There are few topics so intriguing and mysterious as the ways in which girls are initiated into the customs of womanhood. In 1995, an eloquent Texan named Susan B. posted an essay on alt.clothing.lingerie which sparked one of the most fascinating discussions to appear on that newsgroup.
From Susan B.:
I was born in 1955 and reached my teens just as the beginning of the big change from girdles and stockings to pantyhose (and girdles) reached my part of the country.
My earliest memories of my mother have her wearing a heavy-duty panty girdle or all-in-one and stockings under a dress or skirt whenever she left the house and usually when she was staying home for the day. She was not at all overweight, and I don't think that I made a hard connection between girdles and figure control until I was much older and actually had a figure. I don't believe that I ever asked her about it when I was little, but I just somehow came to know early on that wearing such under-attire, as well as a bra, were part of being a grown-up woman. It was something that I looked forward to when I, too, had finally grown up.
Before I started school, my mother wore a skirt or dress every day around the house. And almost always, this included the girdle and stockings. The girdle may have been a little lighter-duty than the ones that she wore when going out or dressing up, but wear one she did. She did have some slacks that she wore while working in the yard or while doing serious cleaning inside the house. But then she usually wore a girdle under them, too. When I finally started school and she went back to work, she was dressed "UP" every weekday for work. This meant a dress (usually) or a skirt, heavy-duty panty girdle or all-in-one, stockings, and heels.
I don't ever remember hearing her make any comments about wanting to get out of her girdle before it was time to retire for the night. But then, she was never one for that kind of complaining and did not put up with any of that from my father or my sister or me, either. I do remember that she would sometimes change from certain shoes into more comfortable ones when she got home, but most of the time she just wore her heels (and dress and girdle and stockings) until it was time to go to bed. Either way, there was never a complaint about how her feet hurt after a day of wearing heels.
Something that may have bearing here: My mother was a very meticulous shopper and would search and search for just the right item instead of just buying something and making do with it - bras, girdles, and shoes in particular. Bras and girdles and shoes had to fit perfectly or she would not buy them. This no doubt led to legions of angry and frustrated sales people over the years. She also never cheaped-out in these areas. We were not wealthy by any means, but she would often wait and buy a few more expensive things and then wear them forever. Quality over quantity, but never extravagant, was her shopping motto.
In those days, the department stores had large, well staffed and stocked lingerie departments with several trained fitters available at all times. My mother had identified several of these women in the stores that carried her favorite brands and she had long customer relationships with them. Her aunt was part-owner of a Pennyrich store and was expert in fitting bras and girdles. And although she did not like most of their line, some things she would only buy there. But no matter what, whatever bra or girdle she bought, one could be assured that it fit her perfectly.
I expect that a lot of the discomfort (real and imagined) many experience when wearing a girdle (or bra or heels, for that matter) is directly related and inversely proportional to the quality and the fit of the item.
Then my older sister reached the age of 12 (1963) and was taken downtown to be fitted for a real bra and a heavy-duty dress-up panty girdle before Easter. I was along for the ride and watched the entire proceedings with interest. My sister was GROWING UP! Finding the proper bra was not much of a problem (wasn't yet a whole lot there to fit one to), but getting the right panty girdle turned out to be a real ordeal - for all of us. We must have gone to three or four stores, with Sharon trying on dozens of girdles, before Mom and Sharon were satisfied with the fit. I was watching closely from where I was sitting, but could not really see that one fit differently from another.
The final selection was one of those really heavy-duty long-leg jobs, complete with the rigid (absolutely non-stretch) satin tulip front panel and side panels... and a side zipper. This one was for church and other special events, and was the most important. That mission complete, they spent another hour trying on and finally selecting two somewhat lesser girdles styles for everyday wear.
By the time Sharon started junior high in the fall, she wore stockings and a panty girdle almost every day to school. During the next few years, as her figure matured into a lush, traditionally proportioned hour-glass shape with a big, beautiful chest (just like our mother), she made regular visits to the various lingerie departments to update her under-wardrobe. By the time she finally stopped growing, she had amassed an amazing number and variety of girdles. The ones she left behind, were, of course, carefully set aside for me, later, when I would need them.
From the beginning, when Sharon only wore her girdle once or twice a week, once it was on, it stayed on the rest of the day unless there was a good reason to take it off like going swimming or playing baseball with the neighborhood kids. Just like our mother. There was no discussion about it, they just kept them on. No complaints, either. When the next school year started and Sharon wore a girdle to school almost every day except for some Saturdays when there was not an expedition out, the same regimen prevailed.
Then finally I was 12 (1967) and Easter was coming up. I eagerly awaited MY trip to the lingerie departments to find just the right bra and girdle for me. So one Saturday morning we set out for downtown. We first stopped by the store in which my mother was then buying most of her foundations and I was handed over to one of the fitters. FINALLY!!
Well, mother nature had not been cooperating with me and a training bra was (just barely) called for. That out of the way, it was time for my heavy-duty girdle. The fitter measured me carefully, TWICE, and was clucking as she left to fetch something for me to try on. Well, that should have been a tip-off.
