by Adriana Velez
When a 47-year-old Oscar-winning actress gets a $500,000 bonus to go topless in a movie, you kind of want to know two things. One, who is this? And two, how does any 47-year-old woman manage to maintain such spectacular breasts? Well, the actress is none other than Halle Berry, who claims she sleeps in a bra. Really — that’s her big secret to a perfect set! So she says. But we think we know what’s really behind this, ehrm, reveal.
On the eve of launching her new Scandale lingerie line at Target, Berry told Yahoo, “My mother taught me when I was very young that if I don’t want my boobs to hit the my knees by the time I’m 30, always wear a bra, even to bed.” So yeah, grain of salt, everyone. Berry’s selling bras, though they’re so lovely, I really don’t think it’s necessary to perpetuate silly boob myths just to help sell them.
At any rate, we figure this is a good time to dispel that one and a few other myths about breasts, sagging, and wearing bras.
1. Wearing a bra to bed will prevent sagging. Nope. Sleeping in a bra will not prevent sagging. Not that most of us do that, anyway.
2. Wearing a bra to bed will damage your breasts. On the other hand, sleeping in a bra isn’t necessarily bad for them, either. Some women are more comfortable wearing one to bed, and that’s fine.
3. You still need to wear a bra to keep your breasts from sagging. Probably not! A recent French study seemed to prove the opposite — wearing a bra causes sagging. There were some holes in the study, though.
4. Wearing a bra increases your risk of breast cancer. One thing we do know is that wearing a bra doesn’t put you at risk for breast cancer. For crying out loud.
5. 8 out of 10 women are wearing the wrong-size bra. This is not based in science, ladies. It’s just a fake statistic designed to sell more bras. No one knows how many of us are wearing the wrong size, but most of us are probably at least close. And getting fitted for the “right” size bra doesn’t always work out, as one mom writing for The Stir found out.
6. Breastfeeding causes your breasts to sag. It only seems that way. Your breasts may lose some elasticity after pregnancy, from swelling larger and then going back to their previous volume. But it’s not the breastfeeding that causes sagging.
What does cause your breasts to sag — or not sag, as the case may be? It’s a lot of other factors like genetics (darn you, genetics!), weight fluctuation, age, breast size, number of pregnancies, running without a sports bra, and smoking.
