Vanity Sizing can Kiss my ass

o...m...f...g... So... the work shirts I have are cheap... I got them b/c of that actually, but they don't fit well, and make me look even huger than I am.... so I decided to go to a department store where their button down shirts are a bit more fitted, and try some on. I felt like I had lost some inches lately... so I got an 8 as well as a 10, just in case. I also got a 4... to see how far away I was from being the largest I think I want to be.

I go into the dressing room, start with the 8, and it fits, but is slightly baggy in the small of my back. So... I don't even bother with the 10.

Then I try on the 4, and it fit perfectly.... W.T.F?! I AM NOT A FUCKING 4, and fitting into a 4 was supposed to be an accomplishment, a marker of a BIG mile stone... and I've been robbed of that by vanity sizing.  I am really quite upset about this... and no, it isn't that I think I'm an 8/10 but am really a 4/6... my hips are an 8, my waist is between 8 and 10.... this concept of my size is based on fucking inches, not my shape in the mirror. So seriously.... gfys company that made those shirts.

Now, I realize that one company's sizes do not need to match up with another's.... but really, it's a fucking 3 inch disparity! That's HUGE.

For reference... because I like their clothing so much I am defining my concept of size by Express's Size Chart and NY&C's Size Charts which are more or less 1/2 inch from each other. When I measured tonight my waist was 29 inches, and hips were 39.... ish. maybe +-.25 inch because I didn't write it down... I was measuring just to make this post. Anyway... I ordered two, because in the end what matters is how something fits, not the number... but still... It's depressing... so much for clothing size being one of the things I could use to gauge success :(