Bride Reaches Altar—What Groom Does in Front of Her Dad Stuns Everyone

By

Jack Beresford is a Newsweek Senior Internet Culture & Trends Reporter, based in London, UK. His focus is reporting on trending topics on the Internet, he covers viral stories from around the world on social media. Jack joined Newsweek in 2021 and previously worked at The Irish Post, Loaded, Den of Geek and FourFourTwo. He is a graduate of Manchester University. Languages: English. You can get in touch with Jack by emailing j.beresford@newsweek.com

Jack Beresford

Senior Life and Trends Reporter

🎙️ Voice is AI-generated. Inconsistencies may occur.

A wedding groom had the most unexpected of reactions to the arrival of his bride-to-be at the altar.

Whitney Padgett knew her husband, Walker, was special, long before she walked down the aisle of a South Louisiana church, in front of friends and family, to marry him on May 24. “We met in college at Auburn University in fall 2019 and were subtly set up by our friend Morgan, who was one of the bridesmaids,” Padgett told Newsweek. “We kept running into each other after that, and the rest was history. We went to a few sorority and fraternity parties and started dating in January 2020.”

Though diverging career paths after college kept them apart, the spark that existed between the pair burned brightly, even at a distance. “I moved to New Orleans that summer and he moved to Birmingham. We dated long distance for the whole time I was in dental school at LSU in New Orleans,” Padgett said.

“We got engaged in June 2024 at the beach. Walker and I took a walk on the beach, he proposed, and we celebrated with both our families afterward.”

But, while their union always felt like a sure thing, the big day itself was still one fraught with nerves, given the expense. A survey of more than 4,000 engaged couples conducted by wedding planning website Zola revealed that 52 percent considered the buildup to their big day as “stressful,” while 59 percent found it to be “overwhelming.”

This anxiety can manifest itself in any number of ways, not least when it comes to the ceremony itself. That proved to be the case for Whitney and Walker, as footage captured by the couple’s wedding content creator, Julie Milne, of Soiree Social, shows.

Milne was on hand to capture the moment Whitney walked down the aisle, alongside her father and the happy couple’s congregated guests. It was an emotional and understandably nerve-wracking moment for both bride and groom, but one that was punctuated by Walker’s unconventional reaction to Whitney’s arrival.

Showing immaculate decorum, Walker made a point of shaking hands with his future father-in-law as they arrived at the altar. What followed next was a little more surprising, though, with Walker proceeding to shake hands with Whitney as well.

The moment had everyone in attendance laughing. The clip was later shared to TikTok, under the handle @soiree.social, by Milne who wrote, “Nothing says ‘forever’ like a firm handshake” alongside the clip.

Milne shared the video as she felt it was a moment that offered a glimpse of the special bond Whitney and Walker have, even when things go a little awry. “They are a very sweet couple,” she told Newsweek. “I love how they immediately laughed off the moment.”

Though Walker’s handshake may have been unexpected, it actually ended up having a positive effect on proceedings. “It seemed to ease the wedding nerves a bit,” Milne said.

Milne’s video has also gone viral on TikTok, amassing more than 3.4 million views. It is a reminder that, when things go wrong, whether it be during a wedding or life in general, the best course of action is always to laugh it off and keep going.

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