Bras: Bad for Our Health?

Let’s just get the point.  I’ll keep this short and sweet.  When you travel to other parts of the world, many countries don’t wear bras!  I remember being in Africa with the Peace Corps and culturally, knees are way more taboo.  So, women would need to cover their knees, but breasts were fair game, often out, and certainly without a lift.  When you compare the rates of breast cancer in the U.S. to those in other nations, you notice a trend in higher rates among Americans.  At one point, this correlation was made to the fact that we wear bras and the nations with lower statistics do not.  That led to the hunt for clues as to what bras could be contributing to the matter.  It was postulated that bras restrict lymph drainage, causing toxins to get trapped in the tissue, and this leads to cancer.  However,  I want to debunk this for a second.

Lymph for breast tissue actually drains in an upward direction.  This means that idea that toxins in breast tissue can’t drain out because of the underwire is somewhat perplexing if you understand physiology.  I may even argue that this correlation is similar to that you may have learned in college when learning that more murders occur in the summer.  More people also eat ice cream in the summer.  So, ice cream consumption must cause people to commit murders.  Hate to burst the bubble.  Correlation doesn’t mean causation.  I think the missing piece of this bra puzzle is really that our lifestyles are very different among countries and those that have less breast cancer rates NOT ONLY wear bras less, but they have less stress, less chemicals, better food quality, and just plain better epigenetics.  Epigenetics are the lifestyle factors that change the environment around your genes.  The better your epigenetics, the better your gene expression.  This can be the difference between getting cancer and not despite holding the gene in the cards you were dealt.

So, on a closing note, I may even argue that bras are good for our health.  The more you work with women who are ill, you know it’s not about the breasts.  It’s about the whole body, their life, their quality of life.  Bras make the girls look perky, they help women look great in clothes, they can boost a woman’s confidence.  These things have a positive physiological effect on our epigenetics.  It’s true.  So, shamelessly wear those bras, ladies.  Take them off at night, and rest in peace knowing it’s ok to wear it again tomorrow. The one pictured is from Third Love. I received some Third Love bras for Christmas, and who knew that I’m actually a half cup person!  Since we only sell bras in full cup sizes, I had missing out on the perfect fit all these years!

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