Why I’ve Been Going to the Store Without Wearing Underwear

I’m learning how to be more present in my body — and it’s both terrifying and liberating

I stood in the parking lot after getting out of my car and stared at myself in the reflection of the window. Was I really going to do this? Oh my god, you could see the outlines of my nipples through my peasant blouse. I knew the moment I started walking, my breasts would begin their trademark jiggle-bounce.

Everyone would know I wasn’t wearing a bra. You can’t hide that when you’re a DD.

But that was the whole point, right?

I glanced across the parking lot at the other shoppers who were walking by. Most of them were prepared for the hot day in tiny athletic shorts and sports bras. One woman was wearing a tank top and flannel pajama bottoms with little penguins on them.

Okay, so it was a grocery store, not an office. Who cared what I looked like, right? I could do this…right?

I made my way across the lot, instinctively folding one arm over my chest, reaching over and clutching my purse strap as if to hold it in place. I reminded myself I wasn’t supposed to hide — they’re just boobs, after all. Their existence unrestrained beneath my shirt was not inherently salacious or obscene.

Inside the building, I lowered my arm, but kept my shoulders hunched forward.

This summer has proved to be an interesting challenge for me in ways I did not expect. I’ve been challenged to be more present in my body — a notion that probably sounds simple, but is absolutely terrifying for me.

It all started when I began seeing a new therapist in mid-spring. Our whole practice together is based on somatic awareness. In all honesty, I probably wouldn’t have chosen her had I truly understand what that term meant way back when we had our consultation. At the time, I would’ve done just about anything to avoid being in my body, especially considering the mystery pain issues I’ve been having that cause so much anxiety, and my frozen shoulder.

However, as tends to be the case, this ended up being exactly what I needed, and I will forever be grateful to this woman for the way she is helping me heal my relationship with my body.

In June, this all took another step further when, in the wake of feeling shaken by a romantic relationship that suddenly ended, I decided to take a class on feminine spirituality. And once again, I found myself in deep exploration with my body — challenging as that has been.

Both of these experiences ask similar questions of me, questions like, How do you feel? and Where do you feel that? Shaking the body is encouraged, in order to complete the stress cycle. Non-sexual self-touch is encouraged in the form of gentle stroking of the arms or face, tapping of the thighs or shoulders, and good, long embraces. There are grounding meditations and practices, dances, and breathwork. Yoga, yoni massages, strategic screaming, and muscle work are also on the menu.

In the beginning, I hated it. All of it. Every time my therapist asked me to check in with my body, I wanted to scream, “I don’t want to!” Every time the facilitators of the class I’m taking ask us to close our eyes so we can “get back into the body,” I want to abruptly leave the Zoom meeting.

But I’ve stuck with it. And I’m starting to find a little crumb of comfort deep in the heart of this work.

I stopped wearing bras most of the time in 2018. This wasn’t for any reason other than the fact that I developed pain in one breast that made wearing bras very uncomfortable. Over the course of these past few years, I’ve discovered something fascinating — I really like not wearing a bra. Really, really.

I used to lament about my big breasts and how I wish I could wear a bra all the time because it felt so uncomfortable to haul these DDs around and have them flopping all over the place. In fact, during my thirties, I did wear a bra all the time — even to bed.

What I discovered, however, is that it wasn’t that I didn’t like my breasts flopping all over or feeling their movement — it was that their natural movement when unbound made me feel indecent. I don’t know how to truly put into words how salacious it feels to go without a bra when you have large breasts — I think only other large-busted women can really know that. Words fail me here. To say I feel like a slut is not strong enough. Like walking pornography — not strong enough.

The shame of having large, unbound breasts has always felt overwhelming to me.

And that is why I was so certain I loved wearing bras. That is why I wore them to bed every night in my thirties — the one decade in my life that I went to bed with a partner every night and wanted to appear good, decent, pure.

In my forties, I’m starting to be much clearer about what brings my body joy and how that feeling is almost always at odds with cultural norms. I understand how much I love having my breasts exist in a freely-moving stage — and that that is perceived as not only obscene by our culture, but also as sloppy and unsexy (unless I happened to have A- or B-cup breasts, in which case, going braless might be a little edgy, but would be super sexy and beautiful).

