'I secretly hate my engagement ring.'

An engagement ring is a very... particular piece of jewellery – especially for those women who have had a very clear picture in their mind of the Engagement Ring Of Their Dreams since, well, forever.

But what do you do if, when your partner pops the question, they don't propose with the perfect sparkler you had in mind?

And how do you navigate having to wear a ring we are not absolutely in love with?

Watch MM Confessions: The worst lie I've ever told my partner. Post continues after video. 

After a wee bit of research, and speaking to some women from the Mamamia community, we realised just how common it is for a soon-to-be bride to receive an engagement ring she isn't keen on. Like, at all.

Here's what six women had to say...

"I threw the ring back at him."

It was a rather, er, strange moment for a then-heavily pregnant 19-year-old Julia* when her boyfriend suddenly pulled over his car as they were driving along.

They were on a residential street in their hometown when he told her he needed to get something off of his chest.

She asked him – slowly – if anything was wrong. 

And that's when he pulled a ring out of his pocket, she tells Mamamia.

"He asked me to marry him," she recalls. "On some random street, about five minutes from my parent's house, which is where he also lived." 

Then, she says, he showed it to her. A "nasty-looking" ring the colour of "steel". 

"I had told him the kind of ring I'd wanted," she tells Mamamia. "I wanted a tiny diamond on a gold band because I only wear gold jewellery. He knew this. He knew that he had messed up as soon as he saw my face."

In Julia's defence, she didn't even really care about getting married. There was no rush, so she wondered why on earth her partner had decided that, after two years and two babies (with another on the way), he had done it so spontaneously. 

"I threw the ring back at him and walked the rest of the way home."

(Side note: Julia later learned why he had presented her with a ring so suddenly. It was because he'd had a physical affair with another woman a week prior. Julia is now single and happily raising her children, in case you wanted to know.)

"I hate my ring and it's my own fault."

One woman shared on Reddit that she hated her engagement ring... after picking out what she thought was the perfect piece herself!

"It looks too big for my hand," the woman wrote, under the username @ungratefulfiancé. "Like it doesn't fit right and he did everything right – got the exact shape, cut, size and style I asked for and I'm being horribly ungrateful. 

"I know he tried so hard and spent so much and I feel so ungrateful."

This bride-to-be wasn't happy – with herself. Image: Reddit.

After several commenters told her it didn't fit well, she added that she was making a "huge adjustment" in wearing it at all.

"I actually never wear jewellery so this is a huge adjustment for me. I was extremely worried about it being gaudy."

"It wasn't something I would have picked."

Sophia wasn't expecting to be proposed to.

After three years of dating, she described the engagement as a "happy shock". While they had discussed kids, marriage hadn't been on the cards. 

"It wasn't overly important to me," Sophia tells Mamamia. "So when he proposed one night on a weekend away, I was so surprised but also so happy and I quickly said yes."

While it was a perfect moment, the ring her partner presented was not at all what she had imagined.

"It was quite over the top and not my style at all. It wasn't something I would have picked. I would have preferred a simple princess cut," she shares. 

Sophia eventually changed her tune when, after one friend described it as the ring not being like her at all, another chimed in and said, "But it is so him!"

"After that, I really loved it. It's not something I would have bought for myself but that's the point – it was something he gave me. And I do look at it and see him, now," she shares.

"I wear it every day and I would never tell my partner about my initial thoughts that I secretly hated my engagement ring."

"I've come to terms with it."

An unnamed woman went viral after she posted about her engagement ring on Reddit, expressing her disappointment at the pearl piece she received when her fiancé "finally" proposed.

"He pulled it out of his pocket and it took just about everything in me to not laugh and question whether this was real life or not," she wrote.

Ouch.

She went on to say that after wearing it for a few days, she’s "come to terms with it".

"I definitely wish it was something different, but oh well. It was his grandmother’s and the pearl is my birthstone and I think that’s the only reason I’ve been able to tolerate it."

"I definitely wish it was something different," an unnamed woman shared on Reddit. Image: Reddit.

"I haven't worn it for 10 years now."

Veronica Kennedy, a Professional Organiser at Hand To Help, tells Mamamia her story is hilarious to retell – even 30 years later.

"It was a lesson in speaking up for myself," she recalls, adding that her husband had always known she'd wanted to choose her own engagement and wedding rings. 

"I went shopping and came up with three rings that I loved," she says. "I'm not a lover of sparkly jewellery so I chose some classic bevel-set rings."

But when she took her then-boyfriend to see what she had chosen, Veronica recalls him not being all too impressed. 

"He didn't like my choices. He liked sparkly... I am his sparkle. We didn't need any more!" she says. "But I went to his jeweller and we chose our wedding rings from there."

While she still got to pick out her engagement rings, Veronica says she "didn't love it but knew it represented something special".

Twenty years after first picking out the rings, she said that it needed some work, but made a decision not to get it fixed up.

"I haven't worn it for 10 years now and I don't miss it," she says, adding that she learnt a lot from that experience.

"Speaking up is sometimes hard to do but it was the most massive learning curve for me."

"I'm fuming angry at the ring my fiancé got me."

"I feel bad," one woman wrote on a viral Reddit post about her engagement ring. 

"I'm fuming angry at the ring my fiancé got me."

Whilst her ring was detailed and unique, the woman shared that she wanted something simple, pretty and clean. 

Instead, she got some serous bling, that came out to about AUD$16,000 after her partner bought the ring in India with his mother. Sadly, she believes her fiancé was "ripped off".

A woman has shared her engagement ring online, sharing it wasn't at all what she envisioned. Image: Reddit.

"I am sure he isn't lying about [the cost]," she said. "I think they ripped him off royally! And this makes me even more angry."

She added, "The problem is, he went to India with his mum to get this ring! So now we have to fly there to get our money back... It was a custom ring [made by] their family friend. So we physically have to be there to get it refunded."

While the woman hasn't given many updates since sharing that she was planning to go to India for a family trip, she did add that she would have preferred a "lab-grown diamond".

"He [said he is] sorry and that he will fix it," she wrote.

*Some names have been changed for privacy.

Feature Image: Reddit.