DRESS HIRE CONFESSIONS
What Happens in the Fitting Room, Stays in the Fitting Room. (And Thank God for That.)
Ten years.
Nearly ten years of running a dress hire business.
Thousands of women. Thousands of dresses. Thousands of zippers.
And an absolutely extraordinary amount of information I never, ever asked to know. When I opened Your Secret Closet, I thought I’d be helping women find beautiful dresses for weddings, races, birthdays and special occasions.
What I didn’t realise was that somewhere along the way, I’d also become an unofficial psychologist, marriage counsellor, keeper of secrets and occasional emergency underwear surgeon.
And to think I actually have a psychology degree.
Of all the places I thought I’d put that qualification to use, standing in a fitting room with a half-naked woman, holding a LEO LIN dress and listening to the details of her extramarital affair wasn’t particularly high on the list.
But here we are.
And let me tell you.
Bayside Melbourne might be a beautiful place to live, but bloody hell, does it have some secrets.
Welcome to the Bayside Confessional
If you live in Bayside, you’ll know exactly what I mean when I say it’s a bubble.
Everyone knows everyone.
Your neighbour knows your sister. Your sister knows your husband’s business partner. Your husband’s business partner is probably having an affair with someone from your Pilates class.
And there’s a reasonable chance I’ve heard about it.
😂
Over the years, women have walked into Your Secret Closet looking for a dress and walked out having told me things that would make your toes curl.
And the strangest part?
Sometimes I’ve only just met them.
There’s something about standing in a fitting room, half-dressed, while someone helps you into a beautiful gown that apparently makes people feel comfortable enough to share their deepest, darkest secrets.
I’ve heard things before husbands knew.
Before best friends knew.
Before the media knew.
And occasionally things I suspect nobody was ever supposed to know.
If those fitting room walls could talk, Bayside would need a bloody crisis management team.
“Belinda… I’m Pregnant.”
Let’s start with the beautiful ones.
There have been occasions when I’ve been helping a woman get dressed for an event, just the two of us in the store, and completely out of nowhere she’ll say:
“Belinda, I’m pregnant.”
Sometimes these are women with very recognisable names.
Women whose pregnancies haven’t been announced publicly.
Sometimes their friends don’t even know yet.
And here I am, holding a dress, suddenly becoming one of the first people to hear their wonderful news.
It’s actually incredibly special.
Sometimes they’re worried about their changing bodies. Sometimes they’re trying to work out how to conceal a little bump. Sometimes they simply need to tell someone.
And I feel genuinely privileged that they trust me enough to share that moment.
Of course, five minutes later I could be helping another customer who is about to confess she’s sleeping with someone else’s husband.
The emotional whiplash in this job is something else.
From Size 14 to Size 6… What the Hell Is Going On?
Now, this is something we’re seeing more and more of.
And particularly around Spring Racing Carnival.
I’ll have a customer come in around March or April. She’s a size 12 or 14, looks fabulous, we find her something beautiful, and off she goes.
Fast-forward to October.
She walks back through the door.
And I barely recognise her.
She’s suddenly a size 6 or 8.
And I’m standing there thinking:
What the hell happened in the last six months?
Quite often, they’ll tell me straight away.
“I’m on the jabs!”
“Oh my God, my friend got me onto them!”
“I’m getting them from someone who knows someone!”
And sometimes the stories about where these medications are coming from are genuinely concerning.
There have been conversations where I haven’t even recognised the name of what someone says they’re taking.
Now, I’m not here to judge anyone for their weight or their medical choices.
Women’s bodies change. There are legitimate medical reasons for using weight-loss medications, and those decisions belong between a woman and her healthcare professional.
But what does worry me is how casually some people talk about accessing injections from questionable sources, sometimes without seeming entirely sure what they’re using.
And there’s another part of this conversation that makes me uncomfortable.
Are we heading straight back to the 1990s, when thin was apparently the ultimate fashion accessory?
Because from where I’m standing, the pressure to be smaller certainly seems to be making a comeback.
And I see it happening in real time.
Literally.
Sometimes with absolutely no clothing involved.
Which brings me to another interesting aspect of this job.
I’ve Seen More Naked Women Than I Ever Thought Possible
People often ask me whether women are shy about getting changed in front of me.
Some are.
Others?
Absolutely not.
Underwear is apparently optional in the Your Secret Closet fitting rooms.
There have been countless occasions where I’ve turned around to find a customer standing there completely naked, casually discussing what she wore to a wedding last weekend.
And I’m thinking:
Right. We’re clearly very comfortable with each other now.
😂
After nearly ten years, I genuinely don’t bat an eyelid.
Different bodies, different shapes, different ages.
I’ve seen it all.
And the funny thing is, the less clothing someone is wearing, the more likely they seem to be to tell me something absolutely outrageous.
Which leads me to…
The Affairs. Oh, the Affairs.
Good Lord.
If there is one thing I was completely unprepared for when I opened a dress hire business, it was the amount of information I would acquire about other people’s sex lives.
“Belinda, I’m having an affair.”
“I’m sleeping with so-and-so’s husband.”
“Did you hear who’s been caught with who?”
And sometimes these aren’t vague stories about people I’ve never met.
Oh no.
This is Bayside.
I know exactly who they’re talking about.
Sometimes I know the husband.
Sometimes I know the wife.
Sometimes I know both families.