Presently she returns with several girdles and a pair of stockings for me to try on. I pulled on the first girdle and was carefully shown how to zip it up without over-stressing the zipper. Once my attention left the zipper, I was almost overcome by the feeling of being held tightly by the girdle - of pressure and gentle restriction. I really liked it.
But I soon realized that there was trouble. Both my mother and the fitter were concerned with the fit. The girdle was actually wrinkling in a couple of places and the waist was not exactly in the right place. Tsk, tsk. Well, it felt pretty good to me. But off it came and the next one went on. After zipping it up, I again drifted into that new and fascinating feeling of tightness. But this one was not the right one, either.
So on this went until finally (in another store) we found one whose fit satisfied everyone. I could tell immediately that this was THE ONE by the way it felt. It was equally snug everywhere and did not bind as I sat or bent over, or ride up or down as I moved about. It really felt good and I felt so grown up and feminine wearing it.
Then came the stockings debacle. The fitter had brought in several pairs of stockings for me to try on. These were the old-style shiny flat-knit non-stretch gartered stockings that my mother and sister wore so much and that my mother thought were much dressier than the newer stretch stockings. Well, I could tell by the look on the fitter's face that she was expecting trouble as she watched me pull on the stocking. Sure enough, the stocking top ended an inch or two below the girdle leg band, several more inches beneath the garter clip, and would not pull up any further.
The fitter brought in larger sizes, but none that fit my size 5 (at the time) foot came anywhere close to the garter clips. I was about 5' 7", short waisted, shaped kinda funny, and mostly legs - all of which together probably caused the difficulty in finding a girdle that fit properly. So we went to plan B: stretch stockings. As it turned out, the medium size/extra long length worked just fine.
The search for shoes and a new dress for Easter the subsequent Saturday went smooth as silk by comparison. I also selected a couple of every-day girdles from Sharon's cast-offs that seemed to fit well. So I was all set, with bra, heavy-duty dress-up panty girdle, stockings, new dress, and new shoes. I could hardly wait for Easter Sunday when I could get all dressed up like Mom and Sharon and be one of the grown-up women.
The day FINALLY rolled around and I remember starting early and taking a long time to get ready. This was to be my first time to go out wearing a girdle and stockings, a little makeup, and dress shoes with about 1 3/4" heels. I took special care that everything was just so - stockings not twisted, panty girdle leg bands even, and panty girdle up tight and positioned just right. It felt great!
All day I felt so grown up, so feminine, and it was a wonderful feeling. After we finally returned home from lunch, we changed out of our good clothes, but we all kept on our dress-up girdles and stockings. It was a day that I will always remember.
That first special shopping trip to get my first bra and girdle was also, sadly, the last occasion in which our mother took that special interest in her younger daughter to explicitly elucidate and demonstrate the finer arts of what it is to be a woman. I am somewhat envious when I read Suzanne's posts in which she tells of how her mother spent a lot of time and effort with each of her daughters and of her commitment to bringing up ALL her daughters to be and dress like ladies. Our mother kept up the intense training with Sharon, but I was pretty much on my own after that first time.
I can think of a number of reasons for this, the most likely of which is that she may have endorsed the "trickle-down" theory of feminine doctrine acquisition - that my just being around Sharon and observing the proceedings, the causes and effects, would osmose through my hard head and save her the (likely considerable) trouble of trying to install it directly through the Susan filters.
Like Sharon, I wore a girdle to church and also to school a few days a week from that day on. By the time I started junior high in the fall, I was wearing a dress or skirt, panty girdle, and stockings just about every day. But things were changing - pantyhose were beginning to appear and hemlines were creeping up. Panty girdles were now available in a wide variety of styles, lengths, materials, and weights, and in a dizzying array of colors.
By the time I reached eighth grade (1968), even Sharon was sometimes wearing pantyhose with her shorter skirts. But she still wore a girdle over her pantyhose. I had been wearing shorter, lighter girdles with extra long stockings that fastened to the leg band of the girdle for a while so I could wear the new shorter skirts without showing too much girdle leg. Soon I made the switch to pantyhose, too. By the time I started high school (ninth grade in these parts) I and ALL my friends wore pantyhose and a short panty girdle under our very short skirts. I don't think that I could name one girl in my age group (or older) that did not wear a girdle every day that she wore a skirt, all through high school.
But as before at home, once the stockings/pantyhose and girdle went on, they stayed on for the rest of the day unless there was some reason to take them off. That went for Mom, Sharon, and me. There was no discussion, it just was. I don't remember every really being uncomfortable wearing one that fit correctly, and I don't remember Sharon ever complaining, either. I did get into some trouble with Mom when I got caught dispensing with the panties under the panty girdle. Wearing panties at all times when awake and certainly when leaving the house, no matter what else you might be wearing in that area (except a swimsuit), turned out to be a BIG rule. I did not find this out until I fan afoul of it - I guess I must've missed that meeting. There was a mighty struggle over this with me trying to apply logic and reasoning to the subject only to be met with edict. This is one of the issues I chose to dig my heels in over and finally I prevailed after basically wearing her down to a nub. No doubt the prospect of my wearing pantyhose under a girdle hastened her decision to let me start wearing the as yet more expensive pantyhose.
