Yes, All Bra Wearers

Friends, it has been twenty-five months since I have worn a bra for an entire day. 

Twenty-five months of living straight up areola-to-shirt, and I’ll tell you I am changed. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the tossing of my bra! Am I alone? Turns out: it’s complicated.

You might assume that I’m small chested, and this is forgivable, less bounce per ounce without a bra, right? That’s just physics! What if I told you I’m a 4’11” woman with a gloriously ample body sporting a pair of hefty F cups? Translation: I regularly need help reaching something in my own kitchen cabinets and, on top of that, I am lugging two bulk bags of Yukon Golds all day, every day. But I only encounter braless problems when I’ve got that monthly tenderness. And by “tenderness” I mean feeling like I’ve repeatedly hurled myself chest-first into Shah Ruh Kahn’s rock hard abs, and all I have to show for it are these bruised jumbo honeydews. (Somebody make that tee shirt.)

Pre-pandemic I assumed that going braless for any length of time would be a painful experience, and only easy for those with smaller chests. Once shelter in place started (aka “SIP” here), 

 I was shocked to discover how much I love going braless. I got nosey and wanted to find out whether fellow bra wearers were also changing their routines. So I did what any self-respecting human with zero boundaries would do: I made my friends, family, coworkers and complete strangers fill out an anonymous (and 100% absolutely for sure totally scientific) Google survey that asked questions about their myriad mammaries. The survey went out back in July 2020, when the first wave of SIP mandates were being lifted. Two hundred and forty respondents answered my call, and here are three results I found the most fascinating:

I love that mighty little green cadre of 3.7 percenters who have not worn a bra during any day of SIP at all. Let your flags fly, you absolute monarchs!

Additional questions covered scenarios like unspoken pressure from others to wear a bra (64.6 percent  agreed that yes, they did!), and in what way their altered bra wearing routines may have impacted both personal and professional relationships. 

The survey as a whole was eye-opening and, I’ll say it, thrilling. Data collection and analysis is my jam. Like, for fun. If all the data I enjoyed studying were books in my apartment Marie Kondo would block me on social media.

Okay, I lied. One last stat, I promise: I asked my respondents whether they’d ever been explicitly told to wear a bra, and if so, by whom? 2.1 percent said they had been explicitly told to wear a bra. That’s a low percentage, I thought, that is good to hear. But when asked who told them they needed to strap in, 66.7 percent of them said it was family members. Excuse me and my completely flat, glow-in-the-dark-white ass, but what?? Back off Aunt Edith! The location and lift of your own breastbone bookends are the only pair with which you should be concerning yourself. By the way, this is compared to the 22 percent who were explicitly told to put on a bra by their partner, which turns me directly into that jpeg of Arthur’s fist. If you police your partner’s body, you can walk directly into the sea.

Both cis and trans respondents reached out to say they’re between an A and a C cup and they are only comfortable when wearing bras or binders, which was great to learn about! Here I am, on the other end of the spectrum, joyfully discovering that I like my baby pandas more when I’m braless. Y’all, bodies are different! Water is wet! Fire is hot! Neither size nor gender factored into the data, and the result created such nuance. This is what I felt was missing from all those “Let’s all toss the bra” think pieces. While I recognize my sample size is extremely small, being able to put forth actual data from a wide range of ages and identities feels more reliable to me than one person deciding to speak for all of us.

At this point I’m on day 751 of a self-imposed SIP. 

I know I’m not the only one who peeks out their window, and heaves a hearty “Nooooope!”before sinking back into the couch to doom scroll twitter for another 18 hours; but I do that shit in comfort I’ll remind you. I chafe (both literally and mentally) at wearing a bra for more than a few hours these days. They no longer feel quite right, no longer supportive in the way I thought I needed them to be. They now feel like an unnecessary social obligation.

While all this data from friends, coworkers, and family (hi mom, I hope you are enjoying this, please still love me) was cool to curl up with and analyze, it was all basically saying the same thing: There is no oneway to make it through quarantine, SIP, and life in general. This isn’t earth-shattering, but it shouldn’t need to be.It should be a given that all bra wearers have their own routine and their own preferences when it comes to dress. None of us can assume who likes to wear what, or for how long or how often. Yes, all bra wearers should be able to do whatever they want, whatever feels good! Whether you’re a double-A who hates going without, a B who loves a well-made binder, or an H whose girls just wanna have fun, you are valid AF. You don’t have to explain to anybody how you like your body to be, and hot damn do I and my hella free hefty Fs salute you.