And then, inevitably, I’ll see one of them walking down Hampton Street.
Or at the supermarket.
Or standing at the school playground.
And I’m there smiling politely, thinking:
If only you knew what I know.
But that’s the thing.
I don’t say a word.
Not to friends.
Not to other customers.
Not even when someone starts telling me a story and I already know considerably more than they’re letting on.
The temptation to say, “Oh darling, you have NO idea,” can be enormous.
But I don’t.
I just smile.
And occasionally make a mental note that Bayside is a very, very small place.
And Then There’s the Party Powder…
Now, this one genuinely surprised me.
I knew people liked to party.
I wasn’t born yesterday.
But I don’t think I was fully prepared for how openly some women would talk about recreational drug use.
Cocaine seems to feature quite regularly in the stories.
Then there are the conversations about Dexies, ADHD medications and various other substances being passed around at parties.
Sometimes the stories are told as casually as someone discussing what champagne they drank.
And the confessions!
Where they did it.
How they did it.
Where they hid it.
How they nearly got caught.
Who else was involved.
Honestly, some of these stories sound like deleted scenes from a very questionable Netflix series.
And while some are told as funny party anecdotes, others are genuinely alarming.
I’m certainly not endorsing any of it.
But I am apparently being given a very detailed education in the social habits of Melbourne’s party circuit.
And I thought my psychology lectures were eye-opening.
The Day I Accidentally Cut Someone Out of Her G-String
Now, this is where things get really ridiculous.
Because occasionally, the stories are so bloody juicy that I forget I’m actually supposed to be doing a job.
Picture this.
I’m standing behind a customer, helping her into a dress.
She’s telling me something absolutely scandalous.
I’m listening.
Completely invested.
Mentally screaming, “SHE DID WHAT?!”
Meanwhile, I’m trying to do up the zipper.
And then…
Stuck.
The zip won’t move.
I give it a little wiggle.
Nothing.
Another gentle attempt.
Still nothing.
I look down.
I’ve zipped her bloody G-string into the dress.
Not the dress lining.
Not a stray thread.
Her actual underwear.
And it’s properly wedged.
So now I’ve got a customer standing there, half-naked, a designer dress attached to her knickers, and me wondering how the hell I’m going to explain this one.
Out come the scissors.
And suddenly I’m performing what can only be described as delicate emergency surgery.
On a G-string.
While trying not to damage a dress worth hundreds of dollars.
Or the woman wearing it.
There is absolutely no chapter in a psychology degree that prepares you for this.
And yes, it’s happened more than once.
Apparently my ability to multitask disappears completely when the gossip reaches a certain level of scandal.
So if you’ve ever wondered whether I genuinely listen to the stories you tell me…
Darling, I’ve sacrificed underwear for them.
😂
The Things I Know Could Fill a Book
Actually, they could probably fill several.
And occasionally, when I’m sitting at home thinking about the last ten years, I wonder how on earth I’ve ended up knowing so much about the private lives of people all over Bayside.
Pregnancies.
Affairs.
Breakups.
Divorces.
Family dramas.
Party scandals.
Medical concerns.
Things that have made me laugh until I’ve cried.
And things that have genuinely broken my heart.
Because not every fitting room confession is funny.
Some women walk into the store carrying things that are incredibly heavy.
Sometimes they’re dressing for an event they don’t particularly want to attend.
Sometimes they’re going through a separation.
Sometimes they’re struggling with how their body has changed.
Sometimes they simply need someone to listen.
And while I might spend most of my day talking about dresses, I’ve learnt that very often the dress is only a tiny part of what’s actually going on.
What Happens in the Fitting Room Stays in the Fitting Room
And this is the part I want every customer to understand.
As much as I love a juicy story — and believe me, I LOVE a juicy story — I take the trust women place in me incredibly seriously.
There have been things shared with me that I suspect haven’t been told to another soul.
And that is a privilege.
Not an invitation to gossip.
I’ve deliberately kept every story in this article anonymous, with no identifying details, because the point isn’t to expose anyone.
It’s to give you a little glimpse into the extraordinary, hilarious, occasionally confronting world that exists behind the fitting room curtain.
When you’re standing there in your underwear, trying to squeeze into a dress while telling me about the most dramatic weekend of your life, you deserve to know that your story is safe.
And it is.
What gets said in the fitting room stays in the fitting room.
Even when I run into you at the supermarket.
Even when I know exactly who you’re talking about.
Even when I have to physically bite my tongue.
And even when your G-string becomes an unfortunate casualty of the conversation.
Ten Years, Thousands of Dresses and One Very Full Head
When I opened Your Secret Closet, I thought I was starting a fashion business.
And I did.
But somewhere along the way, it became something much more personal.
A place where women can laugh, cry, vent, celebrate, confess, strip down to absolutely nothing and hopefully walk out feeling fabulous.
I never imagined my psychology degree would come in quite so handy.
Although I’m fairly sure the university would have some questions about my current methods.
Particularly the scissors.
So here’s to nearly ten years of dressing Melbourne women.
And nearly ten years of hearing things that would make your grandmother faint.
As for all the other secrets I’ve collected along the way?
Well…
A lady never tells.
But bloody hell, sometimes it’s difficult. 😂
Until next Friday,
Belinda x
Behind Belinda’s Desk — The stories, confessions and occasional disasters from nearly ten years behind the scenes at Your Secret Closet.