Advice for teenage DD

[mermaid101]

My DD is 15 and I’m looking for some advice to help with her clothes. She is a size 8 for jeans/skirts and her bra size is 28GG.

It’s really hard for her especially in summer as the pretty strappy tops all her friends wear look different on her. I’ve been shopping with her today and anything she wants to wear makes her look like she is going on a night out.

we have to get her bras from bravissimo which she hates and I was like this at her age and my mum was horrible to me and made me buy huge size 20 tops which were not age appropriate. I think it has really affected me.

part of me thinks I should just let her wear what she wants but I think it would draw a lot of judgement and unwanted attention.

I would love to hear from anyone who has some suggestions for me

Anything she wants to wear…. But basically anything in the shops for this age group would be skimpy on her! It isn’t that she wants to wear skimpy clothes. She wants to wear fashionable clothes that’s all in the shops of this age group and by virtue of her slight frame with very very large breasts - they inevitably always look skimpy

Could you try H&M? My DD is more “developed” up top than her friends but has a small waist. At H&M I found some sleeveless vests that were perfect - not strappy and a bit more supportive but still sleeveless. Could you try those? I think you can get them in packs of 3.

Thank you all so much for these responses! Some of these are really helpful and I’m really grateful for your thoughts and experiences.

To respond to some of these queries which arose, the sort of thing she wants to wear are cami type tops with spaghetti straps, which are very low cut and with her shape show a lot of cleavage. She doesn’t want to wear anything under tops which I understand. Other friends of hers can wear these with no bra or a strapless bra and she is going for the same look as them.

the posted who put a pic of the Zara black vest with jeans; I think this would be a great outfit for her, but she doesn’t like this and prefers a strappyier look.

im trying to encourage her to follow the principle of if you are wearing something short on your legs you should wear more coverage on your top and vice versa but she is not always open to this.

in terms of bravissimo, as one of the other posters said o think her perception is the bras are a bit older and “fuller coverage” and her friends often buy theirs from primark or similar. This is especially true with sports bras which in bigger sizes can sometimes feel like a parachute harness, in my experience.

I was grateful for the suggestion of Boux for small back sizes and which o will definitely look into and also vest tops which are thicker in the strap but she does tend to dismiss these.

I know exactly how she feels. I am now a 32 GG and was like her when I was younger and it was tough especially in the “heroine chic” era. I really want her to feel happy and confident in what she wears.

the next issue will be swim wear for the holidays….

That Instagram account Maia_Andrews I posted about above had lots of post about swimwear. Saw a bra post too she did with another account I follow who is a bra fitting expert. I am a 32H these days so follow her

Bra stop also does swimwear but hit or miss. Maybe just the triangle halter style ones might actually be better for her, less added cleavage!

If she’s bent on wearing the strappy tops there’s not much you can do.

maybe look at gymshark for sports bras

Oh! And high street bikinis might work but what I do is buy say a large and then sew the backstrap to make it fit, but provide enough boob coverage.

River Island has really nice ones, also again boux Avenue

@mermaid101 One of the issues your dd isn’t yet mature enough to realise, is that she can look fabulous by not necessarily following others. Once my dd got really pretty bras that made her look a bit smaller, she embraced more suitable fashion for her size. She realised she was not going to have a boyish figure and embracing her figure was the way forward. When they are young, they just want to copy others but my DD realised pretty quickly that no bra wasn’t an option and neither was it fashionable for her.

The other thing that happened to DD was that, as she lost “puppy fat”, she got smaller boobs but she was still happy to choose clothes which suited her and worry less about others. You don’t have to be a clone. I found that working alongside her to develop her style helped and on the way she did have the odd tantrum in a shop when she had to buy a size 12. Now she has amazing style (size 10 clothes) and always looks incredible but her boobs are smaller now she’s older.