How not to feel like I'm making too much of an effort?

[Ineffable23]

I'm not actually sure that making too much of an effort is quite the right thing to call it.

TLDR: outfit - looks good, or too much? In my head it's too much but I think that is probably my brain being unhelpful.

I've put on weight (and lost a proportion of that weight) over the course of a very stressful COVID in the NHS. It has coincided with me moving from mid-20s to thirty. A crazy level of work as well as pandemic restrictions also meant I spent several years not going out.

I've got an outfit that I think I do look good in but that I have chickened out of wearing more than once. It's both shorter than I usually wear and low cut (though I wear fairly low cut things quite often). I think I feel like it is probably too "sexy" but I am also not sure why I feel like that. Or maybe somewhat too young for me. Or that I am too fat to be allowed to try? I'm not sure any of those are logical feelings but I think they're what's going round in my head.

I've got a date in the day tomorrow, which I don't think it is right for as it is Too Much for the day. Maybe it's too much for the evening too and that's why I am chickening out of wearing it. Especially as fashion has become so casual recently.

Any ideas? I think I would like to feel confident enough to go with it, but equally if it's actually not a good look then I would rather know about it and not be stepping out my comfort zone for something that's not a good look.

Outfit photo attached for reference.

Thanks for the many and varied opinions everyone.

I should say I am obese so my concerns about my weight aren't really just in my head.

I think I'm taking from this that my too much vibe wasn't off the mark. I'll have a think on these and see how I could think differently about my wardrobe.

I think maybe you need some new, up to date clothes. Browse some properly fashionable websites / Instagram accounts and see how people are putting outfits together.

In truth I don’t understand your thread title - and a suspicious person might wonder if the purpose of the thread wasn’t to show a photo of a woman in a low cut dress - in order to garner admiring responses.

It’s not a matter of the outfit looking too much. - it’s more that, for some people, it would give an odd impression of you as a 30 year old woman.

Way too booby for me for a first date but I'm not great at having too much on show.

Hope it goes well.

I think it would look fine in a holiday situation where people are wearing less, but too much otherwise. It isn't that you don't look good - you do! But it is a bit much.

You have an awesome figure, but that dress is too small on the boobs. Sympathies - I'm also large of nork, and it's really hard to get things that fit, but that don't look too booby.

Keep the dress to wear at home/date night at bf's home (not first date) - it looks great on you; it's just too revealing to wear out.

You’ve got amazing boobs so I’d take bmi calculators with a slight pinch of salt. If you are overweight you are lucky as carrying it very well.

I agree though that the outfit is a bit too much flesh on show, but if you added black tights and a blazer it would be fine. If starting from scratch I think a slightly longer length dress would be more modern/on trend.

You have a great figure op.

That outfit isn't to my taste, but there's nothing wrong with it.

The being obese thing is about health. Doesn't mean you necessarily look bad or have an unattractive figure. However, I agree with other posters the dress is too much. Too skimpy looking and looks like you might very easily have a 'wardrobe malfunction' in it. The top bit looks like it would very easily migrate and come apart.

I really would not wear this. It's not a good look. Sorry.