Dress Regret

I don't think this is going to be the dress post you were thinking. And to be honest I've gone back and forth a lot over whether I wanted to post this or not. But I can't stop thinking about it, so hopefully writing it down will help me process it all a little better. And today's actually my mom's birthday, so in a way it almost fitting that my post today is about her.

If you remember back in August I posted about going dress shopping with my bridesmaids. At the time I felt a little guilty that my mom wasn't there because I know she wanted to be. We did send her photos throughout the day so she could be feel included, but I still think she was disappointed that she wasn't there for that first shopping trip. I didn't buy anything or even really make a concrete decision then because I knew that in October my mom would be in Louisiana, and that way she would be there to help me make my decision.

October arrived and my parents came out around my birthday for a visit. Except my mom wasn't feeling well most of the trip. The day that we were supposed to go shopping my mom did get up and tell me she was up for heading out, just to give her some time before we got ready. Except I was going through my own little mental freak-out about shopping, and making a decision, and everything else wedding related. I figured since my mom would probably be miserable most of the time we were out and we probably wouldn't be able to stay out that long, it didn't really make sense to go. I made the decision that we would be staying home, but told my mom not to worry because she would soon would be feeling better and we could go shopping when I was home back in California for Thanksgiving.

But that's not what happened. My mom's funeral was the day before Thanksgiving, and we never got to have our wedding dress shopping trip. Yes, my mom saw the picture I had sent her, but she never go to actually see me in a wedding dress. And the day we were supposed to go shopping she was willing to "suck it up" to make it happen, and I basically veto-d out only chance to go shopping for a wedding dress. Yes, I realize the situation isn't that simple, and going back I would obviously change things. But I still feel guilty about the way situation turned out.

I still don't have a dress and haven't gone shopping since then. You would think that after this I would have learned some type of lesson and gone out immediately to buy a dress, except it's had the opposite effect and I'm dreading the whole thing. I know it has to be done, but I kind of wish there was some way to magically have the perfect dress picked out and ordered for me and be finished with it all.