The Right Fit
By Mary Cartledgehayes
Sometimes it takes an effort to find the right fit.
Take, for instance, my decision to relocate to Louisville
I’d lived in South Carolina for decades and was ready
to tap into a different geographic energy, to hear a
different vocabulary and to overhear different
conversations. The only problem was figuring out where
the moving van should deliver my furniture. For three
years, I tried on different cities and terrains. I wandered
around Baltimore, Md., and Charlottesville, Va.; rented a
room in Durham, N.C., for six months; spent an afternoon with a real estate agent in
White Stone, Va.; bunked at a friend’s apartment in Tarrytown, N.Y., for most of one
summer; and gave serious consideration to the Ohio town where I went to high school.
Each location had something to offer, but none of them seemed to fit quite right. Then
one day I drove down I-71, took the Gene Snyder Expressway to I-64, and, by the time I
reached the Grinstead Drive exit, knew Louisville was the place for me. Something
about the big sky and the Ohio River felt right to me. When I learned later that I can
check out 99 books at a time — 99! from the public library — my happiness was
complete.
If only it were that easy finding a bra that fits.
According to a sign posted in the Dillard’s department store in the Mall of St. Matthews,
70 percent of women wear the wrong size bra. How is that possible? And why should
you care?
The reasons for poorly fitting bras are legion. You gain 10 pounds. You lose 10 pounds.
You weigh the same but your body has (inevitably) changed from one year to the next.
Compounding the problem is the plethora of sizes. You may know that cup sizes range
from A to JJ, but did you know they come in three different shapes: minimal, average,
and full-busted? Few stores carry them all, so often we must settle for what’s available
rather than what fits.
I’ll bet you don’t even know how to tell if you’re wearing the right bra. Here are the
obvious things to look for:
Is the bottom band positioned correctly?
It’s not supposed to curve up your back like a bend in the Ohio River. Rather, it should
be level all the way around your body.
Do the cups fit correctly?
Push-up bras aside, if you’re spilling out, you need a larger cup size. If the fabric is
wrinkled, you need a smaller size.
Are there gouge marks in your shoulders?
If so, the straps are doing more work than they’re engineered to do. According to an
article in the July 2005 issue of O, Oprah’s magazine, posted outside the Dillard’s fitting
room, the straps on a bra are intended to do 10 percent of the work of support. The
other 90 percent is the province of the side and back bands.
Seduced by photos of celebrities falling out of their clothing, we forget that bras serve a
functional purpose: the distribution of the weight of our breasts. Why should we care?
Because otherwise our backs, shoulders, posture, self-esteem, and dispositions suffer.
Granted, some of us go into shock the first time we buy a correctly fitting bra. I call this
the “Oh, Lord!” factor. A friend of mine named Tricia, who’s a student at Louisville
Presbyterian Theological Seminary, endured it recently. It happened the day she said to
a salesclerk, “I want a bra that fits.”
Tricia should have been forewarned when, after looking her over, the clerk asked, “Do
you care what it looks like?”
“No, I don’t. It just has to fit.”
She meant it, too, right up to the moment the clerk held up a device that had more to do
with a hydraulics schematic than with lingerie and said, “Let’s start with this one.”
To which Tricia replied, in dismay, “Oh, Lord.”
Maybe she wasn’t imagining a gauze confection with Alençon lace trim, but neither was
she prepared for the industrial-strength garment the clerk offered her. A funny thing
happened, though. When Tricia put the bra on, her life changed. With the weight of the
world shifted from her shoulders to the bra’s side and back bands, her posture
improved, her clothes fit better, and, for the first time since puberty, she was physically
comfortable in her own body.
You can imagine her surprise, then, when the salesclerk said the bra didn’t fit her. It
took two hours of effort, trying on different shapes, styles, and sizes, before Tricia found
the fit that worked best for her. She left the store exhausted but triumphant.
Here’s what I like best about this story: the rest of us can feel the same way. We’ve
always known that sometimes it takes an effort to find the right fit.Only now, though,
are we discovering that, when it comes to bras, the payoff
is worth the effort expended because in an instant we can improve not only the way we
look but also the way we feel about our bodies, ourselves.
