bosom buddies
With new research shedding light on our complicated relationship with our boobs, Stylist is determined to stamp out the shame
words: meena alexander
re my nipples supposed to look like this?” I blurted out to the female GP I’d just flashed during a routine contraception appointment. As an insecure teenager convinced that my body was the weirdest thing to walk the Earth, most of my angst was reserved for my boobs. Bigger, droopier and far less symmetrical than the pairs I saw on TV and in the magazines I treated like bibles, I was sure they weren’t normal. Even when I grew up and shook off some of my more juvenile beliefs (see: crimped hair looks cool) the feeling of shame about my boobs stuck fast – I’d recoil anytime a friend mentioned how big they were, disappointed that my minimiser bras and too-tight crop tops hadn’t made them completely invisible. It turns out the odds were always stacked against me: in a
