The Line Of Her Frontage

Be warned.  This is a post about breasts.  Boobs, tits, knockers, whatever you call them, women are often defined by them.  At least in this culture.  Far too often.  I can only relate my own experience in dealing with my own breasts, and the challenges they presented to my self-image.

Since the summer after I turned 14, I have struggled with my image of myself.  My breasts developed rather shockingly and suddenly that summer.  I went from almost flat to a C- cup virtually overnight.  Time and age have increased the size, though my recent weight loss is helping a bit.  I not only had these rather obvious signs of my development to deal with, but they had ugly, angry red stretch marks on them.  It took years for those marks to finally fade.  My relatively flat chested mother didn't quite know how to deal with this development.  She found the most uncomfortable, super-constructed steel reinforced bra she could, and got me measured and strapped into one as soon as possible.  The support was necessary, to help the stretch marks, if nothing else.
I have always been of two minds about my figure.  On one hand, the attention I received suddenly was unwelcome and embarrassing.  I must now fight constantly to keep my shoulders back and not hunch up because of all the years I spent trying to hide my breasts.  See, when I was 14, I was already a bit of a poet, a writer keeping multiple journals, and trying to figure out this zoo we call life.  I was serious, not a boy crazy valley girl like some of my acquaintances.  These breasts got me attention of the WRONG kind.  I wanted to be taken seriously for what I had to say, not for what I looked like.
On the other hand,  I wanted to be proud of my body, wanted to feel that it was becoming desirable and sexy, but I felt my breasts were ugly.  Too floppy, and those stretch marks, ick!.  (I often say I don't fear having "old lady boobs", I've had them since I was 14.  They aren't that bad, but I thought so for years.)
They were also too big.  Though, I look at photos from the time, and they aren't really that out of proportion, but they felt that way to me.  I am built on the small side everywhere else.  (I'm only 5'4")
When I am at my normal weight, I have very little in the way of curves except my breasts.  I have the Clark family tendency to not have much to sit on.  (Why is our family so fidgety?  We have no padding on our backsides.  We'd rather be up and doing something than sitting around being uncomfortable.)
I was just looking for some photos of me at about 14, and not surprisingly, I don't seem to have any.  I remember dreading photos in those days, and avoiding cameras whenever possible.  I do have some from later on, after I developed a little more confidence, but was still self-conscious about my figure.

This photo was made when I was 16, and feeling better about myself because a boy was interested in me, and actually started talking to me about books.  (He was sitting next to me when this picture was made.)  Note that my shoulders are still hunched sort of forward, and my arms placed to sort of hide my chest.
I started having to wear glasses at 16, and I actually welcomed that change, because it gave me something to hide behind.  (I only need them for distance, even still, so I take them off often, as I did for this picture.)  I wear them all the time at work and other places out and about. I feel my glasses have always given me a bit of gravitas, and helped people take me more seriously.  (Except maybe when I wore those really outrageous plastic frames in the '80s.  But then again, everyone did in those days.) When I was a senior in high school, disco was all the rage, and all the OTHER girls could wear cute little strappy disco dresses.  But not me.  My figure would not cooperate wtih that.  So, my prom dress was not all that I wanted it to be.  I survived.  Ended up dancing with my friend Brenda, though, because we had had a disco dance class, and we knew how to dance, but our dates didn't. 

Photo on the right, I was 25 or so, already married, and STILL trying to hide the boobs.  Shoulders rolled forward, arms crossed protectively in front of me.  Also, wearing the first pair of the ugly '80s glasses.  I thought for the longest time that my chest was the ONLY thing about me that some people (especially guys) ever saw.  My husband was one of the few guys in my age group who ever actually looked me in the EYE when he met me.  Knowing him as I do, I am sure he did his share of looking, but he was never obvious about it.  He is often obvious about it NOW, but we ARE married, and well, husbands are allowed certain things that others are not.

I often wore things with high necklines, even when something lower cut would have been more flattering.  I did teach elementary school, and I wanted to keep a certain image, but outside of work, I could have loosened up a little.  I did not, because on the few occasions that I did dress more fashionably, shall we say, the catcalls and comments were more than I wanted to deal with.
 

