People usually cry happy tears when they see a wedding dress, but for Mildred and her mom Wendy, it caused a lasting viral twist that no on...
Mildred tells "I thought the video would show a sweet family moment." She laughs and says, "I thought she wasn't going to cry, even though that's what I wanted her to do."
Wendy's response was honest and unexpected; she didn't cry. When she looked at the dress she wore down the aisle, she told it straight out that it was ugly. Wendy wasn't criticising her daughter; her response was due to how she felt about seeing the dress years after her divorce.
"There's something magical and one-of-a-kind about the dress..." Wendy tells PEOPLE, "The lace I wanted was hard to find, and the roses and hand-picked pearls made me feel like a queen with the dress I chose." She remembers how carefully she chose every detail. For example, she used real rose oil to scent the fake roses.
Some people who watched the video were shocked by her judgement. Instead, she talked about how the wedding dress held the weight of sadness and loss. Wendy replies, "No, I don't think it's ugly; I know it's not ugly; I love my dress." "I just didn't see how beautiful it was; I saw what was behind that dress and that date of my wedding day. It wasn't all bad, but the betrayal and disloyalty made it look bad."
Mildred didn't find her mom's response discouraging; instead, it made her feel even closer to the dress. She was proud to see and wear the historical item she had only read about.
Mildred says, "I put it on with pride because I had never seen a dress like that before." "That was the first time I had ever seen my mom's wedding dress in real life." She likes how well it was made and how unique it is, and she says it feels different from current gowns. "It's so pretty, and I made it myself. Everything is sewn on, not hard-glued on like most wedding dresses do these days," she says.
People remember the TikTok so well because Wendy was so brutally honest in it. Mildred says she had no idea the video would get so popular. Her only goal was to share a personal and fun moment, not make a movie that goes viral.
Wendy says she was shocked by how much attention it got. "I had no idea Mildred would put it on TikTok." I knew she liked making movies, but I didn't think she would share one with everyone. "Of course, I was shocked by how people responded," she says. Wendy says she felt bad at first for calling her dress ugly. She says, "That feeling was so natural to me that I didn't even think about it. I had no idea it would get so many views and responses."
But the response from strangers quickly took away her shame. A lot of people defended the dress and said it was beautiful in the comments. "Because my dress is really beautiful, and because people, especially women, are very emotional and romanticise that time of life, the wedding, and the dress that the daughter wears and can wear at her wedding a lot." Wendy thinks, "It should have been a response of love, happiness, and tears, but oh, it was the opposite." Now that she knows the video's charm came from turning assumptions on their heads, she laughs.
The love made her change her mind about how she felt about the dress. She says, "They were right; my dress is really beautiful. At the time, it was my most beautiful illusion. Now I don't have such beautiful memories, but the dress was and will continue to be beautiful." Wendy even makes fun of the dress's new fame. "Of course, I'd sell it if someone was interested." "I could even put it up for auction as the wedding dress from the really bad TikTok video," she laughs.
Mildred thought the best thing about her online fame wasn't the attention it got her, but the connection it made with her mum. "My mum and I used to not be close like we are now..." Mildred says, "I think of her as my best friend now; I can count on her and tell her anything. Sometimes I don't see her as my mum, I see her as my best friend."
Their shared sense of humour shows how close they are. She says, "We have a dark sense of humour because we know that you only live once, so don't take things too seriously all the time." Wendy is still amazed by how strong her daughter is. "My friendship with Mildred is very special to me." When she was little, she seemed very weak to me, so I always wanted to protect her too much. But every day she grew up, she showed me how strong she was.