17 weeks, 4 days (and maternity bras)

We are very quickly approaching the half way mark in this amazing journey that we are living at the moment. I’ll be 18 weeks in just three days, and that will be the official midpoint, as twin pregnancies are considered “full term” at 36 weeks.

I can’t believe we are already almost there! It’s been such a journey, and despite the fact that we started this adventure almost a year ago, time has flown by and it seems that it was yesterday when we were having all our initial appointments with the clinics.

I still have no interesting issues to talk about regarding the pregnancy. No nags, no cravings or anything. So today I will talk about something that has been “bothering” me a bit in the last few weeks: Pregnancy bras.

I normally have a 36C bra size, and for as long as I can remember I have used underwire bras. However over the last few weeks I started noticing that the wires were hurting me and leaving marks between my breast and my armpit. I had read a tiny bit about pregnancy bras, especially the fact your breasts will become bigger and more tender, hence underwire is not the best solution as they can harm you (apart from becoming uncomfortable)

So one day soon after Christmas, my underwire bra was especially uncomfortable and was leaving a nasty mark near my armpit, so Jon and I decided to go to Debenhams (I got a £30 giftcard from my boss for Christmas), and we went directly to the underwear section. We asked for the maternity bras section and spent quite a while looking at them.

Now, I made a very big mistake. Lots of department stores and other associations like the NCT offer bra fitting service for a reason. One does not really know what is best. I decided that I needed bigger cups, so we searched for 36E size, and to our disappointment they only had this size on sports bras, not pregnancy ones. So I grabbed a couple and went to try them on. But because my normal bra had been bothering me so much that day, the moment I tried the new one on, it felt like heaven. In retrospective, it is not that the new sports bra was the most comfortable thing ever… it’s just that compared with my underwired one, this one was better.

So I bought two, one in black and one in white… and since then I have almost regretted buying them. They are NOT comfortable. The side support really goes into my skin, the straps are a bit too thin and not comfy, and silly me (I should have known better) it will only fit by doing up the last row of back eyes…

After having been wearing them for about three days, I received my e-newsletter from BabyCentre (my favourite one from the three that I receive: NHS, NCT and BabyCentre) and, funnily enough, the main topic that they were covering that week was pregnancy bras. And yes, after reading it I realised that all that I did that day at Debenhams was wrong 🙁

First of all I should have asked to get fitted properly (I know they wouldn’t have had anyone available for that at that time of the day, as we went quite late in the evening). If that wasn’t an option I should have just gone to another shop until I found the right size for me – which is not 36E. Yes, I needed a bigger cup size, but the overall size of my chest should have also been taken into account. What I didn’t know then, and I do now, is that your rib cage is bigger now as your womb pushes all your organs up, including your lungs.

So one important lesson learnt there. My only consolation is that at least I didn’t spent any money on them, as I paid with the giftcard (although I could have spent that in something nicer and better!). After reading more in detail about pregnancy bras, I now know that you should get measured every couple of months anyway, so I think I will go and get a proper measurement in a week or two if I see that these bras keep nagging me….

More to come soon!