mille-feuille

Legally-speaking, he is not my husband yet. To even apply for a I-130, he would need to fly here again, we go to the embassy, find a religious institution to marry us, and then freaking redo the wedding. My country isn't somewhere we can just make an appointment at the courthouse and get a marriage certificate quickly. It doesn't work like that at all. Meanwhile, the wedding I had before had no official record (not even a religious certificate) and certainly did not qualify us for a spousal visa. I'm sure you all mean well, but to simply withdraw and apply for a spousal visa just don't make actual sense in my case.

A few months longer? I-130 takes 10,5 months as of now (if not getting pushed back). I'd say this once again, I can't just apply for a spousal visa. The wedding I had included zero paperwork that would be needed to register for a civil marriage.

I don't understand how an engagement party could be an issue. The photos we submitted were travel photos and engagement shot (basically just us at the beach, not with wedding dress/suit). What messages?

Thanks

One of the must-submit document for a spousal visa is a copy of civil marriage certificate. We don't have that, because we never meant to register it legally.

To even register my marriage and apply for a spouse visa I would need to actually marry again. Why? Because our ceremony didn't have any official record. To get married legally we'd need to first go to the US embassy/consulate here and fill out a form there for a CNI and then get a marriage certificate from a religious institution. There's a bunch of paperwork to be done for a marriage here and we never did or submitted any. We can't just go have it registered now, so really we can't just apply for a spouse visa.

Thanks for the compilation. I get that CR-1 has its own advantages, but one of the major disadvantages is that we need to start from zero and wait even longer. We filed for K1 before any wedding plans (in fact, we didn't even know when could we meet again at that time as my country's borders were closed). I literally only signed up on this site last night and never heard that non-registered wedding could be such a problem before.

There is NO church record. I didn't refer it as a religious ceremony because I'm not actually religious.

Ok I'm very much new here and I never heard of other couple's stories. But really why would I head for a possible big trouble when I'm not legally married? Long story short, we never intended to violate anything. We applied for K1 2 months after getting engaged, decided to have a wedding during the long wait after because we wanted to celebrate and also for convenience's sake (I live in a more conservative country). We never submitted wedding pics and during previous embassy interview I said fiance.

Seriously, can I just not mention it during the interview? It isn't on the civil registry here and we don't even have a church certificate.

Well, long wait. No NOA2 yet. My husband could visit me here, but I wanted to see where he lives too and meet his family, so we tried the tourism visa. Official reason for denial is no strong ties to home country. Really though the officer didn't ask that much about myself, mainly about our relationship. No tickets bought yet.

Wow really? I didn't know about it, I thought it'd only matter to them if it's legal. Thanks for letting me know.

Oh we received the confirmation after we applied in March, just haven't heard anything again ever since. No record at the embassy here yet, but I was denied because I admitted I have a fiance in the US (thought I shouldn't lie because after all we have submitted K1 application before and I was planning to stay with him while in the US). I think the officer thought I was gonna misuse the tourist visa to stay there and get married.

Hi, I'm new here. I guess I made an account and jumped straight to the forum so I feel less lonely in the frustration, lol. Submitted in early March, got the confirmation they've received it, but no more updates ever since. Tried to visit the US on tourist visa in September but got denied and told to do the K1 instead. I told the officer we've submitted it already but still haven't heard back (hence I wanted to visit in the meantime), then he checked on his computer and said they didn't have any record of it and simply told me to reapply (#######). Oh well. I guess the documents simply haven't reached this embassy. I actually got married to my fiance in my home country during this crazy long wait, BUT it's not legal. We had a symbolic ceremony and a reception. We didn't actually register it because we don't want to have to cancel this application and start a new one (read: more cost and even longer wait). I wonder should I mention it when I have my interview one day (whenever will that be)? How long do you all had to wait?