Weddings are a beautiful time for family to come together and celebrate love. But for a lot of families, weddings can be a huge source of drama.
The original poster in this Reddit saga never thought her family would be one of those families with drama surrounding a wedding. In a shocking turn of events, that was just the case. OP is a bride whose wedding was postponed due to her mother-in-law's illness. The wedding was all ready to go whenever her mother-in-law's health would permit.
That meant that OP had her wedding dress hanging out in her closet. This might not seem like a big deal, but it turned into one when her mom and sister came over to borrow a dress for her niece's prom at the last minute.
OP's situation is truly one-of-a-kind. The bride-to-be had to postpone her wedding due to her mother-in-law being ill. She and her fiancé were ready to make the wedding happen as soon as her health permitted.
In the meantime, OP was holding on to her wedding dress in her bedroom closet. With infrequent visitors to her home, she didn't see an issue. But she did get some visitors when she was asked for help by her mother and sister.
OP's mom and sister explained that OP's niece needed a prom dress. They claimed the niece had put off dress shopping until it was too late and thought OP might be able to help. OP explained she had a collection of high-fashion dresses from working in a fashion-adjacent industry.
When they came by to check out OP's closet, she was busy. She had a meeting with a client and once that was finished, she discovered her cat had gotten into something and made a mess. She only saw the three of them as they were walking out the door with a black garment bag in hand.
It wasn't until later that OP would look at her closet and realize what had transpired. It seemed that none of the dresses she anticipated were missing, but her wedding dress was. Though the white garment bag was left behind, the dress was nowhere to be found.
OP called her mom and sister, but was initially getting no answer. When she finally got through, she let them know they couldn't use that dress. They could come back for any other dress, but her wedding dress dress was off limits.
At this point, OP also explained that her wedding dress wasn't a traditional bridal gown, leaving room for the fact that the error was genuine. But that didn't change the fact that both mom and sister had been there when she picked the dress and therefore, should have known better.
OP's mom and sister tried to insist on letting niece wear the dress. After all, it had time to be cleaned before the wedding and there would be no overlap in audiences. OP was furious and disagreed. They then blamed her for ruining niece's prom experience, as there would be no time to get another dress and she would miss the event.
At that point, OP turned to Reddit to ask if she was wrong. They quickly let her know loud and clear she wasn't. In her replies, OP let commenters know she planned to talk to her niece the next day. True to her word, she shared an update.
"My niece came by at around 1pm today, and had a friend drop her off," she wrote. "When I answered the door, she looked terrible–it was obvious that she had been crying for some time, and I was wary of her and was worried she would throw another tantrum or simply cry and not hold conversation with me."
She continued: "We sat down at the table, and she told me the whole story. Her mother had been 'postponing' prom dress shopping because she said that there was no point to get a dress if my niece didn't have a date (her date waited until very late last week to ask, but it was mutually agreed that they were going together, he just didn't 'officially' ask). My sister had told her 'no date, no dress' because there was no point in going to prom single."
"So after my niece finally got officially asked, my sister then told her that she was too 'busy' to take her dress shopping and that she would call me and they would just borrow one of my gowns. My niece was understandably upset that she wasn't allowed to go dress shopping (even with her friends), but agreed to just take one of my dresses since she didn't want to fight with her mom," OP explained.
"They came over to my house and went upstairs while I was caught up with a client. My niece said that she was trying on dresses while her mother was pulling gowns out of my closet (for reference, my gowns are stored in my closet but my full length mirror is in the bedroom next to the window). My niece was busy trying on dresses and zipping herself up (since her mother was digging through my things) and when her mother came out with my gown, my niece said she didn't put initially put two and two together."
"My niece initially thought it was just a 'pretty champagne dress' and tried it on and understandably fell in love. She said she had a small doubt in her mind that it might have been a wedding gown, but she had never seen my gown and didn't think her mother would pull my wedding gown for me to try on," OP noted.
"They packed the dress in one of the discarded black bags in my closet and packed the rest of the dresses away, and my niece said she had already seen the white bridal bag tucked away and thus thought that there was no way she had my bridal gown."
"Her mother had her call the florist on the way back to their house under the explanation that florists were understandably busy at this time of year and she needed to get her ribbon and flower preferences in ASAP," OP revealed.
"This solidified the theory that my sister had planned all of this, and used her daughter to further whatever twisted plot she had in her head."
When OP contacted them about the dress, her niece finally put two and two together.
"She wasn't completely understanding of the situation, and thought that I had argued with her mother about taking a 'bridal looking' gown since she thought my actual bridal gown was in the white bag. It wasn't until I left that she realized that regardless of what she thought, she shouldn't have treated me that way or screamed at me for ruining her prom," she wrote.
OP's niece felt bad for how she acted and felt guilty, despite not being fully in the know.
"I talked to her and told her that regardless of what happened, she was still in the wrong for blaming me for ruining her experience, and that she should have thought to ask or check if the dress she had was a special gown. I told her that I was disappointed in her outburst, but I still loved her and didn't blame her for the dress fiasco, but rather was disappointed that she thought it was acceptable to solve her problems by yelling at her aunt instead of holding rational conversation," OP shared.
"I told her that even though it was obvious the main reason behind this entire problem was her mother, I still felt she needed to learn from this ordeal and that I would not be lending any of my things to her for a while, and that she would not be allowed near my closet for a few months at least. She completely understood, and even told me that if any of her friends pulled this with her, she wouldn't have even accepted to talk to them like I did with her."
OP also tried to do her best to try to solve her niece's prom dress dilemma.
"At this point, she was crying from frustration and I felt terrible for her. There was no way her mother would take her to find a dress, and I decided to take her dress shopping instead. We went to the department store and she found a beautiful, appropriate prom dress that matched her flower preferences. I told her that I would not be paying for her dress as a gift, and instead offered the payment as a loan that she would have to pay back before my wedding. Thus, she would have to pay me back for the dress with 1/4 of her monthly paycheck until 75% of the dress was paid back, and she would have to help me with some wedding tasks. She happily agreed, and we had a good afternoon shopping and talking afterwards," she noted.
"I also told my niece that her mother would not be invited to my wedding, but she was welcome to come."
OP also thought the time away from her mom would do her niece good.
"I felt that this also would allow her time away from her mother, since she would have to spend more time practicing arrangements with me and my bridesmaids. The bright side is that my niece is going to college starting this summer in the city, so she will be relatively farther away from her mother and can start exercising her own freedom more," she explained.
"Thus, even if her mother restricts my niece's contact with me, she will be able to do as she pleases once she moves out from under her roof. I hope that allowing her to spend more time out of the house away from her mother gives her the room she needs to grow into a lovely young woman, and realize that many of the behaviors she thought were acceptable are actually bratty and unadjusted behavior as well as a result of her mother's narcissism."
"At the end of the day, I will be phasing out my sister from my life, but I will keep strong contact and support with my niece. I feel that she has a good head on her shoulders, and although it wavers at times with her teenage hormones and temper, she will turn out alright."
These stories are based on posts found on Reddit. Reddit is a user-generated social news aggregation, web content rating, and discussion website where registered members submit content to the site and can up- or down-vote the content. The accuracy and authenticity of each story cannot be confirmed by our staff.
