I was at a bra shop awhile back,
buying myself some of the first nice bras I owned in a long time. The last time I did that was before I had
four children, nursing them for a bunch of years combined. And after all that swelling and deflating,
swelling and deflating ... well, things weren't as perky as they used to be, including my thin cotton bras.
Anyway, so I went into this shop and a
salesperson asked me if I’d like to have my bust measured so that I knew which size
bra to try on. Since I was treating
myself to a nice, expensive bra, I decided, Why
Not?
So she measured my bust and confidently stated what size I needed. And I said, “No, I need a cup size bigger."
“Well, the tape measure says the smaller one,” she
said, clearly a little hurt that I would question her professional measuring
skills.“Ok, grab me a smaller one,” I said, knowing full well it wouldn’t fit.
So she brought it to me, and I tried it
on.
“How’s it fit?” she asked.“It’s way too tight! Can you get me the next size up?” I replied.
When I was done, I could tell that she
was a little confused, like she was thinking, But the tape measure said!?!
What happened? How did I go
wrong?
It didn’t dawn on me until I was
walking out of the store that I should have explained to her what happened (she was clearly too young to know) …
I was wearing a thin,
stretched-out, cotton bra when she measured me.
And “droopy mom boobs” are not the same thing as “perky young boobs.” Our boobs have expanded and deflated so much
that they ooze downward. (Have you ever blown up a balloon really big and then let the air out? Yeah, like that.) And you can't measure them when they are drooping and oozing - because by the
time we finish scooping it all back up and putting them into a supportive,
high-quality bra, they gain a cup size.
So, confused saleslady, it wasn’t your
tape measure or your measuring skills.
It was physics, gravity. Someday you’ll understand: Scoop first, then measure.