By Mary Cartledgehayes
Sometimes it takes an effort to find the right fit.
Take, for instance, my decision to relocate to Louisville
I’d lived in South Carolina for decades and was ready
to tap into a different geographic energy, to hear a
different vocabulary and to overhear different
conversations. The only problem was figuring out where
the moving van should deliver my furniture. For three
years, I tried on different cities and terrains. I wandered
around Baltimore, Md., and Charlottesville, Va.; rented a
room in Durham, N.C., for six months; spent an afternoon with a real estate agent in
White Stone, Va.; bunked at a friend’s apartment in Tarrytown, N.Y., for most of one
summer; and gave serious consideration to the Ohio town where I went to high school.
Each location had something to offer, but none of them seemed to fit quite right. Then
one day I drove down I-71, took the Gene Snyder Expressway to I-64, and, by the time I
reached the Grinstead Drive exit, knew Louisville was the place for me. Something
about the big sky and the Ohio River felt right to me. When I learned later that I can
check out 99 books at a time — 99! from the public library — my happiness was
complete.
If only it were that easy finding a bra that fits.
According to a sign posted in the Dillard’s department store in the Mall of St. Matthews,
70 percent of women wear the wrong size bra. How is that possible? And why should
you care?
The reasons for poorly fitting bras are legion. You gain 10 pounds. You lose 10 pounds.
You weigh the same but your body has (inevitably) changed from one year to the next.
Compounding the problem is the plethora of sizes. You may know that cup sizes range
from A to JJ, but did you know they come in three different shapes: minimal, average,
and full-busted? Few stores carry them all, so often we must settle for what’s available
rather than what fits.
I’ll bet you don’t even know how to tell if you’re wearing the right bra. Here are the
obvious things to look for:
Is the bottom band positioned correctly?
It’s not supposed to curve up your back like a bend in the Ohio River. Rather, it should
be level all the way around your body.
Do the cups fit correctly?
Push-up bras aside, if you’re spilling out, you need a larger cup size. If the fabric is
wrinkled, you need a smaller size.
Are there gouge marks in your shoulders?
If so, the straps are doing more work than they’re engineered to do. According to an
article in the July 2005 issue of O, Oprah’s magazine, posted outside the Dillard’s fitting
room, the straps on a bra are intended to do 10 percent of the work of support. The
other 90 percent is the province of the side and back bands.
Seduced by photos of celebrities falling out of their clothing, we forget that bras serve a
functional purpose: the distribution of the weight of our breasts. Why should we care?
Because otherwise our backs, shoulders, posture, self-esteem, and dispositions suffer.
Granted, some of us go into shock the first time we buy a correctly fitting bra. I call this
the “Oh, Lord!” factor. A friend of mine named Tricia, who’s a student at Louisville
Presbyterian Theological Seminary, endured it recently. It happened the day she said to
a salesclerk, “I want a bra that fits.”
Tricia should have been forewarned when, after looking her over, the clerk asked, “Do
you care what it looks like?”
“No, I don’t. It just has to fit.”
She meant it, too, right up to the moment the clerk held up a device that had more to do
with a hydraulics schematic than with lingerie and said, “Let’s start with this one.”
To which Tricia replied, in dismay, “Oh, Lord.”
Maybe she wasn’t imagining a gauze confection with Alençon lace trim, but neither was
she prepared for the industrial-strength garment the clerk offered her. A funny thing
happened, though. When Tricia put the bra on, her life changed. With the weight of the
world shifted from her shoulders to the bra’s side and back bands, her posture
improved, her clothes fit better, and, for the first time since puberty, she was physically
comfortable in her own body.
You can imagine her surprise, then, when the salesclerk said the bra didn’t fit her. It
took two hours of effort, trying on different shapes, styles, and sizes, before Tricia found
the fit that worked best for her. She left the store exhausted but triumphant.
Here’s what I like best about this story: the rest of us can feel the same way. We’ve
always known that sometimes it takes an effort to find the right fit.Only now, though,
are we discovering that, when it comes to bras, the payoff
is worth the effort expended because in an instant we can improve not only the way we
look but also the way we feel about our bodies, ourselves.