Once I started dating, Mom made an effort to steer me back to the more heavy-duty panty girdles (as she had done with Sharon). She probably thought they afforded more "protection" than the lighter weight jobs I had been wearing for a while. I would not have minded this very much if they were more available in the short leg and brief styles that I needed. But a few were found and I obliged her most of the time on this point. The first time I pulled one of those on again, and felt it holding me tight, I was instantly reminded of why I liked wearing the heavier girdles in the first place.
Light weight or heavy duty, a panty girdle was ABSOLUTELY REQUIRED when going out on a date and wearing a skirt - both for me and for Sharon. Sometimes as part of the pre-date inspection, she would try to determine by looking or by brushing up against our hips or ass if the visual inspection was inconclusive, if we were wearing a girdle before leaving for a date. This got to be such an annoying ritual that after a while I took to standing in front of her and lifting my skirt up to show her in hopes of shaming her into discontinuing the inspections. Well, my little gambit did not work and she actually welcomed the opportunity to be sure I was properly attired.
So I generally wore my tightest girdles out on dates with special guys, both because I wanted to look my best and because they kept me constantly aware of my femininity all evening long and tended to add to and enhance my state of general sexual arousal already present when on a date with a special guy. Years later, I find out that some of my high school friends as well as others I have talked to liked to wear tight girdles on dates for the same reasons.
Like many women, I'm sure, I identified profoundly with what Susan described of the ritual of the first girdle purchase. Like her, I was a younger sister, and so I was more than prepared for what was going to happen, and, like her, I could scarcely contain my eagerness. I still can't believe that I had the self-control to never secretly try on one of my mother's or sisters' girdles, but I did. And so that spring afternoon in 1962 when, in the company of my mother and sisters, I first put on a girdle, it was my first time.
I am still not entirely certain what it was about beginning to wear a girdle that made it such a compelling feminine rite of passage as compared to my first period, or my first bra. I speculate that it might be explained by the fact that a first period is an introduction to biological womanhood, something 1962 was still somewhat embarrassed about, and a first bra was somehow prosaic and even a bit disappointing. I remember my first bra making me feel something like an awkward imposter. It made me acutely aware of how little there was to put in it.
But the first girdle, for me, and for, I suspect many other women, was a genuine entry into well, for lack of a better term, ladyhood. It immediately made me feel, walk, sit, and act like a grown woman, a lady. It was an entry, as it were, into womanhood as a cultural experience, rather than a biological one. It was, at some level, an acceptance of the challenge and rigors of being a lady, and it was interwoven, in my imagination, with all the ribbons and trappings of femininity.
Like Susan, and about 90% of women at the time, my first girdle was purchased the week before Easter. There was something profoundly pagan about Easter (as my Jewish agnostic father often observed to my Polish Catholic mother). It was, in my family, in addition to a sincere religious festival, a pageant of dressing up and feasting. In my mother's extended family, with a lot of girls, it also was a kind of ritualistic presentation of the stages of maturity of the nubile females. Each year, the finery each girl was allowed to wear was more grown up than what she had been allowed to wear the previous Easter. For all of the girl cousins, the great interest was who was wearing stockings for the first time, who was wearing a girdle, lipstick, perfume, heels, for the first time. And so, sometime during Holy Week, every year, my mother and her four daughters would go downtown to a marvelous little feminine jewel box of a corset shop, whose windows were always filled with the latest and most tasteful girdles, bras, and slips. This store was owned by a very elegant and romantically European woman, a refugee from Prague, and her windows gave the main street of our town what little it had of romance and eroticism.
On that afternoon in 1962, we five women were all dressed up. We had an appointment to buy dress-up girdles for the girls for all the dress-up occasions of the spring, which included parties and weddings as well as Easter. We went into the back fitting room, a practical room with sewing machines and tape measures and mirrors, which nevertheless also had a delightfully feminine ambiance. My mother kept her grey suit on (she bought her girdles separately, when we weren't around), but we took our dresses off.
Because of the specialness of the occasion, I was fitted first. My sisters were sweetly encouraging and were also not above inserting some gentle humor into the situation. I felt like a princess being dressed for a ball as Mrs. ___ carefully measured me and evaluated my figure with a maternal seriousness. I was enormously gratified when she made it clear to my mother and my giggling sisters that I was certainly ready to wear a girdle. And I concealed my disappointment when she observed that it was not, however, necessary for me quite yet to start wearing them every day (I was resolved to change my mother's mind on that score as soon as I got her alone).
She brought out several girdles for me to try. I was gratified to see that they were "real" girdles, not "pretend" girdles for a twelve year old, and I mentally resolved that I would walk out of there with a particularly firm satin-fronted, hook and zip long-leg panty girdle that was just like one owned by my eldest sister. That's the one I tried on first. And when I had it on, I felt that it had all been worth waiting for. It was far more comfortable than I had ever expected, and the tight, smooth, held-in feeling was far more pleasant, and to be honest, arousing, than I had ever anticipated. I remembered thinking that I would have to wear something like this all my life and that I didn't mind at all. Now I'm a woman, I felt, and I was sorry that I wouldn't be able to wear it out of the store.
