There’s something rather odd about how a good bra can enhance your sense of wellbeing. With the right fit and style, a new bra can make you feel sexy and confident and – according to Arthur Perry, MD, YouBeauty Cosmetic Surgery Expert – like you’ve lost weight. Perry comments, ‘No question that the larger the breasts are—whether from your genes, pregnancy or obesity—the faster they will sag. The benefit of wearing a good bra is that the sagging and stretching of the tissues is lessened. When breasts are allowed to droop, you get a pulling on the skin. This stimulates the fibroblasts, which are pressure-sensitive cells that make collagen, to make more skin and contributes to drooping of the breast. The advantage of wearing a bra is that you get less stretch and less droopy breasts over time.’ But how exactly do you choose the right bra for you?
1. Spot the signs: You know your bra doesn’t fit if you’re spilling out over the top of the cup – causing the dreaded “double boob” – or if it wrinkles or gaps at the top because it’s too big. The bra should cup most of your breasts, keep them firmly in place, separate your breasts by about an inch and, if you wear underwire bras, the wire should rest against your rib cage and not pull away from your body.
2. Get support in the right places: You can make the mistake of thinking the bra support comes from the straps. However, “bra whisperer” Susan Nethero, owner of Intimacy intimate apparel stores, points out, ‘A good bra provides breast support from the band [across your ribs]—only 10% of the support should come from the bra straps.’ This means slipping the straps off shouldn’t cause a significant breast slump. Moreover, when trying on your bra, look from the side and check that the bra’s bottom band forms a straight line or the back is an inch lower than the front of your bra. Nethero explains, ‘When the bra angles up your back that will cause the cups to fall down.’
3. Don’t be concerned about cup sizes: Some women wear the wrong size bra for years until a specialist tells them they’re a 32 E rather than a 34 C! If you find out your number is bigger or smaller than you previously thought, don’t sweat it! As with clothing, the important thing is to focus on the best fit, rather than some ideal cup size number you have in your head.
4. Stand firm: ‘You want it firm around the body and on the first hook so you have two to three hooks to go as the bra stretches,’ says Nethero. ‘You want a bra that hugs and holds you because you wear them 14 to 16 hours a day.’
5. Choose variety: The statistic shows that almost 70% of us have four bras or fewer in the underwear draw, but how many should we have? Nethero asserts ‘Ideally, seven to ten, but that’s a large number. Women have too few bras that they actually wear—and a lot sitting in their drawers that are a waste of money because they are uncomfortable. If you have five working bras in your wardrobe that you actually wear, that’s good.’ In your (br)arsenal, Nethero recommends that you have two nude bras (one of which should be strapless), one black or dark t-shirt bra and two to three fashion bras. Of these, one should have a deep plunge for clothes like wrap dresses and v-necks, one should be a sexy date bra for when someone might see it, and one, if you need it, should be a push-up bra.
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