Life Without Cleavage.

I tighten the straps on my 32A bra so that it stays in place, because my breasts alone do not accomplish that feat. True life: I barely fit into an A cup.

I was talking to my fellow flat-chested friend not too long ago, and found myself telling her, "I wish I had boobs so I could feel like a woman." She shared my pain -- the pain of turning to the side and looking like a poster board, the pain of devising clothing contraptions to keep a strapless bra standing, the pain of making out with a guy and hoping he doesn't grab a handful of padded bra and freak the fuck out. She also shared with me her tales of making out, with the guy reaching up, realizing the mammary gland situation, and immediately moving down to the butt. At least she has a butt, though.

I've felt like a little boy for a large part of my life. I used to pray for boobs. I used to Google ways to increase my breast size. I've pretty much always been at least partially dissatisfied with my mosquito bites.

They were the subject of a tad bit of taunting in middle school. When high school came, no one seemed to care anymore. When I first reached second base at age fifteen, my boyfriend did not flee the scene. He told me he liked them, and so, I did too. Slightly embarrassing that my self-breast-acceptance was dependent on this and subsequent guys who complimented me. They just feel like an inadequacy sometimes disguised with content. My boobs don't jiggle. I can't wear regular triangle bikini tops. I feel like less of a woman around C and D cups, like a little girl posing as a 20-year-old -- like if you open my purse, you'll discover that all I really have in there is Jolly Ranchers and crayons.

I'm pretty sure everyone deals with this self or societally-inflicted form of feeling subpar. Guys who aren't porno worthy in the nether regions probably feel self-conscious every time they pull out a Durex, and not a Magnum XL. Variety makes the world go round, though. My boobs serve a purpose -- to induce small boob appreciation, maybe to debunk your commonly held theory that you are a "boob man," or at the very least, to girl talk with my fellow IBTC members about.