Although I tried on a few of the others, we did buy that one, and that was the girdle I wore all day at Easter, with a wonderfully silky pair of sheer nylons, a delightful cotton full-skirted dress, and my first pair of (1") heels. After our visit to Mrs. ___'s corset shop, we had a ladylike lunch at a restaurant, but that depressed me a little because I was not wearing a girdle and all of the rest of them were. Still, that was the last year it would be like that. I had grown up.
Oh I know that there's probably something trivial and silly about such an attachment and such associations. And I know that many women did not have the pleasant and comfortable experiences I had, and now continue to have with girdles. But the imagination works in strange and wonderful ways. And I'm glad I have this. I'm glad that it has become part of my adult identity and my relationship with my husband. I only hope that others have things like this, to enrich their lives.
From Lillian:
My first girdle was specially purchased for me by my mother so I could be properly dressed to be a bridesmaid. The year was 1946.
Not long after my 14th birthday my sister and I were invited to be bridesmaids in a cousin's wedding. I suspected then, and still do, that they wanted my sister and took me too to avoid offense. Mother cleared everything of importance with father. When she showed him the pattern for the bridesmaids' dresses, a satin dress fitted at the waist and over the hips, and told him that she was concerned about my figure, he looked at the picture on the pattern and said, "For goodness sake, get the girl a proper girdle!"
My problem by now was a surprisingly full figure for a 14-year-old. Mother never disobeyed father and the next day we went first to the seamstress to be measured for the dresses for my sister and me and then mother took me alone to an exclusive corsetry shop downtown. With little input from me, mother and the saleslady finally chose a white satin straight girdle and a matching longline bra. In the twinkling of an eye I was in a large fitting room in just my panties getting on the bra and, with considerable help, wiggling into the girdle. A seamstress appeared and, after my getting on stockings and getting them properly gartered, I was put on a pedestal in front of a mirror and there was much clucking and measuring by the three of them; mother, saleslady, and seamstress. Another girdle was tried and another bra. As it turned out there was more trouble getting the right girdle and bra than getting my lovely light blue dress completed.
About a week before the wedding we stopped at the corsettiere and I got into the previously chosen girdle and bra and mother put the purchase on her account. The girdle was really beautiful and fit me like a silken glove. It was cut high in the front and low, down over my buttocks, in the back. The waist band dipped a bit front and back. There was an appliqued flower on the tummy panel, little pink roses around it, and pink ribbons over the four garters. There were even little pink roses between the cups and down over the front of the longline bra. The front was arched up and the back arched down over my buttocks. It had four garters covered with pink satin ribbons and there were pink rosebuds on the tummy panel which had a white appliqued rose on it. The longline bra matched the girdle and had pink rosebuds between the cups. Both garments were wonderfully comfortable.
I left the corset shop in the new bra and girdle under my school uniform, feeling like a princess in disguise. When I put on the bridesmaid's dress at the seamstress shop and looked in the mirror I saw not an ugly duckling but a swan. Among other things, for the first time in my life I had some clothes fancier than my sister had, even though they were underclothes.
Bride and bridesmaids dressed in a large room in the church. Mother was my personal dresser. Aunts, cousins, and sundry other females saw me in the new girdle and clearly, for the first time in my life, I was seen as a mature woman. Best of all my sister wore a nice matching bra and straight girdle, but not new and by no means of the quality of mine. As I recall she also had her period and was grouchy. I got much more attention than she did, even when we were dressed. I wore my hair up and mother did a magnificent job on my make-up. I could scarcely keep away from the mirror. I was Cinderella at the ball.
I felt supremely confident at the ceremony, though I was the bridesmaid at the end of the line of six. At the reception I got many comments on my dress. My benevolent and proud father even allowed me a glass of wine. When the dancing started I was never without a partner.
That night at home when getting ready for bed I was surprised when my sister knocked at my door and came into my room and told me that I looked nice and that I was now all grown up. I couldn't believe my ears. Years later in reflecting on that moment I decided that mother and father made her do it, but when I asked her she said that she had really meant the compliment.
The lovely girdle was only part of my transformation, but looking back it was somehow the most important part. I left it out that night, with the bra, on a chair in my bedroom, and then wore bra and girdle to church the next morning. Somehow it made even one of my old Sunday dresses look good.
My second girdle was a panty girdle that I nagged my mother to get me shortly after the wedding so I could wear a girdle to school. It was a pink brief with a short leg and four suspended garters. It was made of an elasticized fabric with a satin tummy panel. I think it was a Jantzen, but I am not sure. Panty girdles at that time were described as for active or informal wear. The garters detached as stockings were not worn by younger school girls then, unless for dress-up. The ample crotch piece was nylon (or maybe rayon) and though the back panel was straight it didn't flatten my derriere too much. By the time I was a junior in high school I had a wardrobe of perhaps half a dozen girdles, half panties and half open. Mother supervised my shopping and girdles and bras were bought in pairs, something I still do. It wasn't that they were sets but rather that they were coordinated in some way.
