The following post is aimed toward the female readers of the blog. Male readers, well, you’re going to enjoy the subject matter I suppose, just keep the sniggering down at the back, ok?
I have an ambivalent attitude toward my breasts. I am happy that I have them and I’d rather have them than the alternative, but there is no getting around the fact that, at times, I wish they were just… different. I am pretty much sure that most women feel the same way toward their breasts – bigger, smaller, different conformation, you name it – none of us are happy with what we’ve got.
For my own, I wish there were just that bit smaller. I’m not approaching Jordan, sorry Katie Price, in proportions, but I am certainly larger in that department than is average. It’s lucky I’ve got a naturally stocky build, or I would be in danger of looking all out of proportion. Most times this does not, shall we say, put me at a disadvantage? But then there come the days when I have to go clothes shopping.
That’s when the wheels fall off the wagon.
I can’t remember where I read the stats, but the ‘average’ woman is a size 12 or 14, and a size 36 B or C, so I’m nudging the upper range of normal. Clothes, on the other hand, are designed for Kirstin Dunst who probably approximates a size 6 and is a 32 A or something. For many years this was fine with me. You shop in the 18 plus and you get inured, if not contented, with voluminous clothes that most definitely weren’t designed with Kirstin Dunst in mind. But I’ve been working hard this past year or so on taming my recalcitrant body, and I’ve finally got to the point where I can wear (and look halfway decent) in clothes designed for normal people. Oh, the pleasure of taking a size 14 into the changing room and knowing that, even if it looks ugly, it won’t be the fit that is to blame! So I am finally able to wear trousers again after about five years of clown-pants and long skirts, and… now I can’t find tops that fit me.
Maybe my proportions are all wrong, but clothes just don’t seem designed for people with breasts. Any breasts, not just slightly-larger-than-average breasts. I tried on one of those looks-great-on-the-models silky camisole thingumies in H&M today. You know that moment when you’ve got the top over your shoulders, but it won’t go over your breasts, and you start to panic thinking “Oh my god, they’re going to have to cut me out of this, and it was the cute male assistant on duty today…“? Well, I had that moment and then some today. Fortunately I remembered some breathing exercises I picked up when playing the oboe that had the side effect of minimizing the bust. Managed to wriggle out of the top, with my dignity (and hairstyle) ruffled but more or less intact. Just hope they’ve not taken to putting cameras in the H&M changing rooms…
Even when I do find tops that fit, which is no easy matter, short of wearing a polo-neck I always end up exposing more cleavage than a nice girl should. I can wear vests underneath tops (fortunately the layered look is in right now), but I still catch more than a few men looking at my breasts instead of my face. As for when I want to wear that nice strapless or backless dress, well, something things are just never going to happen no matter how much we might want them to. I’m never going to be a world-class athlete. Nor, do I think, is au naturelle an option darlings.
Which kind of brings me to part two of my breast-related rant. Bra’s. I could swear that the sizings have got smaller in the last year or so. *eyes narrow* M&S must have some conspiracy going on with small-breasted women to make them feel better, because there is no way that at the same time as LOOSING lots of weight, my breasts have gone UP a cup-size.
Also, do they have to be so fricking expensive? You’re looking at the sharp end of £20 for a nice bra, then £5 or more if you want matching knickers. That’s my weekly grocery budget. Two sets and you practically have a new copy of Mac OSX. You can be sure that if there was a piece of clothing the majority of men had to wear it would cost a lot LOT less. Or be available free from the government or something. There’s a thought – bras on the NHS. Then again as a child who was inflicted with NHS glasses, perhaps not.
We won’t go into the fact that popcorn (anything I eat in the cinema) seems to have a fascination with my cleavage giving me the option of going searching (and incurring some very scandalised looks from the little old lady at the end of the row), or having popcorn where no popcorn was designed to go for the entirety of the film. But, as I said, we won’t be going into that today. That’s more to do with my clutziness than my breasts.
Yes, I love my breasts, and one or two other people have expressed a favorable opinion of them as well, but there are days when they do bug the crap out of me. Like today. No, I am not expecting anything constructive to come of this post, I just wanted to share.
*1*In case you are wondering, todays title is not a quote from any film/book/song or anything I know of. It came out in a conversation about the upcoming film Elizabethtown, a film in which Ms. Dunst looks flatchested, even for her.
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Congratulations, I’ve never read anything that describes my feelings towards my breast that good. I wonder how many other women there are who have the same “problem”?
Thank you Babsi, and welcome to Bright Meadow 🙂 And as for other women, I know several who feel pretty much the same way. They’re just not so brazen about admitting it as I am!
I do enjoy hearing about your breasts, but could the article not be accompanied by some pictures?
Also, I’m not really sure why “bras” has a possessive apostrophe?
Cecil, no, there won’t be any pictures. I have quite enough stalkers already, thank you very much.
Welcome to Bright Meadow though 🙂
Thanks for the warm and all enveloping welcome.
Shame about the pictures. If you decide to reconsider, I’ve handily included my email address in this comment. 😉
Just japing!
Do you really have stalkers?
No Cecil, I don’t really have stalkers.
Or they could just be really stealthy and haven’t made themselves known yet… *eek*!