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Fierce debate after bride calls out bridemaid's weight gain
A bride-to-be has confessed she’s ‘annoyed’ that her best friend and maid of honour hasn’t lost weight for her wedding, sparking a furious debate.
Writing on the popular Mumsnet forum, she explained that her friend hasn’t lost enough weight to fit into her bridesmaid dress, and is ‘even bigger than ever’.
“I got engaged about a year and a half ago, and we set the date for April 2023. Almost a year ago, myself and my bridesmaids had a couple of trips to go dress shopping. We saw a bridesmaid dress that we all absolutely adored, but it turned out that they only did it up to a size 16,” she wrote.
“My best friend who is my maid of honour is a bigger girl so it didn’t seem like this was going to work.
“However she said, off her own back and unprompted, that she was going to lose weight for the wedding anyway and so we should get them. I told her she didn’t need to do that but she insisted it was fine, so we bought them,” she continued.
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“Fast forward a year, and she’s made almost no effort to try and get the weight off. I haven’t raised it with her at all and left her to it, but having just been away for a girls weekend, it was quite obvious that she’s now even bigger than when we bought the dresses (and bigger than she’s ever been) and doesn’t seem to be moderating her eating at all.”
“She said at various points since then that she was going to join the gym, start Slimming World etc, but hasn’t actually done any of it. I was conscious that she wasn’t losing weight, but the weekend away showed that she’s bigger than ever.”
The bride-to-be says she’s now stressed about having to find and pay for new dresses, with her wedding in just 9 months.
“I probably sound like an absolute cow, but am I being unreasonable?” she asked.
Users were quick to debate both sides, with 49 per cent saying the bride was being unreasonable for expecting her friend to lose weight.
“You think she has chosen to be overweight? How would you feel if your ‘friend’ did this to you. Took you dress shopping with a load of skinnier people and made you feel lesser because the only dresses they have are too small. She probably felt she couldn’t say no!” one outraged user wrote.
“Maid of honour can wear a different dress to the bridesmaids. You can’t force someone to lose weight. She’s probably feeling pretty bad about it I would think,” another added.
“If you actually value this friendship take the pressure right off. She was over optimistic about losing the weight, and may well have felt pressured to say she would to please you. For lots of people the stress of that and feeling she’s letting you down could very easily cause weight gain rather than loss,” another advised.
The bride decided she needed to defend herself, and wanted to make it clear that she wasn’t going to get ‘angry’ or ‘unkind’ toward her friend at all.
“We’ve been friends for years and I love her to bits. She’s a gorgeous girl but I do personally wish she would lose the weight for the sake of her health, but I accept it’s her body and her life, and her decision to make. I think I can still feel a bit annoyed about the situation as a whole though,” she added.
There were plenty of users who backed up the bride's point of view, with some believing she was in a lose-lose situation.
“I don’t think you are being unreasonable, because as she said to go ahead, you couldn’t really turn around and say ‘nah, I actually don’t think you’ll lose the weight’,” one pointed out.
“If the dress purchasing scenario was as you describe then your bridesmaid has taken on the responsibility to fit in the dress you have purchased for her on your wedding day. If she does not fit in the dress come the day, that is for her to manage not you,” another said.
“Find a dress that has plus sizes and compliments the other dresses. Tell [your] best friend that you’ve seen this dress and love it, and would like everyone to realise she’s maid of honour,” a third suggested.
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