seperis | this is the voice of irritation

I went with Vannezsa to shop for bridesmaid's dress. This should be a fairly painless procedure, since she left it up to us. Strangely, it's just as horrific when you get to choose.

That was--wow. A very special hell.

Part of it was the sizing, which didn't apply to any planet I know of. The girl with me, who is a freaking size zero she's so small, was in a six, which meant that none of my usual understanding of my own size applied. It was dizzying and terrible for the ego, but worse for the fact that the dresses are not made to be flattering on anyone, even her. I'm sorry, when a girl with a waistline in the low twenties looks weirdly unproportioned, you know something is wrong. I actually liked one floor length blue one, unfortunately spaghetti strapped, but cute, and it actually looked okay on us both, which is saying something. We ended up with a just-above-tea-length a-line one with a halter that shockingly looked really good. We're getting them done in chocolate brown taffeta, for which God be praised is a color that works on pretty much anyone. I can get alternations done to fit better, but the fact that I'm still resisting the fact my cup size is actually a very low C and no longer a B may have something to do with the fact I'm just not comfortable in anything now. I liked B. I was happy with B. The C thing isn't working for me at all and worse, doesn't look it until the bra try-ons start and I stare in horror. Very low C. Like, more a B+. Why is there not a B+?

This is perhaps the first and only time in my life I've considered dieting. The sizing was really, really traumatic. I pulled out pictures of myself in a cheerleading uniform to remind myself of the days I weighed one thirty and looked like a survivor of some sort of famine (my cheekbones weren't just prominent--they looked liposuctioned). It's hideous enough to send me for the bread and cheese whiz. Just--no.

Sometimes, I hate being a girl. I hate this awareness of my body that I can't get away from, no matter how many t-shirts and sweaters I buy and jeans I own. I hate thinking in terms of my body and what it is supposed to be and what it isn't.

It's so tiring.

I also hate my tooth and the fact Tuesday seems very, very far away. And my sister somehow got two of my hydrocodone and I really can't work out how she got them; this time around, I carry them with me or hide them in random places, like under the living room couch or in the car. There's a pretty good chance I left them on my bed to go to the bathroom once.

My mood, let me show you it. I am re-reading Cigarettes by

basingstoke to let Fraser lead me back to Zen (well, technically, I suppose Bayliss as well). For some reason, this one is the one I read most in the series.

Don't buy into this bridesmaid dress sizing panic thing! I had one friend who was as slim as she ever was, but because her dress had "12" in the tag, she insisted she needed to go on a crash diet. All her other clothes were still a six 6, but because this one dress was a 12, that meant she was suddenly 50 pounds heavier and now obese.

Bridesmaid dress sizing is a horrible, horrible racket designed to make you feel shitty about yourself. Don't buy into it!

Which isn't to say that I can't empathize with bigger boobs, or something like that. I just don't want it to be because of some arbitrary sizing system that makes no sense to anyone.

I may be a little bitter.

It *is*. It's just--ewww. Irritating.

The bra size thing is freaking me out. I don't know *why* or where it came from, and I only noticed when I realized all my bras were starting to look low-cut when they weren't, well, low-cut. And hurt. Gah. Hate.

If the girl you were with is usually a size 0 and was wearing a size 6 in the dress shop, it means that the dress shop was using european/couture sizing. I could go into why an Italian six is different from a US 6 but, yeah. That is probably why.

I hate couture a *lot*. You would think a place that is about making a special day special would be, you know, going the other direction. Gah.

There is no logic to the whole bridesmaid dress thing. When I got married, I did my best to find dresses that weren't absolutely horrid. I think I did pretty well. Good job on your pick.

As for the tooth, have you tried the clove oil? I really does work.

~L

My cousin did okay--she just went the formal route for the dresses and was done with it, so they were pretty and useless for anythign else, which was fine. This trying to pick something useful isn't going to work, I think.

Well given that I have never worn my wedding gown since my wedding day, maybe it is a plot to put the bridesmaids in the same boat. :: Thinks about the wedding gown :: As a matter of fact, I think my gown is in two pieces and packed in boxes in my spare bedroom. :: shrugs :: It was very pretty at least...

~L

As everyone else is saying, but it can't hurt to repeat: bridesmaid's dresses are sized "insane." But yay for the halter top -- a cut that works wonders on almost everyone -- and chocolate brown, which does the same.

Bra sizes... try a different brand before you succumb to Tit Trauma. Nothing Victoria's Secret makes ever fits me (they also measure me strangely, being high on the band size and low on the cup size -- and those don't fit, either) and I've ended up going full circle and returning to the Warners and Maidenforms of my early bra years. They fit, they're comfortable, and while they don't come in fuchsia, I'm maybe getting old enough that that doesn't bother me anymore.

