn’t last. When a bride spoke to the groom with constant disrespect, those relationships rarely survived,” one wrote. And a wedding photographer added another bad sign is “if the husband constantly walks faster than the bride during the couple shots.”
“I’ve sang at 5 weddings and all of them have divorced,” another admitted. “Am I a curse?”
In 2023, there were 2,041,926 marriages in the United States, and 672,502 divorces from 45 reporting States and Washington, DC, according to the National Center for Health Statistics.
As of 2024, the US divorce rate remains between 40 to 50 percent for first marriages, although this number has been declining for several decades, according to Modern Family Law.
Yarusso told Newsweek that there are “also indicators of healthy and beautiful relationship patterns” that she often sees while planning weddings.
“Couples that laugh at the moments that go wrong, couples that have a strong ability to compromise, couples that unite against others.”
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