I’m more and more determined to experience myself and my body on my own terms. And therefore, for the past two years, I’ve been feeling a call to stop putting on a bra just to go out to the store. Why shouldn’t the girls be able to fly free in most situations? Maybe a dinner at the White House isn’t ready for audacious, large-breasted women sans bras, but why shouldn’t I be free to exist in my body in the way that feels right to me at the grocery store, the post office, the movie theater?

What would that feel like, to exist in this body so freely?

Another health problem has had me going without panties for the past few months. I wish I could say that this time, I was inspired by my desire to experience my body with fewer and fewer constrictive barriers. But nope, I was strong-armed into it.

However, I was surprised to discover that I really kinda enjoy going without panties. I know that this is going to come off as some naughty sexual experiment because that’s what we do to women in this culture — whatever attempts they are making to connect with their own bodies are sexualized for the pleasure of the observer, or sexualized as a method of moral condemnation.

A woman coming into control of her own body has to be positioned as obscene and titillating or suspicious and potentially dangerous.

None of that is true, certainly not in this case. My first objective was to simply give my vulva some fresh air in order to heal a chemical imbalance. I then noticed what a difference it made in how I experience my own body when I don’t have a restrictive garment around my pelvis — and I wanted more of that experience. All of this culminated in pondering why on earth we are so attached to our undergarments, in general.

Do I really need to always have my vulva covered not once, but twice? Can’t I let it exist in free space, just like my breasts?

So there I was at the grocery store, fiddling with my purse as I walked into the produce department to keep my arms semi-crossed over my chest. I was mortified at the thought of someone noticing what felt like nakedness.

It seems ridiculous to say that when I was wearing a long-sleeved shirt and a skirt that fell almost to my ankles. But beneath those clothes, I was naked. I wasn’t wearing a bra or panties.

I had no worries that anyone would notice my absent panties. You can’t see through my skirt, nor was it anywhere near short enough for there to be a “wardrobe malfunction” that might expose a peek of pussy.

But my lack of bra was very definitely noticeable, as was the fact that I was wearing a mask after our mask mandate has been lifted. In this conservative town, I wondered if a male shopper would approach me and scold me for both — the mask and the freely-swinging breasts. Or worse, if someone might hit on me, taking my state of bralessness as a bid for sexual attention.

However, I kept my chin up, and forced myself to lower my arms. If I was going to do this, I had to commit. I had to actually do it.

I was surprised by how powerful I started to feel with every step. Not because I thought I looked beautiful in that outfit, but because I was living in my body on my own terms. And because — and I realize this might sound strange — but I felt more perceptive within my body without having all my most tender parts armored up. I felt like I could “read” the vibe around me so clearly with my breasts free, and I felt the current of energy from the earth zipping right up between my legs, unfettered.

As I picked up the final item I needed and turned to head to the checkout counter, I almost bumped into a man about my age who was the only other person wearing a mask that I had seen and who was balanced on a pair of crutches. I said, “Excuse me,” and paused. Because of the group of people next to me, I had to rely on him to pivot slightly so I could squeeze by. But he didn’t.

He stared at me for a long moment, then seemed to compose himself and said, “I’m so sorry,” moving out of the way for me.

I suppose I could be wrong, but I felt so strongly that he sensed how present I was in my body. It wasn’t that he thought I was beautiful (I was wearing a mask, after all), or that my free-swinging breasts were sexy (I had been holding several items in my arms, hugging them to my chest and thus, covering them up). He literally slammed into my presence and was momentarily shocked by it. And, I suspect, he liked it.

I have a feeling most heterosexual men very strongly long for women who are deeply rooted in their bodies and are not afraid to live in them on their own terms (which might or might not involve wearing a bra).

Of course, it doesn’t matter to me what heterosexual men long for in a woman. All the better if their longing aligns with my personal explorations, but ultimately, I’m doing this for myself. Because I want to know myself better — with and without underwear. I want to be able to live my life without having to conform to societal standards and cultural biases that limit the joy I am able to experience within this body.

I can’t say that I’ve healed from my chronic dissociation from my body or that I particularly enjoy working to be present within it at any given moment. It’s still hard. It’s still terrifying.

But I’m starting to reclaim what I suspect is my birthright: the innocence and play of my animal body.

© Yael Wolfe 2021

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