H&M Bras--Look, Don't Touch: Guest Post by Eternal*Voyageur

Today I'm excited to bring you my very first guest post! This post comes from a blogger who has been a big inspiration to me. 

   Eternal*Voyageur helps others break out of the Bra Matrix at Venusian*Glow. She also shares DIY skin care experiments, how she got her dream hair and style tips. When she's not blogging she hoop- dances, thrifts and backpacks with two little people.

You can find Eternal*Voyageur on Twitter, @eternalvoyageur, and on Facebook.

H&M Bras – Look, Don't Touch 

    My boobs still hurt every time I wander anywhere near the H&M lingerie section. Now, in case you are wondering why I go there anyway: I search there for cheaper briefs that match the bras I buy online (and am too cheap to order a matching brief with). However it's a challenge to focus on pretty briefs without cringing too much as I watch girls browsing through the deceptively beautiful bras hanging so innocently on the hangers. You see, once upon a time I was one of them. 

    A long, long time ago, when I was very much stuck in the Bra Matrix, H&M was the place I would go to pick out pretty and inexpensive bras. Except I never actually bought any. I just admired the to-die-for colors, the sweet and the sexy designs. So I spent some pleasant moments picking and armful of the prettiest 34C bras from the shelves. And then some not-so-pleasant moments trying them on in the changing room. 

     Even back then I knew something wasn't right – the difference is that I blamed my boobs for it. If only they had the right shape and size! Then they wouldn't look so sad and forlorn in these beautiful bras. Obviously, beautiful bras are meant for fuller, perkier and, to put it succinctly: more “normal” breasts than mine. Don't laugh – those were the times I thought that the photoshopped-and-stuffed- into-too-small-cups boobs of Victoria's Secret models embodied the perfection of mammarian beauty. 

      Most of the time the bras I tried on at H&M ended up back on the store shelves, since what's the point of buying gorgeous bras if I didn't have the boobs for them? Still I was always back after a month or two, with the persistent hope that something would change. Because these bras are just so pretty and cheap! 

       A lot did change, but it was not my boobs. I broke out of the Bra Matrix when I found out I should be wearing 30D. I still remember the first time I tried on a bra in that size: I couldn't stop admiring myself in the mirror – I actually had boobage! I haven't looked back since then, and neither have my breasts: they vastly improved in shape and consistency, and now I even “grew” a cleavage. And I ended up helping to fit other women, in bras that come in 90 sizes. 
      I still go and look at the pretty H&M bras, because they are such a pleasure to look at. But only to look at, not to wear. 

      So, H&M bras, now I take my revenge and analyze you with the cold, unforgiving eye of one who has experienced well-fitting bras. I find you guilty of: 
• A miserable size range: the smallest band size is 32, and that comes only in A cup (really? Really?!?). This means H&M bras correctly fit, what, 1% of the population?
• Oh, sorry, my bad. You can get a 30 band at H&M, in the kids section. It comes in an A cup, heavily padded (why? why?!? To distort the young girls developing breast tissue while at the same time giving them insecurities?) 
• The H&M padded bras are so padded, they should be called quilted. Is this meant to be a protection against winter cold? In case we decide to wear them on a polar expedition? 
• The underwires often decide to make a bid for freedom and escape out of the bra. 
• In the push-up bras the pads seem to take up most of the room in the cups. 
• Most of the bras are flattening, when seen from profile. Especially the push-ups. 
• The bands can be snug, but stretch out very quickly with washing. (Still, the quality is much better than that of Triumph.)
• The H&M bra size calculator  tells me to “pull the tape tightly around your body below the bust and if it is an odd number add 5 inches, if it is an even number add 6 inches”. Their guide would put me in a 32 band, that is two band sizes more than I need to be wearing (I wear 28 bands these days). Such a loose band would obviously give me no support. 

       So when I see girls browsing through the shelves of the H&M lingerie section, I cringe because I know that in the changing rooms these girls will stuff their breasts into wrongly size cups, prematurely aging their breasts by distorting the tissue. And most of these girls will compare their their boobs to the orbs on catalogue photos and sigh, believing that something is wrong with their bodies.