My Story

I’ve only been in correctly fitted bras for about 8 or 9 months now. This time last year I owned three bras, but I only found two of them “wearable”. They definitely weren’t comfortable, but they did the job (if the job is cover my nipples and make me uncomfortable). I was wearing 32D’s, whereas now I generally wear 28F-FF’s. Just a few months before that I was wearing 32C’s, and a year before that 34C’s, and during high school I wore 34B’s. Basically, I had my boobs shoved into all the wrong places for a long time. It’s kind of important to note that my breasts haven’t changed size much since 11th grade, so half of high school was pretty terrible for my breasts since they spent most their time in small cups unsupported by a loose band. The rest of this post is going to consist of memories, anything I can think of that would explain how I let myself feel uncomfortable for so long.

Most of my friends told me that I was flat chested. This confused me, because I knew I wasn’t flat, I knew I had breasts. But honestly I heard it often enough that I just started to believe it. I thought that I must have small boobs, so that means I’m like a 32 or 34B right? Or at least, that’s the size my mom bought me, and my mom knows best so that must be my size. On that note, it didn’t help that my mom never spoke to me about my breasts. She would take me shopping for bras at Wal-Mart or something, and basically pick a bra and we’d take it home without trying it on. I started to really envy flat chested women. I wanted to be flat, or at least smaller. I felt really clunky, whereas small chested women looked elegant. What was worse is that my body is tiny. Everything looked like one of those small chested women EXCEPT my chest. So it’s fair to say I was pretty annoyed with my breasts. Too bad someone didn’t just explain the BASICS OF BRA FITTING TO ME, and then I would’ve stopped blaming my body for my discomfort, physically and mentally.

I stopped playing sports when my breasts developed. I felt awkward, and dare I say “girly”. I used to consider myself one of the guys when I played sports, and I was pretty respected for being half decent at them. But the feeling of my breasts bouncing was both painful and embarrassing. I remember something from 8th grade from before I was really conscious of my breasts. I had just finished running laps outside with some classmates when a friend of mine said to me, “I know where your nipples are!” I guess it was cold out, and my high beams decided to activate. From then on I was a bit more conscious of my breasts.

I remember pretty clearly being in a department store with my mom and sister with the intention of buying bras. I’m not sure how old I was, but it was young enough that I found the very concept of breasts embarrassing, and was denying their existence. I remember standing beside the isle that my mom and sister were in while they looked at bras. When they spoke to me, I would answer quickly and then look away. I tried to act like I wasn’t looking for bras, because I didn’t want anyone to know that I needed them, because then they would know I had breasts. I really didn’t want anyone to think I had breasts. I think I had the idea in mind that breasts were kind of dirty, or they were sexy. And I certainly was not sexy, I was just a kid.

During my first summer in University, I was the most fed up with my breasts that I have ever been. After searching online for bra calculators and such, the internet determined that my bra size was 30D. I thought this was plausible, since it was a a size I’d ever heard of and nothing that I had heard of fit me. I happened upon Bravissimo and saw TONS of bras, and numbers like 28 and letters like K. I was kind of confused, since I thought the bra alphabet ended at some number of D’s. I honestly cannot remember why I didn’t try ordering from bravissimo. I think it was a combination of lack of money, being completely unsure whether or not a 30D would work (and it wouldn’t have) and not having easy access to a credit card to shop online. Regardless, I eventually forgot about Bravissimo and carried on with my ill fitted bras for a long while longer.

Finally, I remember getting fitted at La Senza just a few months before I started wearing properly fitted bras. The fitter told me that my 32D’s were fitting pretty well, and I did think that they looked better than my 32C’s. I guess I also found a firmer style or something, because they felt tighter than my previous bras as well. “Great!” I thought, “now I have a bra that fits.” But when I wore the bra for a day, the band rode up my back, and the small amount of lift I got when I put the bra on in the morning was gone. I was pretty much ready to give up until my friend dragged me off to a lingerie boutique she worked at. I got fitted into 28 F and FF bras, and it was amazing! I could tell it was different than the previous times I thought I had found bras that fit. I actually had good bras now, and it was the beginning of a new interest: the world of bra fitting.

So I guess what I’m trying to say is… my breasts were the bane of my existence for a long time. I could manage to ignore them for fairly long periods of time, but the problem would always return. I’d eventually find it impossible to ignore the discomfort and try to solve the problem without success. But eventually there was REAL success, and then life was fantastic. And that’s pretty much my story!

-Windie