The Nightmare Of Buying New Jeans

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My jeans are the foundation of my wardrobe and when I have found a great pair I have a tendency to wear them literally to death. My jeans are like old friends, they mould themselves to me over the course of time and I understand them well. I know what clothes I can buy to partner with them and which footwear will work with their length. I feel comfortable and at one with the world when I step out wearing my jeans and I don’t have to spend hours in my bedroom deciding what to wear. It is, then, a minor catastrophe in my life when a much loved pair of jeans finally give up the ghost.

Mourning

I don’t know about you but I actually mourn the passing of a good pair of jeans. Something I can really rely on has gone and I know that I have the nightmarish task of sourcing a new pair that will serve me equally well. You would think that with the vast array of colours, styles and fabrics now available it would be a simple task to find the perfect pair but somehow it never works out that way and what starts out as a pleasant foray into the world of retail always seems to end in monumental frustration and the firm belief that my body must be a freaky shape that jeans designers do not cater for.

Bummer

The main problem seems to be that I have a bottom. I know everyone has one but mine seems to be particularly problematic. I wouldn’t say it is huge but it is shapely with the direct result that any jeans which accommodate it are inevitably too big on the waist. I have no need to ask if my bum looks big in a pair of jeans because it looks big in everything, mainly because it is big! I am sure you are screaming “wear low rise jeans” but they don’t work either as for whatever reason they just do not suit my shape at all.

What am I talking about? I know bloody well what the reason is! It is my less than flat stomach. It is not that I am clinically obese, in fact I am not even fat (I am a size 12) but if you have anything less than a flat stomach those low rise styles cause the offending flab to droop over the waistband in unsightly fashion.

The solution is to find jeans with elastane in the fabric. The stretchy fabric allows me to squeeze my posterior into the jeans and still achieve some level of fit on the waist. The only downside is that elastane fibres have a shorter life span than cotton and so the jeans will die young causing more heartache.

Vertical Challenge

Many jeans are ridiculously long. How many women are actually six feet tall? All of them according to some designer labels. I am of average height and do not see why I should buy a pair of jeans that require me to chop a foot of fabric off the legs. I always take my instruments of torture (high heeled boots) with me when I try on jeans but even my stilts often fail to put me at the right height for many pairs. This has led to acute paranoia with me feeling that I might actually be a dwarf.

Defects

So we have established that I am a dwarf with a sizable arse and a flabby belly which is pretty much the same as saying that I am a typical woman! All the more astonishing then that finding the right pair of jeans is such a project. They are out there and I always find something suitable in the end but there is always a lot of pain along the way. It is a strange paradox that finding the jeans that make you feel good and that you come to rely on involves so much ritual humiliation and feelings of inadequacy.

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Sally Stacey tells of a time when her jeans were consigned to the bin, and how it was a nightmare trying to find some new ones...