Day Four - Fashion Abreast

From here on out, I refuse to be ashamed of my breasts. Ask any girl with size C’s or larger and she will tell you that boobs are a mixed blessing. Women want them, men drool over them, and girls stuff their shirts and dream about getting them. Boobs are kind of a big deal, so why then am I expected to either hide them or pretend it’s okay for you to stare at them? I spend half my time trying to boost them up, bending over to lift and then lower into my push up bra and the other half in search of tank tops that lay flat enough to wear under everything so my cleavage line doesn’t offend other people. No more. Today I vow to let the girls be who they want to be and if that offends your sense of decorum then stop looking.

I didn’t always have breasts. I remember when I was thirteen and “going” with Robert Freeman who was one grade higher than me. It was the last day of school before summer break. I would be coming back an eighth grader and Robert would be moving on to high school. The last thing he ever said to me was that he would not miss me because I had a flat chest. At 13 that one really stung, not because he wouldn’t miss me, but because he judged me for something I had not noticed myself. I remember being ashamed of my chest after he said that. Before that day I was not one of those girls that worried about not getting my boobs, honestly I didn’t care all that much and I wasn’t a girly girl anyway. His words made me suddenly aware of my body in a new way and I did not like what I saw. This was the moment when my body consciousness really kicked in, setting into motion what turned into a 23-year obsession.

These days I bounce between a C and a D cup depending on diet, exercise and if I’m taking birth control. I admit it is great to know you can fill out a top and I have definitely used cleavage to my advantage more than once when otherwise feeling fat or insecure. Not only does sexy sell, it keeps people from noticing when your bloated tummy can pass for a late term pregnancy. I don’t remember when the girls moved in upstairs, I just know that I went from an A to a C seemingly overnight and never looked back. In high school I spent lots of time trying to de-emphasize them and luckily the bras back then were not overly supportive, so a certain amount of deflation was a given. 

Today I revel in the push-up bra. I have them in every color and design imaginable (in both C and D). The problem with perking up the girls, or really just in having them at all, is that boobs have kind of gone out of fashion. Women’s clothing today stresses a more flowing silhouette exemplified by the 5’7” and over girls who possess neither hips nor tits. The athletic and willowy bodies so admired on models and actresses have made their way into the mainstream, bustling past the busty in their form flattering tanks and bohemian peasant blouses.

A recent shopping trip to an upscale mall proved over and over again that if I wanted to be fashionable, the girls were going to be left out in the cold, literally. Nothing fits properly. A tank top that looks like a chic, casual summer top on a friend looks nearly pornographic on the mammary gifted. A button front blouse menaces the bystander, gaping in front and threatening to launch a torpedo-like button assault with every breath. I’ve seen your disapproving looks. I’ve heard the comments. Hell, some of my closest friends have insisted I cover up on occassion. Do you think I’m shopping at a special store? That perhaps there is a “big-boobed ‘ho” store somewhere that all chesty women are shopping at? I wear the same clothes you wear, they just look different on me. The same top that you could wear to a PTA meeting I could wear onstage at a strip club.

Why should the burden to dig up some sort of cleavage camouflage always fall to me? A v-neck camisole purchased at The Gap is not intended to invoke talks about “those kinds of women” between Mothers and their young children. Yesterday I wore such a shirt and I tore through three drawers of bras to find one that downplayed the cleavage and enhanced my sag factor. Really? While other women are getting breast enhancements I am trying to lie flat? Often, before spending time with more conservative friends, I work myself into a self-esteem bashing frenzy while trying on dozens of shirts to find one that is more “The Loft” than aloft. I actually have felt BAD about myself because I have breasts and I don’t want to wear a turtleneck in the summer.

I joke about my cleavage, but in reality I want to be an A-cup, I always have. No stress over how my breasts make me look, no more $45 bras, no more fashionable tops I can’t squeeze into. I’m a relatively small-framed girl and while my torso says small, the girls scream large. It’s not easy to shop and I usually prefer to order online, trying things on in private and returning what doesn’t fit, rather than deal with the humiliation of getting stuck in a shirt and needing the attendant to help me out (yes, that’s actually happened). I am just as self-conscious of my endowments as some flat-chested girls are about their Kiera Knightley like frames. Celebrities are a great example. Women in Hollywood with boobs are treated like pariahs. They are the predators or bad girls compared to their svelte peers. Why should I feel l bad because I have breasts? Why should I worry about hiding them or that they might make others uncomfortable? I didn’t buy them, mine came with the package.

One final note, pregnant women newly fascinated and enamored with their sudden breast enhancements do not cover up with crewnecks or ponchos. They wear the same dresses and scoop-neck tops we all do, except now their girls have come out to see the light. What’s really ironic, is that no one calls a pregnant woman who bares a little cleavage a slut, and yet she’s the only one you know for certain has actually been getting any action.