In seventh grade some of my friends actually needed a bra, making the switch from soft training bra to a more form-fitting undergarment. Watching the girls I’d grown up with begin to take shape was surreal. Soon I could tell who was wearing a bra not only by the crisscross on their back, but by slight shapes in the front. I impatiently joined the ranks of girls waiting for signs of development, wondering what our figures would look like by the time of the homecoming dance. It seemed that over the span of a weekend a chest could sprout. The rest of us – the un-blossomed - would quiz the most recent boob recipient. What did you eat? Did you sleep on your stomach or back? What soap do you use? Are you doing a special exercise? The wealth of development advice, though well intentioned, did not produce dependable results. It seemed no combination of pectoral flexing, scrubbing with a pink Dove soap bar, stomach sleeping and jet-puffed marshmallows would produce breasts every time. The method of helping each other grow up that we’d always enjoyed had failed us. When the first person in Kindergarten had lost their tooth, we’d all taken his “eat an apple” advice to heart. Before the week was through most of us had a visit from the Tooth Fairy. When one girl’s big sister taught her to write her name in cursive in first grade, she’d helped us all connect our curvy letters at recess that day. Something had changed now. Our bodies were not under our control, and no amount of friendly advice could make them so.
By high school we had stopped discussing how to get breasts, and began whispering about who should consider an underwire. The boys also noticed. After years of keeping bra talk ‘girls only’, at slumber parties and changing for PE, it had spread to the other locker room. The hierarchy of desirable girls to date was directionally proportional to cup size, or so it seemed to those of us with A’s. Words like miracle, push-ups, rubber chicken cutlets, and stuffing began circulating. The over-the-weekend blossoming in middle school was nothing compared to the phenomenon that occurred in high school. A girl could start the day a band nerd with mosquito bites and by lunch attain a perfect C and a date with a senior. Those of us with high moral standards refused to stuff, or at least did it gradually so no one would notice.
In the beginning of my college days I loathed my small chest, but was either too lazy or too busy to do much about it. Given the choice of a few extra minutes of sleep or correctly positioning superfluous bra padding, I would choose sleep every time. Boys didn’t seem to matter as much, and the girls were more focused on studying than gossiping about bra size. I didn’t particularly love my figure, but for the first time since age eleven breast worries were not at the forefront of my mind.
One hot Texas summer I worked at a camp, and spent the entire week in the most unflattering sports bra. Temperatures soared over 100 degrees and most of our activities were outside. As I worked with the group of gawky sixth graders, I watched them struggle through many of the same body issues I had. There was, of course, the one twelve-year-old who looked like Malibu Barbie. I secretly pledged my allegiance to the awkward, frizzy-haired girl who only wore a tank top underneath her shirt. One of my co-counselors was a blue-eyed, southern-drawled, oh so handsome boy. By Wednesday we’d confessed our undying love, despite my so flat chest. If he could love me sweaty and unsupported, I knew he was the one.
That fall I watched my grandmother fight to keep her breasts. Refusing to lose her life, or even miss too many days of work, she endured agonizing procedures and nauseating chemotherapy. In the end she did lose one of her breasts, but stood strong through it all. This woman, whose figure was once so like mine, won the battle with cancer. Through her pain I learned to accept my own shape.
A few years later that summer-love-turned-husband and I were expecting a sweet baby girl. We watched in wonder as my A’s turned into C’s during the rounding of pregnancy. When our daughter was born I chose to breastfeed. I heard horror stories about banana-shaped breasts, stretch marks and sagging that can occur after breastfeeding. One woman assured me that my breasts would most definitely shrink even smaller than before if I nursed longer than six months. Watching my Ava fill her tiny tummy with milk gave everlasting meaning and purpose to this once-vexing body part. The superficial chest requirements that had plagued me for so long quickly faded away, though I am pleased to report that after eighteen months of nursing the only bananas are in our fruit bowl. The journey from the dread of development to the realization of function took many turns. How thankful I am that through my daughter’s dependence on me, I finally learned to love my breasts.
