FFS! What is it With Men and Lingerie?

What is it with men wanting women to wear matching lingerie? And I’m not talking about getting out the good gear just once in a while for a planned night of debauchery, but ALL the time.

We’ve been married for 25 years but I have only just recently discovered that this is my husband’s desire.

About a year ago I spent a weekend in the city with my husband Spud and after a big night out on Saturday, we spent Sunday doing some heavy doing shopping. We went to the Emporium in Melbourne and I got some great jeans from 7 for all Mankind, a casserole dish from Le Creuset and then we ended up wandering across the walkway and found ourselves bang smack in the middle of the lingerie section in Myer. He said “I want you to pick out some matching lingerie”. I said really?? He said “yeah, take your time – buy as much as you want”. I thought wow, that’s a pretty good offer and one that I shouldn’t take lightly. I LOVE looking at lingerie and I already own a lot of lingerie and Myer in the city carries every single brand in every single range in every single size and colour and the options are absolutely staggering; lace, satin, silk, cotton, g-string, boy-leg, French-cut, high-waisted, plunging bras, balconette, padded, see-through, push-up. How to even start? So I spent a long, long time wandering around, took my time – stared at every display and grabbed things that called out to me. I only picked my favorite colours and I tried to get things that looked sexy but weren’t going to be uncomfortable and then dragged the whole lot into the changing rooms, ripped off my top and tried on bra after bra after bra, hanging the ‘keepers’ on the hook and discarding the rest. And it took a long, long time to do that because they always adjust the straps to the smallest setting before they hang them up and it’s a fiddly process just getting them off the clips on the hangers. And there wasn’t a single salesperson in cooee to help me…

Finally, satisfied with my loot and with my arms full of various hues of the rainbow I staggered up to the cash register and then nearly had a heart attack at the final tally. $1428. Holy shit. Oops. Maybe I should’ve chosen more from the Bonds racks than from the Pleasure State racks. But hey, Spud told me to do that and I did. I got home and I cut off all the tags and neatly put all my new purchases in the ‘special’ drawer. As in the special occasion undie drawer as opposed to the everyday one with its’ mish-mash of faded, faithful, comfortable, cotton undies and the stand-alone favorite unpadded, unadorned, flesh toned and black t-shirt bras.

About a week later we caught up with friends for dinner and I mentioned to my girlfriend Fiona that Spud had made this special request that I binge spend on matching lingerie when he sure as hell never encourages me to go crazy on dresses or shoes. And I said I don’t know what the big deal is that bras and knickers have to be MATCHING. Spud pipes up and said “because you are always walking around in your underwear and it doesn’t match and it just doesn’t look good and men are visual and we want to see you look nice”. I said, what do you mean I’m ALWAYS walking around in my underwear? No, I’m not! I might run from the bedroom to the laundry for 5 seconds in front of you looking for something in the dryer. And he said no, you sit around in it at night time too. I thought for a second and said you mean after dinner when my jeans are too tight and I tug them off and throw them in a corner and then remove my bra from underneath my t-shirt, sigh in relief and throw that too? He said I don’t know, but I see you in them all the time and it’s just nice for you to look nice.

I said to Fiona, it’s all well and good for them to say that but they don’t realise that you have to buy 4 pairs of underwear to every bra so that the wear/wash ratio evens out. She said yeah, I know – that’s why I only wear black so that I’m always matching.

Fast forward to the present time and I think I’ve worn each of the ‘outfits’ a sum total of one time each respectively. And guess what? He barely saw me in any of them. Each outfit I put on with the thought that at some point today, he’s going to see me in this sexy set of underwear, become overwhelmed with desire and I will end up being ravished beyond my wildest imagination. Never happened. One time I remembered I was dressed provocatively underneath and while he was engrossed in an re-run of MASH for the millionth time I stripped off my clothes and paraded past him on the way to the bedroom. He raised his eyebrows, said ‘cool’, then fell asleep on the couch. I ended up having to put on my tired, faded, coffee stained dressing gown on top because I got cold.

Then last week I was watching an episode of Dr. Phil about a warring couple; one of the husband’s complaints about his wife was that she had let herself go (after 5 kids mind you, arsehole) and that she could “at least wear matching underwear”. OMG, this is an actual man-thing, worldwide. It got me to thinking. Spud has recently shed 15kgs, and has been buying himself new clothes and even went on-line two days ago purchasing “Morning Wood” Beard Oil and Charcoal Body Scrub from The Well Groomed Man. I had better lift my game before he’s out the door chasing down Miss Matchy-Matchy Match-Face.

So I just dug through my collection, rejected all the g-bangers because I cannot stand the feeling of a constant wedgie all day long and chose a lacy, black pair of knickers with a ribbon that laces them up the back. They immediately got caught on the seam of my jeans as I pulled them up. And I’m sitting in this engineer-constructed bra which is restricting my breathing and is causing weird lumps and bumps under my t-shirt.

I can’t do this. I HATE being uncomfortable. My idea of perfect underwear is seam-free, smooth, hip-height cotton undies that don’t ride up, pinch, pull or show under fitted pants and the perfect bra is again also, seam-free, wire-free, un-welded, un-molded and is there basically to prevent nipple-gate incidents. And also an item that I don’t wish to have showing through what is basically my daily uniform of either a singlet in summer or a t-shirt in winter; that means it needs to be smooth, so no lace, buttons, ribbons or other embellishments and it needs to be a colour that doesn’t clash with my top so will always be unlikely to match my underwear. Personally I think all bras should be flesh-toned with different colour straps in case they poke out – THEY can match my top and all underwear should be pink just because that’s my favorite colour and it makes me happy.

Just imagine if we told men that it would turn us on if they would ditch their boxers and strut around all day in a little itchy string of lace that rubbed against their butt-hole underneath their business suit or work pants and hey while you’re at it, throw on a lumpy matching number up top for your man boobs, then when you get home I may or may not actually notice that you made this effort for me and may or may not give a shit depending on what mood/time of day/how tired I am. FFS.