Four months after having a double mastectomy because I tested positive for the BRCA gene, I was going to take my new boobs out and buy them presents. I was a new woman, liberated and braless. My new boobies were built behind my pectoral muscles, so they looked cute and perky at all times. I am braless as you are reading this, and I haven’t worn one all week. I repeat: I never have to wear a bra.

Before my surgery, the last time I had gone anywhere without a bra, I was seven and was obsessed with giving my Barbies supershort haircuts. When my boobs came in, there was no way they could be untethered. So this bra-free sensation was something of a revelation to me.

I love not wearing a bra! But sometimes I miss the girlie ritual, and after I healed, I wanted to buy me some hotsy-totsy bras.

Victoria’s Secret has always been intimidating to me. It’s like the cool girls’ table, and I was an outsider. Sure, I wore bras, but they weren’t fun and trendy. They had to be specially ordered online from London, because they were the only ones that offered bras for narrow backs with huge cups. I had cute bras with ample amounts of sexy lace, but it was much harder to hunt them down, and they weren’t cheap. I accepted it, with bitter acceptance, like never getting a seat at the cool girls’ table.

This time, it was different. Maybe I could be part of the club of infamous sexy angels, running around and laughing in yoga pants? The doors were open to me now, and the overpriced thongs weren’t the only thing I could purchase.

I walked in and smelled the supersweet perfume I knew well. I touched every piece of satin like I did when I was little. But now I actually had the money and the power to buy whatever unrealistic piece I wanted. I looked at the shiny neon-orange-lace demi-cups with matching garter belts, touching them, lovingly aware that finally, I was one of the average-size masses, picking out an average-size bra.

A woman in all black immediately approached me. “Hi! Can I help you?” Without waiting for an answer, she began flipping through stacks of bras as she proclaimed, ever so casually, “You’re probably 32D.”

A 32D? Did she just say I was a 32D? Oh, no, she didn’t just try to take away my hard-earned C. Not happening. I didn’t just go through two surgeries and twenty-nine pints of recovery ice cream to be called a D! I had an average C-cup, lady, and the hospital bills to prove it.

“Nope. That is incorrect,” I informed her with a surprisingly serious expression, and I marched upstairs to the dressing rooms with bras I chose on my own. High and mighty on my own determination, I stood in line for a curtained hot-pink room to try on my new bras. I could hardly wait, and I wasn’t going to let that oblivious woman ruin my outing. Finally, a dressing room opened up, and I entered it, ready for my transformation. And then . . .

As if no time had passed, as if I were still that teenage girl with an ill-proportioned body and G-sized boobs that couldn’t be properly contained with any bras made in America, I couldn’t find a bra that fit. I tried on eighteen bras! This was not supposed to happen! I designed my perfect breasts, and I had the scars to show for it. How could it still be this difficult to find a bra that fits?

My boobs were finally average, normal, run-of-the-mill. They were not deluxe or designer; they were off-the-rack, everyday boobies, and I just wanted a pretty bra to wear over them! Victoria, you are still so high maintenance!

I tried on all eighteen again. One bra had a cup that would cut in too much under my implant. One bra gaped too much in the front. One bra was padded and made me look like I had a huge underboob. One had a cup that was too long and went up under my armpit, and another was too small and pinched where my nipples would be if I had them.

Something wasn’t right here. This was supposed to my own little infomercial moment. Where was my “After” reveal celebration? Where was the confetti cannon? I finally asked for help.

I’d been sitting in the dressing room regrouping (read: sweating and tired) when I heard a very nice sales associate outside my curtain, trying to help a family of Italian tourists, a woman who was really pissed the hip-hugger panty in large wasn’t on sale, and a very overwhelmed man nervously shopping for his girlfriend. She was sweet to each one of them, and I thought she might be kind to me, too. I flagged her down and explained my whole saga. I told her about my surgeries and comforted her when she told me about her aunt’s diagnosis.

Her name was Christina, and I was right: She was one of the kindest people in the world. She asked helpful questions and gave me as much time as I needed. We looked for a bra that wasn’t too tight, eliminating all underwire bras because there was no need for a supportive band, though I could buy one with an underwire and cut the wire out of the cups, so there would be no risk of getting poked by a rogue wire and not being able to feel it. We didn’t want a cup that was too small and would cut into my implant or possibly rub me during the day. We also ruled out anything that was overly structured—I would need a soft cup shape that could gently mold to my body.

In the end, we picked a very comfortable T-shirt bra. This bra rested gently on my chest without any pulling or gaping. She totally understood when I told her, “Think more ‘picture frame’ and less ‘pulley system.’”

As I tried on a new batch of bras, Christina would run back and check on me while she tended to the other shoppers and tried to aid the man with the girlfriend who was clearly relying on lingerie to save his relationship. She made me feel special and completely ordinary at the same time, which was exactly what I wanted. When it was all over, I took a few selfies and sent them to my mom, to share the exciting news.

Even with perfect woman-made boobies, the whole process took about an hour. I was ready to hand over my credit card like a trust-fund kid with a solid 401k, but the checkout line was filled with Swedish tourists and I started to get a perfume headache. So I did what all savvy women do: I went back home and ordered the bras online with a promo code.

The bra-shopping experience was just as frustrating as it ever was. As if I never had the surgery, as if my body was like it had always been. But you know what?! It also felt wonderful! I had gone through all of this surgery convinced that I would be a different woman afterward, and I wasn’t;

I was still me. Everything was just like it always was and totally different, too. It felt good.

Excerpted from Dangerous Boobies: Breaking Up with My Time-Bomb Breasts by Caitlin Brodnick (Seal Press, September 12). Brodnick is the blogger behind Glamour’s award-winning Screw You, Cancer video series.

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