“[Am I The Jerk] For Not Wearing The Wedding Dress My Stepsister Handmade For Me?”

Most would probably agree that supporting your family members is important. But if whatever they’re trying to do is really not going well for them, where do we draw the line between staying supportive and telling them how it really is?

As one Redditor recently shared, sometimes, this type of dilemma may not have a solution where no one ends up being hurt. When her fashion graduate stepsister offered to make her wedding dress, the woman was happy to give it a shot. The stepsisters agreed on a design, but a month before the ceremony, the bride received her wedding dress that looked nothing like it was supposed to be, so she refused to wear it, causing family drama. Scroll down to learn about it all!

More info: Reddit

Supporting family is important, but sugarcoating a situation to the point where they lose the opportunity to learn from their mistakes is more harmful than good

Image credits: cottonbro studio (not the actual photo)

A woman was getting married, and her fashion-student stepsister offered to design and make her dress, to which she agreed

Image credits: Cate Bligh (not the actual photo)

They settled on a design, but a month before the wedding, the woman received the dress, and it was too big and looked nothing like it was supposed to

Image credits: Filipp Romanovski (not the actual photo)

She told her stepsister that she was willing to pay for her work but wouldn’t wear the dress, which left her and her parents unhappy

Image credits: u/ThrwayStepSisDress

The parents and the stepsister left the wedding an hour into the reception and called the woman the next day to tell her off, refusing to listen to reason

The OP and her husband got married a couple of weeks ago and paid for most of it themselves. The few things they didn’t pay for were covered by her father, who had a girlfriend of two years, who, for this story, will be referred to as Stella.

That said girlfriend has a daughter of her own, who we will call Zoey. Being a few years younger than the poster, Zoey was a fashion design student nearing her graduation.

She wanted to get into the wedding dress industry and, as a start, offered to design and make a dress for her stepsister’s ceremony. Since the OP liked some of her previous designs and also saw this as a bonding opportunity, she decided to give it a shot.

After a few meetups to discuss how the dress should look, it became apparent that they had very different styles. Nonetheless, the women eventually agreed on a design they both liked.

However, a month before the wedding, the woman received a dress that was too big and nothing like the design. She then called her stepsister and explained the situation, offering to pay for the work but refusing to wear the dress.

When the wedding day came, Zoey seemed on the verge of tears, and the OP’s father and Stella didn’t look happy either. The company left the wedding an hour into the reception but didn’t hesitate to call the author the next day and tell her off while refusing to listen to anything that she had to say.

The commenters were completely on the OP’s side. They all seemed to agree that as a wedding dress designer, one really needs to learn to listen to their clients and that this occurrence could be a great opportunity for her to learn this lesson if her parents didn’t coddle her.

Image credits: Victoria Priessnitz (not the actual photo)

Protecting their children is something most parents do. But while it may not be easy, it is also essential to let them make mistakes and learn from them.

As Mandie Shean of The Conversation wrote, children should be allowed to experience the outcomes of their actions, as this teaches them the power of their own decisions and the consequences that come with them. 

Making mistakes is not a sign of incompetence but rather the main part of the learning process. When children are disciplined for it, instead of doing better, they start avoiding challenges.

At the same time, if parents try to protect their kids from failure, they don’t get to experience the learning part of making mistakes, which, according to studies, leads to more depression and less satisfaction later in life. 

But if it is so important, then why do so many people try to shelter their children so much? As Pamela Li of Parenting For Brain explained, parents’ overprotection of their kids has always been a thing because people are instinctively protective of their offspring.  

Nevertheless, things like anxiety or panic disorders make people more prone to such behavior, as they’re often more preoccupied with dangers than those who aren’t dealing with these issues. Similarly, if parents suffer from physical disabilities or chronic illnesses, they’re likely to perceive their children as more vulnerable to similar things and try everything to make sure they’re safe.

Another reason could be the massive amount of information that we receive daily, leading parents to perceive the world as more dangerous than it is. If a parent has previously escaped some kind of disaster and, in turn, has developed PTSD, that could further increase the overprotection levels in other areas.

Ultimately, it is usually our fears in life that push us to try to protect children from experiencing the same fears. But the thing is that, sooner or later, there will come a time when one will have to fend for themselves, and being totally unprepared can only make it worse. 

Take vaccines as an example. Being exposed to smaller amounts of weakened but harmful organisms helps us develop our own protection instead of having none at all (if we were completely avoiding the virus). And when you look at it, every other negative experience works similarly. After all, it’s better to get softly rejected by your stepsister, learn, and improve than change nothing and keep messing up, not knowing why.

What did you think about this story? How would you have acted in the poster’s place? Tell us all about it below!

The commenters supported the poster, saying that her stepsister should learn to listen to and respect her client’s needs if she wants to be a wedding dress designer

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