High school dress in the late 1940's meant blouses and sweaters and nice straight skirts. Cardigans were popular. Bobby socks were, unfortunately, popular too. Most of my school friends were wearing panty girdles to school and sometimes stockings. We would show each other cute new panty girdles in the girls' restroom and talk about clothes and boys consumed our attention. In the spring we all wore lovely pastel cotton dresses which seemed to demand lacy open girdles, stockings, and lace-edged bras.
Late in my sophomore year I started working at the branch of the public library and came under the influence of the head librarian, the stylish but stern Miss Petersen. This was an after school and Saturday job which I kept through my senior year. My sister had worked there before me and Miss Petersen was a patient and friend of my father. Real girdles, not panty girdles, were de rigueur. Miss Petersen's pages were to be young ladies and she saw that they acted as such. We kept a spare girdle and stockings in space allotted to us in our lounge. If one arrived in a panty girdle she was expected to change to a real girdle immediately. Garter belts were regarded as declasse. I once saw a new girl being scolded by Miss Petersen in a back office. The girl was holding up her skirt and slip to reveal rather sagging panties and a garter belt and was sobbing as Miss Petersen lectured her on proper dress. She soon found after school employment at the neighborhood soda fountain where the dress code was surely less strict. As I have written elsewhere Miss Petersen was a marvelous influence on an entire generation of girls, not just in dress, but in deportment and self-discipline.
From Jean:
I first wore a girdle in 1969 at age thirteen. It was Easter Sunday, a traditional time in our community, a smallish town in Iowa, for young women to be permitted the "next step." For me, it was a panty girdle, stockings , a real bra (not the training bra I had insisted on but didn't need) and what I called "serious" make-up. My older sister and my mother helped select the set, white, of course--both bra and panty girdle manufactured by Formfit Rogers. I felt so grown up and feminine as I fastened my hose and pulled the cuffs down over them, fussing to get everything "just so." I was so proud to walk out of that big Des Moines department store with my mother and my sister, with rustling, crackling bags that carried my own real and true bra, girdle, nude stockings and lacy satin slip (and my Easter dress which my sister carried for me on a hanger)!
As much joy as I felt from this the experience, miniskirts, pantyhose and bell bottoms took over my life that very summer and I don't think I wore that first girdle more than three or four times. My mother made sure I was fitted with at least two other girdles during my teenage years, purchased in conjunction with weddings and so forth. I wore them to humor her, feeling that pantyhose were much more comfortable and modern.
From Chris:
Being a teenager in England during the early sixties I coincided with that last decade when girdles were almost universally worn by women. My mother in common with all her contemporaries, considered a girdle to be an absolute prerequisite to being properly dressed and she always wore one whether at home or out.
Looking back now I think her views as to "the proper way to dress" owed more to the attitudes of the 50's than the 60's, however, it was taken for granted that both I and my sister (a year my junior) would follow her lead and be put into and be required to wear girdles as soon as we reached "that certain age". For myself, as with a number of other posters here, the matter of compulsion did not, initially, enter my thoughts for I was anxious to be allowed to wear one and it was with some excitement that I got taken by my mother to be fitted for my first proper girdle.
Although the inconveniences of having to wear a girdle from the moment I got up in the morning to the time I went to bed in the evening swiftly became apparent, especially over the following long and very hot summer vacation, it never dawned on me to question the need to wear one, it was simply what a young lady did. Only my sister, whom had the misfortune of being cursed with a little too much puppy fat, complained bitterly to our Mother but to no avail, about the rather formidable remedial underpinnings which the old lady at the foundation shop had decreed she needed.
It was only later when I was sent off to boarding school that I discovered that there was an alternative way to dress. For although, for many of us, girdles were no more compulsory there than they were at home (girdles of a particular style figured in the school's list of required underwear) the very fact that the rules stated you had to wear one was sufficient to encourage a number of the more "troublesome" girls to leave them off whenever possible, despite the risk of discovery and matron's extreme displeasure.
I myself never really flouted those stupid rules, mainly because I didn't really mind wearing mine and didn't want to make it some pointless issue of principal. However, thereafter, I always considered wearing a girdle an option chosen by me for my own reasons.
BTW to this day I continue to wear and enjoy wearing proper foundations.
I tried on my mother's girdles "unofficially" on a number of occasions when I was little, but of course they were much too large to have any real effect. But, I seemed to get a real sense of closeness, well-being and intimacy from those experiences. It made me feel secure and close to Mom when I dressed up in her cast-off clothes in the rummage box we used to play with.
Officially my first girdle was at Easter, I believe, when I was twelve years old in the spring of 1953. I don't believe I even owned a bra at the time.
