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Feb 06, 2013 -- When +0 just doesn't work ... venting my frustration.
Sometimes the +0 fitting rule, or underbust measurement = band size, just doesn't seem to work.
If you, like me, have a very conical ribcage and/or shallow breasts, chances are you have to size up in the band to prevent overstretched wires and distorted cups. If you, like me, lack 'padding' and/or suffer from some kind of hypersensitivity affliction and/or for whichever reason cannot get used to the constant and rather high level of 'elastic compression' exerted by tight bra bands, chances are you may have to size up in the band to achieve any semblance of comfort.
And then there are the bras themselves. I'm more and more inclined to believing that many bras simply aren't designed to be worn +0, especially not on bodies like mine. Chantelle's moulded foam cups that come in 65/30 bands for example seem meant to be worn by 65cm ribcages -- not by 69cm/27" ribcages like mine and definitely not by 75cm/30" ribcages like the +0 rule suggests -- or the very flexible wires will overstretch and the cups distort horribly. In my, admittedly limited, experience more or less the same seems to apply to Bravissimo half cups, Panache Andorra and any unknown number of other bra models and brands.
However, will going up in band size (relative to +0) for any of the reasons listed above result in a bra that offers any kind of support for anything but the very smallest of breasts? No, it probably won't. Won't the bands right up monumentally and/or the centre gores hover miles away from the sternum? Oh yes, they probably will.
According to +0 I am a smallish 28F (the Butterfly Collection calculator even claims I should be looking at 26GG -- 24H if I like my bands even tighter!!! -- but to be honest, that seems like complete and utter nonsense to me). Whatever the numbers, I think it's safe to say I'm not particularly huge, so there shouldn't really be a reason to strangle myself with a bra band. However, I WOULD like SOME support for my ladies as they aren't exactly tiny either and their gravity defying days are, unfortunately, quite over.
But here I feel I'm trapped: I cannot wear bands +0 style for the reasons mentioned above (and I really shouldn't have to), but looser bands seem to offer little to no support and have all sorts of problem of their own (riding up, floating gores). Assuming that my ideal band size is then somewhere between 60/28 and 70/32 and my ideal cup size subsequently between E/F and D/DD, it also doesn't really help that my size puts me right at the bottom end of the full bust 'speciality' brands -- which I so far haven't found to work very well for my shape -- and right at the top end of the 'regular' brands -- which I haven't found to work very well for me either.
What is a girl to do?!
To me it seems that the way modern bras are designed and constructed is fundamentally flawed: a supporting garment shouldn't have to rely on elastic compression of a tiny sliver of the body alone to stay in place. Even ordinary SOCKS are nowadays drafted more cleverly -- and more healthily!!! -- than that!
Filed under Boob and body issues
29 comments
I am probably the only one person here (oops and Denocte) who think that +0 inches rule is wrong so I'm looking forward to read what other girls will write.
I don't believe in "rules" based on a measuring tape alone. No matter how often they get described as "only a starting point", people seem to take them as the law... even faced with bras after bras that don't fit in their supposed size, they'll keep on saying "but I am a *insert size*". They just have to size up/size down in every model they've tried!
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