As soon as young girls develop breasts, we are told to wear a bra. That’s it. Just put a bra on and you’re set, but make sure it fits properly. Now you’re set. Oh yeah, and always wear a sports bra when you’re being active. Sound good?
Not quite.
It’s not that our mothers have failed entirely by simply setting us free in the bra department of Target once they recognized that we have breasts. It is setting us free with only the knowledge passed down from their mothers in the bra department that is the problem.
Breast knowledge is advancing more and more each year; sadly this is because of the increasing breast cancer rates. Becoming aware of how to keep our girls healthy is going to be an ongoing struggle that all women will face, but with the advancements in research, it can be assured that future generations of young women will forever have the proper knowledge of their boobs.
That being said, I wish that the knowledge and the importance of a great sports bra was stressed to me as a child.
Like most young girls, when it is decided that you need a sports bra, your mom and you make a trip to pick one up. Upon arrival, it is guaranteed that neither you nor your mom did proper research on which sports bra to purchase. (Wait! There’re different types?!)
Believe it. There are several different types of sports bras ranging anywhere from light impact to high impact, from padded to unpadded. It’s overwhelming for a woman of any age, let alone a first time buyer.
Basically, the type of sports bra one would need depends on the type of activity. For young girls, a basic low impact sports bra works perfectly. This type of cotton, shelf-like bra gives enough support to ‘the girls’ while still maintaining comfort and protection.
When we were young girls, it wasn’t emphasized that the new additions to our body were delicate. The breast tissue is under an extreme amount of stress during this period of a girl’s life. The tissue is growing at a rapid rate while we are still running around the playground like maniacs. The activities we played at recess without a sports bra affect us even now as adult women.
As we mature and discover Victoria’s Secret, we start to take more interest in our boobs. Women buy fancy bras in every color imaginable and any style. If we see something we like, most of us buy it without thinking twice about how our boobs feel about it. Granted, our boobs don’t have an opinion on what leopard print bra we buy, but they sure make us regret buying a super push-up bra. We buy a push-up bra thinking that we’ll have perfect cleavage that will make men turn their heads as we walk by. But by the end of the night all we want to do is go home and take the stupid thing off.
This is true of sports bras as well. Buying the clearance sports bra in ‘maybe’ a size too big or small, or buying it just to buy it, isn’t smart. It really becomes a waste of money as well as a hard habit to break.
Buying a good sports bra is one of the most important things we can do to help out our breasts. As a runner, I realized recently that I was running in the wrong sports bra. Not only does running, or for that matter being extremely active six days a week, in the wrong sports bra horrible for your breasts, it makes it harder to get back what you had; perkiness.
That’s what all women want isn’t it? Perky breasts. That’s where the importance of a great sports bra comes in when we were girls! (What goes around really does come around.) After we have damaged the breast tissue to a certain point, it almost becomes irreparable. When we are young and chasing the boys around the playground we don’t even know of the damage we are doing to our breasts.
Even though the damage is irreversible to a point, women can change the pattern for the future. If you are an extremely active woman, running around and playing various sports several times a week, look into a high impact sports bra. When you first put one on, you’ll feel as though you can’t breathe, but it’s meant to keep the girls as close to your body as possible. If you dabble in yoga, you’re a perfect candidate for a low impact bra. They don’t wear as tight and they give a little more room for movement.
Alright ladies, let’s become more knowledgeable about the most prideful part of our lovely bodies. By passing on the awareness we learn from having a good sports bra, we are truly helping girls think about their ‘girls’ for the future.