I had secretly borrowed one of mother's smaller girdles once or twice to wear out of the house and she had found out. She wasn't angry with me - just amused. She took me shopping and bought me my first girdle, an open bottom Warners as I recall. It was very snug and fit so nicely. I wore it under a new skirt with heels and hose to church. I felt soooo mature and womanly. We walked to church and I heard my mother telling my father that I was wearing a girdle. That made me blush but I was very pleased with myself at the same time.
My recollections about girdle styles and how frequently they were worn during girls' teens differ a little from the experiences and recollections of Suzanne and others. I think I am somewhat more "senior" and the difference in years may explain this. ( I went through high school in the late forties and early fifties.)
The girdle was certainly a sign of growing up so it was something every girl (now a woman) was anxious to "need". But with a few exceptions most girls didn't wear them every day. And in those days many of the teen girdles were lightweight, puckery little things meant to hold up stockings more than to control. Many of these lightweight styles were half way between girdle and garter belt. Bobby socks were in style and skirts were relatively long. Most of us didn't or couldn't afford to wear stockings regularly. And as I recall most girdles were straight open bottom styles.
So girdles were not part of our daily wardrobe. Girdles were more an item for dress-up occasions. Of course, the more "grown up" the girdle, the more woman and feminine you were.
My mother later reminded me of how I fit the mold. It was about a Junior Spring Dance so I was seventeen and probably had a twenty- five inch waist. We went into the city to buy a party dress for the dance. I chose a lovely rose dress with a fitted top and rather full mid length skirt. I then told my mother that I needed a new girdle to wear with the dress. She knew that I didn't need one, not for that dress. But she good-naturedly went with me to the foundations department where I was actually fitted for the first time. The fitter (tongue in cheek no doubt) treated the situation with the seriousness, professionalism and attention that I obviously attached to this critical purchase. I selected the firmest really feminine one they had made in the fashion of the day. It was a pinkish flesh colored girdle with a high waist, bones with satin panels and a zipper. And very important it had six garters - for some reason, the pedigree of a real girdle.
All this for a slim active teenager! My mother's suggestion that I really didn't need so much girdle wasn't even heard. It felt so good and knew I was so much more a woman in it. (It had to be very important because she told me I would have to pay for it because the dress and girdle together were way over mom's budget. Her gentle way of trying to dissuade me from an extravagance I didn't need and couldn't afford.)
I thoroughly enjoyed the dance even though my date was no dreamboat. The combination of special hair-do and luxurious attire made it one of those special moments. Every once in a while my mother would relate the incident to the women at a family gathering. The whole thing as she related it took the ridiculous to the hilarious. But God love her, she wouldn't rain on my parade at that most momentous time in a teen's life.
From Melinda:
At about the age of twelve, I began secretly trying on some of my mother's girdles, more out of curiosity than anything else. From the very first time I put one on, I remember how nicely snug it felt on me and that it gave me such a warm feeling of being lady-like when I wore it.
Then one day I was caught trying on one of her newest ones. Red-faced, I had to own up to the fact that I liked to wear a girdle. At that time, I was fourteen years old and shortly thereafter I "officially" got my first girdle of my very own. I was ecstatic! It was 1959 and it was a Playtex Magic Controller open bottom, which was a rubber girdle with the "Magic Fingers" for tummy control and a cotton inner lining. The first time I wore it was on a special family dinner outing, complete with a new slip and dress and my first "real" pair of stockings. It was nice and firm and I loved the way it hugged me. I felt so proud, demure and soooooo very much a woman that day !
From Bunny:
I was allowed to have a girdle and stockings when I was ten for wearing to church. That was the beginning of an ambivalent relationship with girdles, because I adored the stockings and the shoes, but I kept poking at the stockings until I ruined them and got chewed out by my mother, who had let me borrow her best pair. I thought I should wear a girdle and stockings to church because my grandmother did (I lived with her at the time). Little girls wore Buster Brown shoes and white anklets, and I wanted to look grown up. For ruining the stockings, I was pronounced not ready for grownup clothes. I never quite got over the embarrassment.
From Ruth:
To give you some background, I grew up in the south in a Victorian household with a wonderful Mother whose word was absolute. My husband always insisted she ruled "with an iron fist in a velvet glove" because what she said went, but she never raised her voice or got angry. My teen years were late 50s and early 60s and I hardly ever left the house without a girdle from the time I was 12 years old. Being a bit on the "pudgy" side, I probably needed them. I recall only having one garter belt to hold up my stockings. After that, it was always a girdle of some type, normally panty girdles but also roll-ons.
I wore them to school, to church, to any social function. My Victorian mother did not allow girls to climb trees or play rough. The only time I wore slacks or jeans was to ride my bicycle or help with the yard work, and I did not wear a girdle then unless it was a rubber brief. My first Playtex was open bottom, but my heavy thighs rubbed together when I walked and I developed a rash that summer. I believe I was probably 13 at that time. So, the next Playtex had legs in it. If I remember correctly the legs were not as long as they are in the nonrubber panty girdles I wear presently. I had girdles made of other material as well as the Playtex rubber ones. And I recall one other rubber one of another manufacture.