The chocolate and halter are the best part. If she sticks with that, or even the wide strapped bodice, I'll look okay I think. My shoulders are square and wide, so the spaghetti only works rarely.

I'm writing this down for the bras. I can live without fuschia, but I cannot deal with a bra that feels either too tight or too loose.

oh, bridesmaid dress sizes. o.O

on the bra thing: there's some company that makes half-size bras, and I think they do like, A-and-a-half, B-and-a-half bras.

ah HAH.

Playtex "Thank Goodness It Fits" line has half-sizes.

Writing down. Screw designer--I want something I can *wear*.

What kind of a wedding is it? We have brides that come in and buy all the same dress from our store for their bridemaids when we get the holiday-party type dresses in, which should be in a month or two. A lot of them are beautiful and unique.

Really?

Semi-formal if you squint for the wedding party. She used to want formal, which I wouldn't mind since floor length woudl be good, but Texas in April is not a good time for that and an outside wedding.

4 srs. We often get in some really lovely silk chiffon dresses for holiday. I can link you once they come out. The cool thing is that our dresses are pretty and formal but they don't look like bridesmaid dresses, so you can use them again. I used one in

irinaauthor's wedding, lemme find pics...

Here is one! (http://pics.livejournal.com/tropes/pic/000khxb8)

You, darlin', are beautiful, even if you don't feel like it right now. And I would absolutely kill to be your size, something I haven't been since, oh, I dunno, seventh grade? Something like that.

I wish you could have gotten in to see the dentist sooner, though. That royally sucks. Clove does work, at least on the short term, though bourbon is better (not with pain meds, though). Or I could come by and hit you on the head with a board, if you promised to do the same with me the next time my back acted up.

You're sweet. *hugs you* Thanks. I was actually surprised by my own reaction, to be honest--I'd never really had such a--bad reaction before. I never really thought I was *that* kind of vain, on something so silly.

You have absolutely no need to diet. Period. Take the word of the lesbian: you're hot, babe.

*g* Aww, you are good for my ego. Also, bought ballet flats at VVC! THEY ARE AWESOME. Everyoen laughed, but it was teh first year I could dance, too, since I wasn't in heels and the flats, well, they are *made* to dance in. So deeply cool.

Eee, yay! I am so glad I started wearing the ballet slippers; they get grungy and worn really quickly out in the Real World as opposed to in a studio, but they've just been so much better for me it's not even funny.

If you ever bump into european (EU) sizing, don't have a heart attack: Size zero is 30.

Anyway, I have always wondered why the bridesmaids' dresses have to be exact the same outfit for everyone. Why not just the same color? It's not like the bridesmaids would be actually sisters or back-up singers or anything. And when some of the bridesmaids are size zero and some are 18, it tends to look rather ridiculous. So why the uniformity?

(where I live there is only one best man and one best woman, two in some cases, and no adult bridesmaids at all. If there happens to be a relative under 10 years, a girl or a boy, then she or he might be one to throw flowers.)

Size zero is 30.

Ah ha ha ha ha. There's a clothing store near me (in the US) that organizes its import jeans according to (European) size, with all the brands mixed together. Every time I go there, I have to walk up to the salespeople and ask them where to start. I was like, "Is it 30 centimeters at the waist?? Is anybody that small?"

Let us merely say that I have tried on a lot of jeans where I can't get them up past my knees. I... think I wear a 40, but really, I just can't remember.

Heh, I don't even know where the size numbers originate. The thumb rule is that 34=extra small, 36 = still small, 38= medium, 40-42=large, and from that, larger and larger. I'm a big person and my "eBay"-(American) size on tops is 3xl, which is 50 in European sizes.. It's so nice to be a size 50.

I have a friend who is size 32 (which is the smallest size that can be found from a rack), but who has recently lost weight due health reasons. She visited a posh shop with american sizing in Middle Europe and when she went to ask if there was a smaller size yet of a pair of trousers she was trying out, (they didn't have any smaller) the sales lady looked her up and down and was like, "you are size zero, right?" My friend was like, "Oh no! I'm not! Take that back!" She obviously wasn't very happy to hear that she had the same size as, say, Nicole Richie ;)

It's been very funny, watching size-creep within my lifetime. I remember before size 0 existed, and now there's a size 00. Eventually, they've got to run out of zeroes, right? Or go into negative numbers, which would be hilarious.

As long as European shoe sizes don't change on me, I'll be fine.

There is a size 00? They make clothes especially for anorectic or something now?

I think that the public dismay would prevent putting those sizes for sale in Europe. At least Cheap Monday, a trendy jeans label, put their 00's on sale as children's' clothing on kids' section, only with too long trouser legs for children. Kinda creepy, that.

I think 00 today is the same as 0 last year is the same as 2 a handful of years ago. (I do know adults who shop for clothes in the children's section, but all of them are very short, not necessarily very thin.)

