It's National Underwear Day. Are you an apple or an orange?

Happy National Underwear Day. Yes, that’s a thing. Let me brief(ly) give you the skinny and uncover some of the history for you. (Yes, this post will contain as many underwear puns as possible, although National Pun Day was on May 15, but I’m still observing it.) It's no surprise that National Underwear Day was created by an underwear company, Freshpair, in 2003. They say it was created to support the benefits of wearing underwear, but we know it’s all about selling more underwear. I had to dig in to understand more about why we need a day to celebrate the items of clothing that we work so hard to keep undercover. Worn correctly, it also keeps those things we want to keep covered up, well under wraps.

Underwear has been around longer than pajamas. It dates back to the Middle Ages when men wore  linen shorts or “braies,” and women wore a “shift” under their dresses. This is according to NationalToday.com, the brainchild of a San Francisco marketing company that helps promote all the National Days we like to celebrate, so we have an excuse to eat more ice cream (July 21) and drink more margaritas (Feb 22) and think about our under things.

Ironically, something as simple and prevalent as underwear, is among the most complicated thing to buy. A handful of customers have asked us if we could make bras and underwear to be moisture-wicking, cooling and soft like our  PJs. We’d love to, really, but we can’t even find a bra that fits right anymore, so for now, we’re going to stick to our pajama business.

Frankly, I find buying a bra sheer torture. It’s so bad, I’ll put up with a lot of pain and discomfort with a bad bra, just so I don’t have to go buy a new one. I once wore a bra for an embarrassingly long amount of time even after the wire sprung a leak. 

A day that really needs to be celebrated is the day the day the lingerie industry gets together and agrees on a uniform bra size. Every company has a different sizing system. It’s so complicated, there are bra sizing specialists. Several years ago, I did a proper bra fitting at Von Maur.

The salesperson, who wore a tape measure around her neck, took one look at me and said: “Yes, we need to get the girls back to where they belong.”

So, I untucked them from my pants, and let the measuring begin. As embarrassing and uncomfortable as a bra fitting is, I did get a great bra that day, and it lasted for a few years, until the wire sprung free.

I’m not going back in for another measurement, because, well, COVID. But, I did find a helpful video from a woman who used to help people lift the girls back up.

Who knew that the measurement difference between the under boob to the fullest part determined the cup size. Hold for a moment, while I go re-measure.

Can we get rid of cup sizes? Who came up with this term, anyway? Maybe it was citrus growers. In trying to find information on how to do a bra fitting myself, I discovered my new favorite person Madison Anne Hill, the former lingerie sales person. She is using TikTok to help women wear better fitting bras. Use fruit, she says. Are you an apple? An orange? A lemon? You can watch it here. 

My take away is this: If you’re an eggplant, the last thing you’ll be doing today is celebrating the beauty of National Underwear Day. So, let’s all go commando and cover up with PJs.