Down With The Gown

Terri Psiakis learns that bridal shopping involves learning new skills in language and mammary manipulation.

Let's get this straight: I am not a girly-girl. I'm not into hair, I don't accessorize and if I ever even so much as imply that I care about what they're wearing on the catwalks of Milan this season, you have my happy permission to punch me in the face. Hence the steep learning curve that began when I started shopping for a wedding dress.

It's all about semantics when it comes to bridal wear. Apparently it's not a dress: it's a gown. In the past, I've only ever used the word 'gown' in reference to what they made me wear when I underwent surgery in hospital, so I can't say the prospect of wearing a wedding outfit made of paper and revealing more than just a hint of my arse appealed. According to the first of many hush-toned bridal shop attendants, the reason it's a wedding gown is because it's "more than just a dress." Yeah. About four thousand dollars more. It was so hard to refrain from asking whether it would cost less if I paid cash.

Actually trying on a gown is no simple exercise, either. The shop attendant laughed when I tried to put one over my head because apparently you're meant to "just step into them." How did she know I was attempting to get gowned-up the wrong way? Because she was right next to me. In the change room. While I was practically nude. Oh yeah – apparently there's no such thing as privacy when you're trying this stuff on. It's no holds barred to the point where it's the paid job of someone you've only just met to stare thoughtfully at your semi-naked figure while wondering aloud whether the curve of your hips might benefit from a "full circle drop or something more A-line." I still don't know what that actually means but I do know that having a complete stranger tuck your back-fat into a bodice is most definitely a bonding experience.

This is the thing: you don't just wear a wedding gown, you literally arrange yourself inside one. For example, I now know how to "swing" my breasts. This is the process by which one pushes one's norks sideways into the cups of a gown's top section in order to produce a more shapely cleavage. And here's me thinking that breast-swinging was merely the result of not wearing a bra.

My breasts have officially learned to swing which should make them more popular at parties but I'm tipping I'll have better things to think about during the wedding ceremony than whether my jugs have been jostled into prime position. Although my thought process won't be a patch on the Bloke's. His response, after hearing everything I'd learned at the bridal shop: "You reckon you've got problems. I have to concentrate on standing there while trying not to nervously fart."

- Terri Psiakis