Advice Needed - Custom Dress Emergency

Ok, so I’ve been explaining my custom dress experience in another thread, but long story short (or shorter, sorry this is a long one) I ordered from an Etsy shop based in China based on her absolute rave reviews, including on sites like Reddit where people left detailed timelines, pics, etc. There have been a lot of bumps in the road, mostly huge delays (the delivery estimate she put on my order was January 18). I built delays into my timeline and ordered early, so I wouldn’t be concerned except that she lies constantly (“we finished this part of the dress already and I’ll send you a picture shortly” and then crickets and then when I follow up a few days later, she’s once again working on that part of the dress that was supposedly finished).


So fast forward to March 1. She sends me a pic of what is clearly intended to be the final dress and marks it as shipped on Etsy. And don’t get me wrong, it looks AMAZING. Except there are small things that aren’t done, like one of the straps is clearly not completely sewn on, and there are button loops in the back but no buttons. So I ask her about that, and she tells me not to worry because they haven’t finished the final hand work. Ok fine. So I follow up a few days later to ask her when that will be done and when the dress will actually ship. She says they’re done with the hand work and it’s shipping tomorrow. Tomorrow would be this past Sunday in the US, Monday in China.
So when I didn’t hear anything more, on Monday, I asked her for a final picture of the dress (which she’s supposed to do for approval before shipping). She says no problem, she’ll send me a picture “shortly”. Then nothing. Last night, I messaged her and asked for the picture and a timeline for shipping. She said she’d send me the picture in a few hours, nothing on shipping. So I followed up and said ok and the shipping estimate? She responded this morning and told me that I’ll definitely have the dress next week because she’s going to choose the fastest shipping option. Still no picture.
So I’m at a loss. I believe my dress is at least 95% done based on the 3/1 photo. Since she marked it as shipped on Etsy that day, I suspect that what happened is she didn’t think I would notice the small unfinished details and intended for that to be the final approval pic. But I did notice, so she kept the dress and kept working on it. I still want the dress, but I don’t know when or if she will be finishing it and sending it. If she would have just said it’s going to take me another couple weeks to complete, I would’ve been perfectly fine with that and not panicking. That’s not what she said, though. It’s supposedly done now, but according to her it’s been done since at least Sunday and there’s still no picture to prove that.
I paid via PayPal, which I know is generally super protective of the buyer but I’m not sure if that’s the case with a seller in another country? I don’t want to file a dispute until it’s clear that she’s not sending it for some reason or that she sent me a noticeably unfinished dress, but I’m also getting very concerned that, according to her, the dress is done but she can’t even send me a simple picture and despite saying it would be shipped on Sunday/Monday, it clearly hasn’t been shipped (which she shouldn’t be doing before getting my approval on a final picture anyway).
I’m 6 months out. What should I be doing? File the dispute to try and get my money back and rush to a boutique to buy an off the rack sample? Just keep waiting? Message her more frequently/less frequently? I of course knew I was taking a huge risk ordering online, but it’s too late to change that, so my question is what should I be doing now?