It was my greatest hope that rubber girdles would help me sweat off some of the weight I felt I needed to lose. I wore the Playtex girdle to school on days that I did not have physical education class. Because it caused me to sweat (even in December in the south, one would sweat in a rubber girdle!), it was too difficult to struggle back into quickly enough to get dressed and get on to the next class. I wore panty girdles made of elastic and nylon on those days. Thank goodness we only had gym every other day. About half the girls in my gym classes in the late 50s wore girdles and thought nothing of it... just another piece of clothing.
From Barbara:
I wore my first girdle for my Bat Mitzvah, a Jewish girl's religious and social entry into adulthood at the age of thirteen. Certainly, with my girdle, makeup, little heels, and my hair done, I felt grown up! It was a super weekend, as full of thrills and excitement as it was of tension and terror.
From another Barbara:
I was born in 1961, the oldest of three with two younger brothers. I never even SAW a girdle except in catalogues and movies until my mother was cleaning out an old box of clothes one day while was in high school (I must have been 15 or 16) and she came across an old panty girdle of hers. By then I had developed a love of old movies, especially the late 50's early 60's movies with Doris Day, Cary Grant, and all the others, and I still have images in my mind of elegantly dressed women in chiffon and satin whisking about exotic cities in open top sports cars, scarf on their head blowing in the wind....
So I equated that style of clothes, and the related undergarments, with success, happiness, and all the other things that a single mom with three children was hard pressed to provide in the 60s and 70s. Well, my mother had been glad to get rid of her girdle, and seemed a little embarrassed about still having it. But she humored me, and let me keep it, and we spent a wonderful day with me hearing about what it was like to grow up when girdles, hose, and petticoats were proper everyday wear. Most of the experiences I have read about women who came of age in the 60's were related to me by my mother.
That girdle actually fit, though I know now it was hardly a tight fit on my immature figure, but the mold was cast, so to speak, and every time I wore it, I felt like I was riding in a sports car down a palm-lined avenue....
From Leigh:
I really don't remember much about the process of getting my first girdle, and reading through the other womens' accounts, find that my whole experience was very different.
To begin with, the other accounts all seem to share a common theme- "I was happy to get a girdle because it made me feel grown-up."
I was not at all anxious to grow up. I was happy being a kid and doing kid things, and I really resented the peer pressure to act sophisticated. I was pretty much a loner, and I never wanted to do what the rest of the kids were doing. I often felt like an outsider anyway- I lived in a small working-class enclave in an affluent suburb, and the other kids in school all acted more sophisticated than I did because their families did things that my family never dreamt of doing. We didn't go to restaurants and plays in the city, we didn't take fancy vacation trips, my mother didn't wear fashionable clothes. There would have been no way at all for me to compete in that arena, so I just opted out.
Also, I was greatly influenced by my older sister, who was no clotheshorse, either. She made flannel shirts and jeans her uniform some thirty years before the grunge look was invented.
So I did my best to avoid the pressure to take on the trappings of adulthood- makeup, stockings, and the rest. I finally got my first pair of stockings in seventh or eighth grade, when I would have been twelve or thirteen. (This would have been 1961 or 1962.) I don't remember the occasion- maybe it was Easter like everyone else, but I can't say for sure. My mother gave me a pair of roll garters to hold them up. No one else mentioned these- was I the only one to wear them?
At first I only wore stockings when I couldn't avoid it, but eventually I had to give in and wear them pretty much regularly to school. I didn't care for the roll garters at all- it was like wearing rubber bands around your legs. They were tight enough to cut uncomfortably into my thighs, but still the stockings would constantly bag and wrinkle and work their way downwards. You had to keep fiddling with them.
So I asked my mother if there was a better way of keeping the stockings up. (I'm sure I would have asked my sister if she were around, but she was off at college by this point.) My mother took me to the local JC Penney store, where she picked out a girdle for me. I probably tried it on before we bought it, but I certainly don't recall the sort of meticulous selection process that others have described. We just bought it like any other piece of underwear- that was all.
I can describe what it looked like, however, because I found it at the bottom of an old bureau drawer many years later and was able to refresh my memory. (And yes, of course I checked, and yes, I could still get it on.) It was a white, medium-weight brief, with a reinforced stomach panel. It was made from a lacy fabric, rather than solid, and it was actually fairly pretty. I found wearing it to be preferable to using the roll garters, but after a couple of full school days, I wasn't exactly pleased with the girdle, either. The elasticized leg openings cut into my groin, and before lunch time I'd be looking for places where I could discreetly reach up and pull them away from my skin.
My sister gave me my next girdle, a lightweight pink brief, also made from some sort of stretch lace. It was one of hers, and for some reason she didn't want it anymore, but she hated to throw things away, so she lobbied very hard to convince me to take it. I finally acceded, pretty much to get her off my back. It was lighter than the other one, but still not all that comfortable. The fabric crotch was ridiculously over-wide, and it tended to bunch up disconcertingly in my intimate areas. (Maybe that's why my sister was so eager to get rid of it!)
