I started wearing them just to fill up the spaces. I have tiny breasts. I would wear some kind of dress and my chest would be flat as if I didn’t have lemons on my chest. What is a woman without her lemons? I would walk through life without my confidence and without my zeal to impress. When I pass by people and they look back at me, I say in my head, “They are staring at my breast-less chest and wondering why a woman like me doesn’t have breasts. I walked around talking to myself in the most demeaning way. I needed a solution and I found them in padded bras. They did something to my chest and in the end, worked magic on my confidence.
My boobs are not the only culprits in my life. My back too. I don’t have any right to say “My back” because they are not there. I don’t have them. I believe when God was creating me, he forgot to add buttocks. Just when I was about to leave, he remembered he didn’t give me a butt but the soil was finished so he was forced to scrap the bottom and slap the little soil he got behind my back. It’s flat. They are just not there. You look at me and you may think my waist is joined directly to my thighs. I’m not exaggerating because I know myself.
When I was in school I became a joke. Anything flat was compared to my bottom. I laughed along with them but when I was left alone, I thought about it. “God, why me? Why would you create your own daughter and deny her the two most essential things on a woman’s body? Did my forefathers wrong you in any way?” In SHS I had a boyfriend but his friends teased him until he gave up on me. He told me one day, “Erica, It’s not working. I really want it to work but it’s not working. My friends see us and they laugh at me. I think the best is for us to break up.” I begged. I called him my all. “As you’re leaving me, who will I have in my life? You’re my everything.”
How can he be my everything when I didn’t bring ass and chest to the table?
He left me. His next girlfriend didn’t lack any of the two things I lacked. If you’re a woman and have gone through all these, you’ll definitely think of a solution. I’m not ugly, far from it. After taking these two essential things from me, God gave me a face of an angel. My face will catch the man and my back and chest would release him. So my relationship life from SHS to the university was on and off. I would go off for a very long time, come on with a guy and a few weeks or months later, I would go off again.
So I found love in padded things. I bought a lot of padded bras and later added padded underwear too. I will dress up in them and look in the mirror and feel like the woman God had the chance to create yet failed. I would turn around confidently, touch my chest and touch my back and say, “This is who I really am.” I wake up every day and correct God’s mistake in my life with padded bras and padded underwear. The result was instant. Men will look at me twice and initiate conversations. They would give me smiles I don’t deserve. Those I allowed space in my life called me with endearing names like sweetheart, my dear, my sunshine and the rest. But once the padded supports go off, my sunshine goes off with them too.
Recently, I met a guy in a church I visited. He sat next to me and shared my hymn book with me. He picked some sort of conversation and I smiled along until church closed and he took my number. He called my number daily and had conversations a guy would have with a woman he’s interested in. I caught the line but I was slow to swallow the hook. He expressed interest in me but I wasn’t sure whether he was really in love with me or was in love with what he saw of me. I liked him too so I didn’t allow my doubts to stand in our way. I said yes along the line and we became lovers. He would look at me with desiring eyes and I would tell him to take things slowly with me.
He asked me, “Are you a virgin?” I told him, “No I’m not but I like to take things slowly. I’m kind of old school. I like it when the man takes his time to know me. Knowing me deeply and still loving me for who I am is what sweeps me off my feet completely.” He laughed at me. “But I know you and I’m in love with you because of who you are.” I said in my head, “Gentleman, you don’t know me until you see me without my padded armour. When you love me still after seeing them, that’s what sweeps me off my feet.”
We’ve been talking and every day seems to increase the love between us but I feel guilty. I feel like I’ve sold a version of me to him that is not real. We’ve been dating for the past three months and everything is going on very well. He’s taking his time with me and I like that. I go to him and he tries to touch me. Immediately I raise the red flag, he would stop and retreat. So the last time I told him, “I feel like I would lose you if I lay it all down at once. To be honest, I love you and want this to last but can you stand it if I tell you that no sex until marriage?”
He took in a deep breath and said, “Regardless of what happens between us, I will still love you. I’m not trying to be fake or I’m not pursuing you because of shuperu. I really want this to work just as you want it to work.” I told him, “Then let’s take our time. It may happen along the line. It will get to the point where we can no longer withstand the pressure of our desires but I will plead with you to take your time.”
He nodded his head in affirmation and I said in my head, “Awww that’s sweet. A man who understands, who will get.”
I’m all bubbly and joyful around him but my guilty conscience won’t allow me to enjoy this relationship. We’ve kissed. That day it was a battle trying to hold his hands off me so he doesn’t touch my shame. He’s that guy who can’t kiss and stand still. He wants to kiss while his fingers travel. I held his hands. “No, don’t do it. It will spoil everything. You may touch me somewhere I can’t resist. This is not the right time.”
“Dear, this is the right time,” my conscience echoed but I kept fighting for my life because I didn’t want him to discover my shame and lose his love.
I don’t know how this would end but I’m determined to squeeze the juice and keep it going for a long time. I love him and it would break my heart if I lose him but I don’t know how he’ll take it if he sees me for who I truly am. I want to give it a try. I throw subtle questions at him while talking. Questions like, “Will you love a woman without boobs and behind?” He would say something like, “It’s not about the physical appearance” but I know men. They can lie. If it wasn’t about physical appearance why did he choose me? Why did he try to be nice to me that day? He found me beautiful, right? So it’s about physical appearance, right?
This is my trouble. It is what keeps me awake at night, whether to go clean or keep the lie going. He has visited my place twice. I was home and I could have been myself but because he was coming, I had to put my armour on so I don’t get caught off-guard. Nothing is easy, even fake life but I know one day he’ll definitely get to know the truth. I’ll leave everything and show him who I am but this is not that day. So I’ll keep squeezing the juice while praying to the god of ‘love is blind’ to blind him from my physical deficiency when the day comes.
Or you say I should tell him the truth now and shame the devil?
–Erica
