A 27-year-old has turned to the internet after a family dispute broke out over a second-hand wedding dress that she turned into an elaborate costume.
Reddit u/ProfessionalRush7272, an “avid cosplayer,” posted on the AmItheA****** forum to explain how the wedding dress intended for a cosplay sparked outrage from her cousin and other family members.
According to the post, the OP, her girlfriend and her 30-year-old cousin went on a shopping trip to charity stores in search of costume materials for their upcoming conventions.
A file photo of female friends arguing with each other. The original poster wrote that she and her girlfriend had been “bombarded” with messages from the family, making her doubt her decision.
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The cousin, who wasn’t a cosplayer, tagged along to enjoy the bargain hunt. During their trip, they came across an old-fashioned unique wedding dress. While the cousin initially dismissed it, expressing her desire for a new dress for her own wedding, the OP and her girlfriend saw potential in it for a new cosplay project.
“My girlfriend was the one to point out to me if we did some alterations, it’d be a perfect dupe for Sarah’s ballgown in Jim Henson’s “Labyrinth,” which is our favorite movie,” she wrote in her post.
Excited by the idea, they bought the dress for £150, planning to use it as part of a matching cosplay for the 2025 convention season, with the OP’s girlfriend cosplaying as Jareth, the Goblin King.
Months passed, and the OP posted the progress of the wedding dress on social media, where it caught the attention of her cousin. However, she had since changed her mind about the dress.
Having failed to find a dress she liked for her big day, she asked the OP if she could buy it back, offering to pay the OP £150 she had spent in the thrift store, plus an extra £100 for the work she’d done restoring it.
“I laughed and asked if she was joking, she told me she was deadly serious and I told her that wasn’t happening,” the OP wrote.
This led to a heated argument, with the cousin insisting she should have the dress and the OP standing firm in her refusal. The disagreement soon spread throughout the family, with various relatives weighing in.
Some urged the OP to sell or give the dress to her cousin, arguing that it was inconsiderate to repurpose a wedding dress that could have been used by someone in need. Others berated the OP for not being a “good cousin” by giving up the dress entirely, while a few accused her of depriving a bride who might need the discounted gown.
The situation quickly became overwhelming for OP, who noted that her girlfriend had been fielding the flood of family phone calls, trying to shield her from the rising tensions.
“I’m getting stressed and upset with this,” OP wrote. “My girlfriend is a wonder, and I’m so grateful to have her with me for this.”
Professional View
Newsweek spoke to Renée Zavislak, an integrative psychotherapist and host of the “Psycho Therapist” podcast. She questioned the OP’s motives for sticking to her decision to retain the dress for herself.
“In the first condition, the OP is setting and holding a boundary because the dress brings her joy, so much so that she would be doing herself a disservice to sell or gift it—that is healthy boundary setting,” Zavislak said.
On the other hand, the OP could be withholding the dress as an act of hostility, which sounds like revenge to Zavislak.
At the time of writing, the Redditor’s post had received 11,000 upvotes and hundreds of comments from other users, many of whom were of the “she had her chance” mindset.
One user pointed out that the OP’s cousin was simply interested in her work, rather than the dress itself. “Your cousin wants your work, you said no, she can kick rocks but instead she’s throwing a tantrum and family members are allowing her… might be time to put them all on mute,” they wrote.
Another, who called the cousin “greedy and cheap,” commented that if the OP were to sell the dress, £250 would be an unreasonable price for the time and labor anyway. Instead, they suggested a figure more in the £1,000-plus range and calculating the cost of the dress like a professional, which they thought the family wouldn’t understand.
They put it bluntly: “She’s pushing to get a champagne and caviar dress for the price of a Big Mac. Someone else bought it when she didn’t, and it doesn’t matter who or why. End of story.”
Zavislak also wondered if there was some underlying tension between the OP and her cousin, and whether she’s holding onto the dress in response to an ongoing struggle.
“Weddings have a knack for pulling buried resentments to the surface. If this is the case, then perhaps the wedding dress row can be the springboard for some healing. Maybe this is exactly the inroad OP needs to a conversation with her cousin within which these old wounds can heal,” she told Newsweek.
