My niece wants to wear my wedding dress — she says my daughter is too large for it anyway

I remember when planning my wedding, I felt every time I let slip I was getting married, the vendor would add an extra zero to the price.

The average Aussie couple spends about $34,715 (about $22,582 USD) on their big day (for the first time, I wish I was not above average), and many are looking for clever ways to cut costs.

From DIY invites on Canva to opting for smaller, more intimate gatherings, with the current cost of living song never seeming to end, you can’t blame a bride for looking to save a dollar or two.

A classic dress

A woman has taken to the Wild West of internet forums, also known as Reddit, and asked if she was out of line refusing to lend her 90s wedding dress to her niece to help her cut costs.

“I married 30 years ago and was lucky enough to have a custom-made dress,” she wrote.

“I was very thin at the time, and the dress design I chose was not typical 90s… I stored it away and carried on with life.”

She went on to share she has two sons and a daughter, however, her daughter “is a totally different body shape [and she would never wear [her] dress.”

“She has a beautiful hourglass figure whereas I was catwalk model thin.”

“Can I borrow your dress?”

“My brother has two adult daughters,” she continued. 

“One is built like my daughter, the other is thinner [and] this is the one who asked for my dress after she got engaged at Christmas.”

“I don’t like this girl. She is immature for a 27-year-old, she is an attention seeker and intentionally unemployed hypochondriac,” she shared. 

“I dread any family events with her attendance because guaranteed she will become ill at some point or talk over the speeches or demand to dance with the host.

She recounts an unexpected text she received from her niece she is still yet to reply to.

“So she sends me a text saying ‘hi aunty, just got engaged and really want to wear your dress for the big day. Have you still got it?”

Mums the word… or not

The original poster revealed she called her mum and asked how her naive was aware she still had the dress and wasn’t too fond of reply she got.

“[My mum] said that she offered the dress knowing it was stored away and that because [my] niece was on a budget, using my dress would be a great idea And it’s not like your daughter will wear it because she’s so large”. 

The original poster became even more frustrated after her mum not only told her niece her wedding dress was an option, but that her daughter was “large”.

“After laying into my mother about insulting my kid and then laying into her again for offering something that didn’t even belong to her, I hung up.”

Damned if you do and damned if you don’t

The original poster finished her rant, asking for advice on her dilemma.

“I’m not a sentimental person,” she wrote.

“I love the dress, but if my daughter wanted to cut it up and use pieces of it, I wouldn’t mind. I just don’t want to see it on my niece, and I don’t want to deal with the drama if I say no.

“Would I be the a**hole if I refused?” she asked.

A choir of no’s

The post amassed a whopping 1.5k comments (and counting) and despite my best efforts (and suspected carpel tunnel in my finger from scrolling), I only found one comment that didn’t support the original poster’s decision to tell her niece to get lost.

“I’d say no. I’d burn it in the yard first,” said one commenter.

“Don’t lend it to her. She sounds like the type that will alter it beyond recognition to make it “her own” warned another.

“If that’s her text to you verbatim, I wouldn’t lend it to her based on that alone!” claimed another.

As for the comments in support of the niece…

“Woah woah woah why do you think she’s a hypochondriac? None of the behaviors you’ve listed show she’s anything but genuinely disabled. Disabilities show up differently and many are invisible, the way you talk about her illness is horrible.

NTA [not the a**hole] for not wanting to lend your dress, your dress your decision, but YTA [you’re the a**hole] for the way you treat your niece.”

Makes me think about my own dress

I got married back in 2020 and wore (what I like to think is) a pretty timeless dress.

It’s all boxed up and sitting in the top of my wardrobe at my parents’ place and to be honest, I don’t know if I’d lend it to someone else if I didn’t like them.

I don’t care if my daughter decided to chop it all up to make something new, but it represents such a special day that I wouldn’t want any bad juju associated with it.

I wouldn’t go as far as lighting fire to it in my front yard, as one commenter shared above, but in this instance, I’m siding with the original poster on this one.

Plus, she should check out Vinnies, they have loads of incredible wedding dresses that cost less than a lunch in Sydney!