What finally worked for me were something called garter panties. No one else has mentioned these, but they were lightweight elasticized panties with garters attached. They were full-cut panties- bikinis were still some years down the road- and just snug enough to anchor the stockings. They certainly did not provide any figure control, but that was okay with me- I was skinny (and flat-chested) throughout high school.
By the way, I don't remember discussing underwear with my friends at all. About the only incident I can recall is one time I was walking home from school with my best friend when she tugged disgustedly at her clothing and exclaimed, "This girdle's gotta go!"
I wore garter panties all through high school and into college. In my contrary way, I started paying more attention to clothes as my contemporaries started paying less. Even as jeans became the standard, I wore a dress or skirt to class every day in college. I wore the girdle once in a great while, when a specific outfit seemed to call for it. I can remember one very clingy jersey dress in particular that I always wore the girdle with. When pantyhose came along, halfway through college, I was very happy to make the switch from stockings.
I always assumed I'd never wear a girdle again, but years later, I was very surprised to find that my husband found them sexy. After some negotiation, I let him buy me one. Of course, he bought several. I started wearing them now and then, strictly for his pleasure, but I have to confess I'm not thrilled about the idea. I often find myself wishing he were fixated on flannel nightgowns or fuzzy robes, instead.
I have made one significant concession to time, however. Although I don't weigh very much more than I did in high school, things have shifted around a bit and I will grudgingly admit that my outline looks smoother with a little bit of help underneath. So, when I dress up, I usually wear a lightweight Olga "Secret Hug" brief over my pantyhose. They are reasonably comfortable, yet smooth things over nicely and keep the pantyhose from drooping. (Once my husband found out I liked these, he bought me a half-dozen.)
From Anna:
I have only been reading this newsgroup [alt.clothing.lingerie- ed.] for a month or so, but it has already proven to be a corrupting influence. I gained a few pounds this dreary dark winter (in February, Ben and Jerry really are your best friends). Previously I would have read rec.fitness and spent every day at the gym until this excess poundage came off. Now what do I do?
I buy a girdle.
It's great, I'm thin again. (I celebrated with a cookie). The little knobs at my hips are gone. My stomach looks way more toned than Nautilus ever made it. This is all fine, as far as it goes, but as far as I know, girdles have not yet been shown to decrease blood cholesterol.
I have to confess, I sort of copped out and got a sort of very stretchy high-tech modern girdle. I went shopping with the full intention of getting something super-constructed, a fifties movie starlet girdle, but didn't find anything to my liking. Perhaps, as a girdle novice, I was not looking in the right places.
Despite its efficacy, I doubt I will wear this sort of girdle once I've taken off the newfound 5 lbs. This does not, however, mean I will never wear a girdle again, but if I do, probably not as an everyday thing- my wardrobe just conflicts too much- rather more as a special-occasion or just general fun garment to wear. I recall a post from some weeks ago from someone who wears vintage girdles- that is definitely something I could go for. I have always liked vintage lingerie, but as of yet have only bought camisoles, tap pants, slips, sleepwear. Vintage girdles sound chic and fun- a bit of retro class for this modern girl.
From Glenda
A Southern lady was expected to wear a girdle as soon as she had acquired the necessary motor skills to put one on. I can't recall the specific occasion that prompted my mother to purchase that first girdle for me. (A white panty girdle, no garters.) I suspect it would have been when I was around 8 years old -this was the time that I began to be a little chubby and Mother began to worry about my future marriage prospects. She probably bought the girdle to serve as my first defense against the threat of spinsterhood. I was 8 in 1966, and we lived in Alabama.
In a way, my mother's presenting me with a girdle heralded the beginning of other restrictions that my culture required me to "wear". By 8th grade, all my female friends were wearing girdles. Every adult female I knew wore a girdle. It would have been improper not to do so. It had nothing to do with weight; a Southern lady might be a size 3, she still had to wear a girdle for the sake of propriety!
From Mae:
Thought you might find this amusing.
Five or six weeks ago my granddaughter went to her first "prom". She's an eighth-grader and the school had a "formal" dance for her class. Most of the kids didn't have dates. The boys and girls just went in groups of friends. But other than that, this was serious business, at least for the girls. I think it took more planning and telephone chit-chat than a wedding!
It was such fun seeing all the excitement and seriousness entailed in preparation for the big night. Her mother made lovely muted peach softly fitted formal with a V neckline. It took her weeks and was completed just minutes before the big event.
A couple of weeks before the dance she asked if she could borrow one of my girdles to wear under the gown. I was really surprised she'd even know what one was much less want to wear one. I gave her a long-line high-waist Smoothie panty and told her to wear it for the final fittings so the dress would fall correctly.
The day of the prom she had her hair set in an upsweep. She looked so grownup made up with the hairdo, makeup, heels and dress. She looked lovely. I really enjoyed seeing how thrilled she was but realized my little girl was not a little girl anymore. She had a wonderful time. A few days later she returned my girdle freshly laundered with nothing more than a casual thank you.
So I don't know if girdles are coming back or if this was a one-time thing. Thought you might be interested.
Come to think of it there was another cute girdle episode when she was about twelve but that's another story.
Do tell! -Ed.
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