Before planning a wedding — a process I'm in the midst of — I never understood what the big deal was. I never understood why people talked about it like it was one of the big stresses of life, why untold numbers of books had been written about it, why blocks of programming were devoted to it and why it took people I love and made them unrecognizable. Also I never understood the halting wide-eyed warnings people would issue when I told them I was planning a wedding. "Whatever you do," they would say, grabbing my wrist for emphasis, "Don't read the bridal magazines. They will just drive you crazy. Read two, but then stop." Or "Don't listen to all the voices, just remember, it's about what you and Daniel want." I also received the exact opposite advice, "The sooner you recognize that a wedding is for your family, and really isn't for you and Daniel, the easier it'll be."

The intensity and variety of the advice I received made me think I wasn't taking the whole endeavor seriously enough — not that I wasn't taking matrimony seriously, because I was — but that somehow I wasn't taking wedding planning seriously enough. For example, I hadn't signed up for ballroom dancing classes, started a scrapbook or even made a profile on Pinterest. And when people discovered this, and that I was trying to plan the thing in about four months, they gave me a look that was a mix of pity, fear and vicarious thrill. Probably the same look I would get if they found out I was going on a lengthy polar expedition and all I brought to sustain me was a cardigan, half a Fresca and a peanut.

"But what could possibly take so long?" I wondered. "Why do people start planning 14 months in advance?"

Now I know, having almost come out the other side of it, and here's what I wish people had explained to me.

If you are the kind of person who looks at two vendors online and then chooses one and is happy with that decision and never looks back, you don't need an impossibly long lead time. However, the planning process takes a long time if you're a relatively thorough person who likes to make sure each decision is the best one, given a number of factors from quality of service to cost.

I'm indecisive and like to weigh my options. To feel comfortable I like to thoroughly vet each detail—- something I should have known about myself to begin with but didn't quite recognize — and so I'm finding the process to be immensely stressful and time-consuming.

Another thing no one really warned me about: the paralyzing effect of IT'S YOUR DAY. You will receive this message — that a wedding is your big day and you should love every aspect of it — between two and three million times in the course of planning a wedding. You will think it isn't really affecting you, but then you will sit down and try to choose between two florists, and one uses peonies, and you aren't sure if you like peonies, and on the one hand does it really matter, a flower is a flower, but on the other hand, IT'S YOUR BIG DAY, and you should love everything about it, which is a lot of pressure.

At a certain point you will wonder why you're doing this — it's stressful and expensive and you will think you should either elope or postpone the wedding or just not get married at all. And you will freak out. And then you will discover the parallel universe of wedding websites and books devoted to this reaction. I don't know if it's a generational thing or just something that has always happened but wasn't often talked about, but women getting cold feet isn't that uncommon. Especially women who get married in their 30s who are used to being independent and fear the loss of that identity.

At the outset, I thought of planning a wedding as akin to planning a party — something I don't have a lot of experience doing but how hard can it be — now I realize it's about coming to terms with what it means to be married. And also figuring out whether you like peonies.

Hear more from Alison Rosen on her podcast, "Alison Rosen Is Your New Best Friend" or on the immensely popular "Adam Carolla Show" podcast. Follow her on Twitter @alisonrosen or visit her website at www.alisonrosen.com