4 Common Causes Of Wedding Dress Drama

Although it's possible that you need to go to yet another ten stores to try on dresses, the reasons why you just can't seem to find the right dress may have nothing to do with dress shopping at all. Here are the top four reasons for your dress drama:

1. You are trying to be the "perfect bride". The most likely reason for your dissatisfaction with dress shopping has nothing to do with the dress at all. It is likely that you want to portray the image of the "perfect bride." Engaged? 3 Ways To Tame An Overbearing Mother

Perfectionism can easily rear its ugly head during wedding planning because orchestrating a wedding calls for paying attention to the tiniest of details. However, the dress can be a particular source of wedding related perfectionism because it is a tangible object that double-dog-dares for you to get wrong. Many brides recoil in horror at the thought of going down the aisle in the "wrong" dress and regretting it for the rest of their lives.

The way to manage this situation is to engage in some realistic self-talk. Remind yourself that you will not have a perfect wedding (no such thing exists) and you will not be a perfect bride (she doesn't exist either).

2. The dress is symbolic of your upcoming marriage. Here is a close cousin of the "perfect bride" syndrome. You may be falling into the common trap of thinking (mainly unconsciously), "If I don’t find the perfect dress, then I won't have the perfect wedding. And if I don’t have the perfect wedding, then I won't have the perfect marriage." So, you may be focusing on finding the perfect dress in order to try and attain the unrealistic goal of having a perfect wedding (therefore an ideal marriage).

This realization is enough to bring even the calmest of brides to a therapist's couch for premarital counseling. However, the way to work through this on your own is by engaging in some serious premarital education. Read books on building a healthy marriage or find alternative ways of learning how handle typical marital problems. Most importantly, create a mantra around telling yourself that your wedding is definitely not a refection of your marriage. 3 Simple Steps For Lasting Love

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3. It's safer to obsess about the dress. During wedding planning, brides often find something to obsess about, and it's not surprising if you are pouring a ton of energy into finding the right dress. The dress is often symbolic of everything the quintessential bride is supposed to be: beautiful, radiant, and awe-inspiring.

The problem is that all of the mental and emotional energy that goes into finding the elusive dress is not going into other (more important) things. Like obsessing about how to keep your upcoming marriage happy and healthy. Or obsessing about how this marriage is going to forever change your identity. Or what it really means to commit to another person, "for better or worse." Instead, it's much easier and less emotionally jarring to pour energy into something we can control, like a hemline. 6 Ways To Stay In Love While Planning Your Wedding

4. You want the fairytale ending. Forget the simple happy ending. You want the full shebang. The real deal. You want what Disney has been promising girls all over the world since they were three years old. You want the fairytale ending.

And of course the fairytale ending would not be complete without the "perfect" dress. So, it's understandable that you are spending hours pouring through magazines and stressing about which neckline suits your figure the best. However, now is the time to take a step back and take stock of what really matters to you when it comes to your nuptials. In pursuit of the "fairytale" wedding, many brides get so completely caught up in trying to create a fantasy wedding that they miss out on the opportunities to connect in real ways to their loved ones.

Finding the right wedding dress often carries more emotional weight than necessary. By taking the time to explore the meaning of the dress you can free yourself from this kind of wedding related angst and use your energy to prepare for your marriage.