So why the uniformity?

So the bride will feel like she's in control? I dunno, I bought a bunch of gorgeous teal silk and my two attendants made their own dresses, in completely different designs to suit their completely different body types, but in the same fabric.

*winces* I've seen that on clothes with the three sizes, but never paid attention to it.

If Syn's word as a lesbian is not enough, this bisexual also has to say: you're hot. Seriously. You do not need to diet.

Also, I have so much sympathy for you re: the boobs thing. Oh man. So much sympathy. You have seen me quite recently! For shits and giggles, take a guess at my cup-size.

*thoughtful* D or E?

F, actually. Or DDD, if you prefer. I take comfort that people consistently under-estimate the size of them because at least that means I don't *look* dis-proportionate. *wry*

See, here's the thing about the design of bridesmaid dresses. Thinking is that it's the bride's special day and no one should outshine (look better) than the bride. Now, not everybody's thinking is that retro, but enough are (is? grammar, argh) that many bridesmaid dresses are deliberately made to be less flattering than the bride's dress. Which, considering how godsawful some bridal gowns are, just might explain a lot.

Or, I could be wrong. But it's a theory.

No, I think that's a good theory. There's really no other explanation.

For my brother's wedding last weekend, I had to order a size 18. To fit the largest part of me. Which would be my boobs. I've been a bridesmaid a couple of times now, so I don't even care about what the stupid tag says as long as it fits and isn't hideous.

I've spent the last few days clothes shopping because I'm starting a new job, and it wasn't nearly as traumatic as it usually is. I guess I've finally internalized Clinton and Stacy's advice from What Not To Wear.

I have to take friends when I shop; left to my own devices, I'll either follow something cute I thought I saw, or stuff that i know looks okay straight out of the dryer. Preferably both.

Congrats on the new job, btw! It sounds amazing.

Oh, man. I know. This is why I refuse to go on 'official' diets. Because the whole time I'm dieting? I'm thinking about my body the entire time and I'm MISERABLE.

Yes, this. Exactly.

I was a bridesmaid once, and we had the same problem. I ordered the damn thing based strictly on measurements, and it was either 2 or 4 sizes larger than I usually am, then I had to get it altered, which was not cheap. My friend, the bride, is tinytinytiny and her dress was either a 6 or an 8, she can do a 0 in normal clothes, and she had to have it altered like crazy.

It's not us, it's those damn dresses.

Evil dresses. *winces* No matter what I get, I'll have to get it altered, but luckily, my mother or grandmother may be able to do it, so it won't cost too much. *crosses fingers*

Formal-dress sizes are, as previously pointed out, couture sizing. I prefer to think of it as sizes that haven't succumbed to the "zero is good because you're NO SIZE AT ALL!" inflation that's hit, say, store-brand jeans in the last couple of decades. These are the sizes that made Marilyn Monroe a size 14/16 - most sources say that she'd be a 6/8 in today's sizing. 10 and 12 were very slim in 1950's sizes. 6 was small-boned, ribs-visible small.

Not claiming that dress sizing is in it for your self esteem, not by a long shot - it just helps me sometimes to think of it as quirkily old-fashioned instead of trying to sell me diet patches. And I feel you on the "not being able to get away from having a body that society thinks needs regulating" feeling. I hate that. Hate.

Wow. *winces*

Seriously, it makes me break out teh cookies and cheese whiz so *fast*.

Hah! Speaking as a sometimes-size-0 let me just say that this thing society does to us and our bodies is the suckiest thing that sucked the suck.

This. Yes. I am so freaking *tired* of it; I can't imagine if I worked somewhere that appearance was more regulated. Luckily, all my jobs, except for the ombudsman, were pretty easy on that, and even in the ombudsman, business casual could be somewhat stretched. I couldn't deal if I had to be more strict.

Well, once upon a time, size 6 was what we call a size 0 today. Actually, if you go back to sizing in the 1960's, a size 10 had a 32" bust.

I've been a bridesmaid several times and I've never worn a dress that wasn't ill-fitting, of loopy design and cheesy fabric, and that didn't make me feel like circus clown. The topper was when eight of us had to wear a style which flattered only the maid of honor...who was nine months pregnant. On the up-side, "you can use it again", turned out to be true. The dress slipped off the hanger onto the floor and my cat made a comfy nest out of it. He slept in it until his dying day.

...that is the best use of a dress *ever*.

Bridal and bridesmaid shopping is a special kind of hell. The sizing makes absolutely no sense and the whole process takes forever. *sends good vibes your way*

*resigned* One more weekend of it. *crosses fingers*

I saw this and thought immediately of you: snail mail with real snails (http://www.boredomresearch.net/rsm/index.html).

This is the most awesome thing in the history of awesome. Seriously. Awesome.

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