When I started researching women and body armor, I never imagined the journey would lead to a TEDx stage. Yet here we are. “Bras, Breasts, and Bulletproof Vests,” is now live!
This TEDx talk gave me a platform, but the message came from you! This isn’t my talk – this is the culmination of all the stories you shared with me the last couple of years.
As I prepared for this speech, I felt a tremendous responsibility to bring the stories of female armor wearers to a wider audience and highlight the importance of armor ergonomics.
Many of you took time out of busy shifts to complete my survey and candidly share your experiences. You spoke about discomfort, mobility restrictions, fit challenges, and the daily reality of working in hot, heavy equipment that doesn’t fit women well.
One of the most important lessons I learned throughout this work is that discussions about bras and breasts are often dismissed as trivial, awkward, or something people would laugh about. But breasts in protective equipment design should be discussed as objectively as we discuss feet when designing footwear. When we ignore them or skate around the subject, we overlook an important factor affecting comfort, mobility, fit, and performance.
Frankly, it’s a conversation that deserves a much bigger audience than academic journals and conference rooms.
That’s why I took the leap to try out for the TEDx stage (it was kinda scary!)
Let’s normalize this topic for all women who wear protective, torso-born PPE—from law enforcement to surgeons using radiology—and until we have better materials that shape to the body, at least we can make gains in the right bra and load carriage placement to optimize human performance.
To the women in law enforcement who have supported this work from the beginning, thank you. Thank you for trusting me with your stories and helping elevate a topic that is often overlooked but so important.
Please watch the talk. Share it with a colleague. Share it with a supervisor. Share it with someone who still thinks this topic is too small, too niche, or not serious enough to discuss. Let’s move this needle together.