Wedding Dress Regrets, Been 3 years.

[SillyCook0]

I got married at 24, had a great day, love my husband. I felt young and daft in the shop and ended up buying the first dress I tried on.

It's been years now and I still sometimes torture myself over it. It crops up when I am anxious about other things in life.

I've attached a photo. I analyse photos and go down a rabbit hole sometimes when I'm feeling low. I don't know what's wrong and why I can't snap out of it!

It's beautiful. Stop worrying!

Thanks @jocktamsonsbairn. I used to have body issues and a few photos I've seen of me in it are bad angles, from relatives phones mostly. I really struggle with it mentally and I'm not quite sure why. It's such a waste of headspace and a non-issue!

What a beautiful dress!

It is a beautiful dress and fitted you perfectly. I suspect it's a focus point on not the actual underlying issue, just a surface detail. I'm going to gently and respectfully suggest you explore councilling or therapy OP. Sounds like a metaphor you are using to beat yourself up. Try being your own best friend when this occurs instead.

That's gorgeous, both you and the dress look stunning

Thanks @flyinghen and @Welliwould
Yes, I think I need some therapy or something. I feel like I struggle to live with my decisions, I'm not sure I'd be fully happy with anything I picked! I have had issues with eating in the past and I thought I had overcome the body stuff, but a wedding day and all the photos and the spotlight... ugh it just brings it all back for me :(

Lovely simple dress for a lovely young woman. Really stop fretting :)

It's lovely, what do you wish was different about it?

Why waste time trying numerous dresses on when the first one was perfect?

Beautiful

Oh sweetheart the dress is lovely ❤️

You looked stunning in it 😍xx

It's lovely - elegant and timeless and won't look dated like 80s puffy sleeve dresses 😊

Thanks everyone. @Neveralonewithaclone I feel it was very plain, and I feel like in some angles it was very unflattering on my belly. I was often sucking in on the day and clutching my bouquet! My husband says I don't have a belly and that I made the right choice. I need to just get over this and learn to love it. I'm completely aware how ridiculous this is, it's a feeling I can't seem to turn off.

Thank you everyone, this has really boosted my confidence and brought a tear to my eye ❤️

I like it and if you’re a little bit shy possibly I think it's very difficult to have a very bold dress. You have to feel like yourself rather than like you're in a costume.

No i think you look slim with a nice figure and maybe too many sparkles and ruffles or whatever are just not very you.

It’s a perfectly ok dress. Even if it wasn’t, only you will be thinking of it 3 years on. Perhaps it’s become a symbol of an underlying issue? You could do with some therapy.

Goodness me, I was expecting to see a horrendous meringue monstrosity but that dress is simply gorgeous and fits you like a glove! You made an excellent choice!

I think it’s very elegant and timeless!

That's a beautfiul, elegant dress and you look lovely in it.

Did you say you were 23 at the time? You had very refined sophisticated taste for a youngster ❤️

I feel like I struggle to live with my decisions, I'm not sure I'd be fully happy with anything I picked!

Bless you OP, I feel for you because I was the same for a very, very long time. I'm a classic perfectionist and used to ruminate terribly over decisions, especially when things didn't turn out the way I'd hoped, even though there is no possible way I could have forseen things at the time. I think there was probably a lot of buried self hatred in there. No, hatred is too strong a word. But something like that.

It's taken a long time but finally at nearly 50 I find I am much less hard on myself, more accepting of inperfection, and can move on much faster from mistakes and misjudgements. I do wonder if I could have spared myself a lot of unhappiness if I had have sought some therapy at a younger age (although I don't beat myself up about that now 😀).

It's a beautiful dress, not just because it is objectively a lovely dress, but because it is YOUR dress and part of your unique, imperfectly perfect story.

Firstly you look lovely in the dress and have nothing to be anxious about - you have a lovely figure.

Wedding dresses are complicated things. In my ideal world I would have gone to selfridges and bought a beautiful designer red carpet dress for probably less (for some reason I always imagine yellow silk even though I could not pull it off ). But, my mums dream was buying the big white dress for me and I was comfortable with giving her that.

Please please I Hope appreciate how beautiful you are, but also remember the wedding is one day. My favourite pictures of me are just after we got engaged and holding my new son. So many lovely things will happen in life and hopefully you'll have the photos to remember them!

@AbbeFausseMaigre that is such a kind message ❤️ thank you so much. I am glad you don't beat yourself up anymore over decisions and I hope I stop doing this too! I often think 'what a waste of precious life and time' and yet, 5 minutes later my head is spinning again. It is a very hard habit to break. X

1). Less is more. Always.

2). You have lovely taste.

3). Never, ever be upset with yourself for being the “do it once, do it right” type. That’s an asset.

Thanks @andthenwho, anxiety is a funny thing! Yes, and although I loved my wedding day, I really have loved the days following it more. I am quite shy and my honeymoon with just my husband was the highlight of that time in my life. It is one day. I often think if I was born before the time of photos galore, social media etc, it wouldn't bother me half as much!