Here's one from when I was 19.  A bit less self-conscious, but I was concentrating on my little cousin.  I worked at Taco Bell at that time, and had to wear a really form-fitting brown polyester uniform.  I hated it, not just because it was brown and polyester, but because it was so form fitting, I often got unwelcome comments from male customers.  The experience did teach me how to deal with such things, though. I finally got so I could pointedly ignore or joke about such comments, depending on the demeanor of the guy in question.

After I'd been married awhile, I got a lot less self-conscious about my breasts.  I was even kind of proud of them once in a while.  I think part of it was being older, not a girl anymore, looking a little more like someone to take seriously in spite of my figure.  (Also, I had this really muscular red-headed guy with me a lot of the time who was (and is) very protective.)  (Alas, he's not so muscular anymore...)

The photo on the right was made probably in 1987 or so.  That dress at last, one that showed off my curves to my advantage, even if those glasses are horrible!  (But, like I said, everybody had them in the '80s.)

So, I finally decided that I could admit to having this figure, then I gained weight, lost weight, and gained weight again.  I have gone through many years when I just couldn't stand the way I looked, and have finally just NOW gotten enough motivation and support to do something that may well last long term about my weight.  I am following a SENSIBLE diet, and am exercising as much as I can.  Two half hour walks a day lately, but I must start the free weights again or I will still be flabby.

This last photo is one I made a few days ago to celebrate being able to wear that shirt and those jeans again.  I did not have to pin the shirt so it wouldn't gap for the first time since I bought the dang thing.  Yes, it is conservatively snapped up almost to the top, but I was preparing to go to work, and I do work with the public in a fairly small suburb, so I do not want to be provocative in the way I dress.  Want to look neat and at least a little professionally competent. (Add my current owly glasses, and it fits at the library perfectly!)

While I have finally come to accept my figure, I still have some issues about living with these breasts.  The stuff most people who don't have to carry them around all day don't think about.
1) They are HEAVY.  I carry a lot of my total body weight in my bosom.  I still have to wear the steel reinforced bras that have underwires because of the weight of my breasts.  They just are NOT adequately supported by anything less.  (Much as I would LOVE to be able to wear some of the sweet little nothings smaller women can, they make no sense on this body.  These boobs laugh at any bra (other than a strong sports bra) that doesn't have underwires.

2)  They require careful watching.  All women have to do self-examinations and go for regular mammograms to ensure they catch any changes before they become serious.  For those of us with larger breasts, those exams are more difficult.  At least mine are fairly "squishy" , so I can feel all the usual lumps and bumps and know where they are and if they change,  but going for a mammogram just always brings back that  odd old expression about having 'a tit in the wringer'.  (Not so odd if you remember wringer washing machines, which I do, but just barely.)

3)  They cause marks on your body.  Because of them being so heavy, and having to wear the types of bras I do, I have permanent ruts in my shoulders from straps, and indentations around my torso from where the band sits.  Some of the permanent lumps in my breasts are likely cysts that were caused by the tops of the under wires irritating the tissue for so many years.  Or so my GYN nurse practitioner says.  The cysts have been there since before my first mammogram, and have not changed ever.

4) They are often inconvenient.  I have knocked things off of shelves while trying to reach something on a higher shelf.  Cleavage can also become a catch-all of things that fall on their way to your mouth.  Cleaning crumbs out of the cleavage is one reason for scurrying off to the ladies room after a meal.  Lying on your stomach is not as comfortable as you would like it to be.   Backaches and habitual bad posture are often a side effect of a large bust.  I still have to force myself to sit and stand with my shoulders back to prevent back and shoulder pain, and to keep from becoming permanently round-shouldered. 

Perhaps there will always be things about my figure that upset me, but for the most part, I have made peace with it.  As long as I can continue to lose weight and get back to my normal healthy weight, I will be very happy with my figure indeed.  One nice thing about getting older is the absence of the cat-calls I used to get, but it makes me a bit wistful, too.  Not that I no longer get appreciative glances, but they are far more rare. (Or perhaps by the time guys reach this age, they've learned to be a LOT less obvious.  At least, most of them have.)

At any rate, these days, since I have gotten below 150 pounds, finally, I note that I feel proud of myself when I stride out on my walks every day.  I enjoy the way I look for the most part.  Now, if I could just keep my face from getting all jowly and wrinkly...

Here is a recent picture.  The weight loss has given me back a waistline.  I am trying to be proud of myself these days, and not so self-conscious.