I adore my mom. I’m obsessed with her, as a matter of fact. She gave birth to me, she turned me into the woman I am today, she’s my all-time favorite shopping partner. So why, please tell me why, “wedding industry,” would I want her to look a hot mess in some mother of bride monstrosity when I get married?

This past weekend, I went bridesmaid dress shopping with one of my best friends, and found myself strolling through the “mother of the bride” section of the store. I wish someone captured the look on my face as I was thumbing through these horrific gowns. It was something like this:

Anyways … I never thought I would see a garment that had too much sparkle to it, but alas it happened. Perhaps it was because the bottom of this one dress looked like it got hit with a glitter bomb, and the middle was this like rouged awful fabric, and the top was lace … paired with an overly structured blazer … and an oddly placed brooch. Umm what? What’s the classic saying by Chanel, take one thing off before you leave the house? Try take off five with this hot mess.

Let’s talk about the blazers and shrugs, shall we? Every dress has one. I get it, we get older and stuff starts to lose its luster, but my God. Formal dresses with blazers … don’t look good together. They just don’t. And ladies … there are other options then having to wear one of these things over a gown to cover up parts of your body that you aren’t fond of. Trust. Think outside of the box. And when a bridal boutique associate tries to add more nonsense to your dress, like a brooch, smack her hand away. Seriously.

After I came face-to-face with an MOB dress in a blue-green iridescent, yes iridescent, fabric covered in sparkles with a tuxedo blazer to match, I ran in the bathroom to throw up and when I came to … got really mad. Why are we telling our mother’s that these are their only options to wear when we get married? I get it, it’s “your day,” blah-blah-blahbity-blah, but your day wouldn’t happen without these influential women in your life.

Tradition states that the bride’s family is to pay for the wedding. Right? I mean, I HOPE this isn’t the case in 2014, but who knows. To each their own. So these “mother of the bride’s” are shelling out THOUSANDS to make their baby’s dream wedding come to life, and yet have to undergo the torture of trying on these heinous “MOB dresses,” which PS. are NOT cheap. I’m talking like $700 not cheap.

You know what I say, fuck mother of the bride dresses. Seriously. Down with them all. I want my mother, and my future mother-in-law (that is if I like her), and my aunts, and any “older” woman in my life to look like rock stars when I get married. Because they deserve to.

Go to Bloomies, go to Saks, go to Macy’s … step outside of the bridal boutique box, mother’s of the bride. You deserve to look smashing because, hopefully, this will be the one and only time you will see your daughter or son walk down the aisle … and you’ve spent a HELL of a lot of time turning them into the descent human beings they are today. Even if your kid sucks, you still deserve a fab dress. And guess what, if you are thinking about paying over $500 for a MOB dress, why not take that money and go buy an actual designer gown. Live it up a little, you know what I mean?

Remember when your daughter or daughter-in-law drags you out to one of these awful boutiques and subjects you to the MOB dresses … it is about what makes you feel good. What makes you flip your hair back like Cher and strut. You will know it even before the sales associate tries to talk you in to buying it. Trust.