Bra shopping misery...yes, I'm aware I've gained weight. But didn't think bra shopping would be this hard

[alltoomuchrightnow]

For most of my 30s I fluctuated between 36 - 38 DD apart from when I lost a load of weight with Lighterlife and was a 36D for a couple of years before I regained the weight
I have a broad back/ shoulders and my bra size doesn't change that much... having lost five stone with LL and getting to a size 10-12 on bottom half (and looking v slim as i'm tall), I was still a top heavy 36D
But anyway...sigh..that was then
I have put weight on in the last couple of years, I need to address that, I will address that, but need a bra for the here and now especially as I have job interviews . Right now, as from very recently, am a 40DD. Just gaining that bit of extra weight backfat has made high street shopping today a nightmare...I had to try as all my 38DDs were cutting in my back

Primark... only one 40DD in the entire (large). Balconette style, which is not my thing, but I snapped it up because it was cheap and I'm out of work.
Went to John Lewis, really thought I'd be able to get something in Freya or Triumph as I've been wearing Triumph for years, never a problem with my normal 38 DD...not a single one. Assistant asked me if I needed help. When I told her the size, she said they didn't stock it because 'we don't do that size. Buyers would never want to buy in that size for us' . I felt like such a fat frump.

So it's not the DD's is it..but being a 40 that's so hard?
Where can I get non frumpy but supportive and not extortionate ones? Guess it's going to have to be online?
Is 40 really that unusual? There are plus size shops and plus size clothing ranges everywhere (and to be honest I'm not entirely at that stage yet, can get away with 16 - 18 in most stores and hope to lose weight. i.e. I'm a 16 bottom half but an 18 top cos of the norks) but I do need a plus size bra...

In stretchy tops I'm more like a 14, but if it was something like a button up shirt I need a lot more room for my boobs than my waist! If I look at a normal clothes size chart there is about a 2-3 dress size difference (and then the same for my elephant hips!

Have a look at this website, it shows women in properly fitting bras and helps to imagine what sizes look like

www.brabandproject.com/

Going against popular advice here.
You might be a 40 if you've put on weight. Happened to me, got it checked professionally.
I managed to get some very nice Vera Wang bras in TK Maxx 40 DD for a fiver each.
Get professionally measured, but try on a variety of sizes to check. Put a thin t shirt on top to check for bulges/overspill - not always immediately visible when just wearing the bra.
M & S also do 40+ sizes, some of them quite pretty.

Ooooooh this is very interesting! When I was a size 10 at secondary school, I was measured in JL as a 38D I was mortified and thought i must have been bigger then I was. I put on weight over the years but stayed in a 38D. Then I lost 3st and my bras were finally too big. I got remeasured at debenhams and was told I was a 36C. I was 9.5st at that point and couldn't understand why I was still a 36 across the back. I'm going to dig out my old tape tomorrow and see if I can do better myself. Hope you manage to get yours sorted too op x

It's not that it's impossible to be a 40 Auntysib, it's that chances are the OP was never a 36 to start with so is starting from the wrong place and adjusting the wrong way. And she doesn't measure 40 underbust...

I'm a 14. I used to all hang badly in a 36DD. I now have an altogether more impressive rack in a 32g. And I've put on weight!

John Lewis nowadays fit the Bra Intervention way (more or less). So that's why they didn't have any 40s in stock - not because JL customers are all slim, but because JL fit in such a way that almost nobody ends up as a 40. If you'd asked for help with fitting OP, rather than saying "do you stock 40DD?" then they'd almost certainly have put you in a 36/38F/G.