Some people used covid days to learn how to bake bread. Or knit. Or train for a marathon. Some became fluent in a foreign language or took up yoga.

I learned I was wearing the wrong bra size.

This post will inevitably reveal way too much personal stuff about me and some folks aren’t down for that so I’ll just give you guys a minute to slip quietly from the room.

No judgement.

I get not everyone’s on board with discussing bras, especially if you haven’t even had your coffee yet.

Still here? You sure? Okey dokie, let’s roll.

I’ve spent a literal lifetime believing boobs fell neatly into categories. [Yes, I say boobs, probably because it makes me giggle.] Smallish boobs that fit neatly into triangle bikini tops, regular boobs noticeable under t-shirts, large boobs that command a room, and extra large boobs that women either seem to love or hate. My brain roughly translated those into A cup to D cup because, let’s be real, I didn’t even know something bigger than a D cup existed.

And that, friends, is how I was convinced I was a 34B for decades. I guess someone, somewhere, at some point in time must have measured me and said that was my bra size so either it’s changed or they got it wrong. I dunno. But here I am, facing the upending truth that I have been wearing the wrong bra size FOR WHO KNOWS HOW LONG.

It’s a bit mind boggling. Perhaps because nobody ever takes the time to teach girls about bra measurements. Leave it to TikTok to fix that.

I don’t spend a lot of time on TikTok, folks — too easy to drop down a rabbit hole — but spotting this one was life altering. Take a sec to watch Kayak’s brilliant breakdown. Go on, click play.

Isn’t she fantastic? ‘Cuz we’re not trying to smash the bittys!

She made me curious, though. Maybe, just maybe the reason I was spilling out of my bra was because — could it be? — I was wearing the wrong size. Seemed impossible since, y’know, 34B and average t-shirt boobs here. But being it was covid times and there wasn’t a whole lot to do I pulled out my trusty measuring tape.

I measured. And measured. And measured some more. I measured with a shirt and without one, with a bra and without one, at different times of the day and in every conceivable configuration because these numbers just weren’t adding up. One thing was certain: I was definitively NOT a 34B. I wasn’t even meant to wear the 34C racerbacks I’d stashed in my drawer.

I was measuring out at a 34DD. Seriously.

Those of you who know me in real life know I’m not what one would call boobalicious. In fact, this week I was in a V.ery S.pecial store specializing in bras and their exceedingly personable fitter helping us on the floor was 100% certain my measurements couldn’t possibly be correct. Which she might have convinced me of if I hadn’t been standing there in my perfectly fitted 34DD I’d bought elsewhere last week. She freaked me out enough that I came home and remeasured, though. Sure enough, that five inch difference between my cup and band measurement hadn’t changed.

Trust the tape, man. Trust the tape.

So why on earth would I be putting this out there for all of you? Anybody who’s ever spent time adjusting their underwire or smushing spillover back into a bra cup knows the wrong size bra makes for miserable wearing, and if covid’s taught me anything it’s that life’s too short to wear uncomfortable bras.

And the room shouted back AMEN.