Somewhere around age 12, I had been playing little league baseball, and took on the position of catcher. The coach had a heart to heart with my dad, and my dad later explained that I would need to start wearing a cup to protect myself. I had never heard of such a thing but it made sense, I certainly didn’t want to take a stray pitch “downstairs”. So off we went to Dunhams to pick up a cup, and a “supporter”, which I assumed was meant to “support” the cup somehow. We returned with a Grid cup and supporter, in Youth Medium. Dad even was a good sport, and picked up a new cup for himself, which probably wasn’t a bad idea for someone who helped warm up the pitchers! With some help, I figured out how to put on the supporter, which seemed to fit similar to my briefs, except with a really wide waistband, these odd leg straps, and pouch for the cup. It was a little stiff and awkward once I shoved the cup in, but I liked the idea of being protected behind the plate. I wore my briefs over the thing, since it to me didn’t seem like “enough” to constitute underwear, and wore the cup when I was to play catcher.
That season came and passed, and the cup and supporter were tossed on the pile with my baseball gear until the next season rolled around. As I suited up again the following year, I tried on my supporter and thought it felt kind of tight, tighter than I remembered. I grew like a weed at that age, so like most things, I assumed I outgrew it, and asked my parents for a new one. They seemed surprised at this, maybe since it was less than a year old, and I remember they even got out a tape measure and checked my waist size against the box, which we still had. I was still a Youth Medium, but they shrugged it off and picked up a Youth Large for me.
That supporter got the job done for that season, and I remember the year after not even bothering with the supporter, thinking it probably didn’t fit anyway. I just stuck the cup in my briefs, which seemed to work well enough that it didn’t fall out. Somewhere around this time, or perhaps when debating my new size the previous season, my dad offered me to try one of his older supporters. He had an old, kind of wrinkled up Bike “wheel” style, in Adult Medium. Whether it was stretched or just huge on me, it felt like a tent. I didn’t understand why it only had a single layer of fabric, instead of a cup pouch. He said something to the effect that you could just put the cup in the front of it, right against your body. I didn’t understand either why it sometimes hung on the line with his swimsuit. What were you going to get hit with in the swimming pool?
My baseball days faded out not long after that, as I moved on to other activities. Like anyone growing up I had gotten more curious about my body. At least once, I dug out my old supporter and tried it on, but after sitting in the basement for a good couple years, the thing had probably dry rotted and was stretched out and hardly fit. Whether it was from friends talking, or reading it somewhere, I found out people apparently wore a supporter or jockstrap for lot of different sports, with or without a cup. Once I was in high school and could drive, my curiosity got the best of me, and I decided to pick up a new supporter to try out again. I picked a day I was home alone, and headed back to Dunhams. I figured without playing baseball, I didn’t have a good “excuse” anymore to need one, so I didn’t want to explain it to my folks. When I found the right aisle, I looked at my options. The old Grid I grew up with was long gone, so I settled on an Adams, which was the best price. I decided to try a regular “athletic supporter” like Dad’s old one, without the cup pocket. I went with a Youth Large, just like the last supporter I had. I figured youth was ok, since I was still in school and growing, and my waist was still around the upper end of the size range listed for that.
I couldn’t strip fast enough once I got home to try this thing on. Once I got my legs where they belonged, I pulled the jockstrap up into place. The waistband was very heavy elastic, and it took a little bit of effort to get it up over my butt and situated on my hips. The pouch snugged into place over my genitals. Unlike my old cup supporter with its stretchy elastic pouch, this had more of a ribbed mesh, with a seam right up the middle that didn’t stretch much, and pulled my penis and testicles up flat against my body. Maybe it was years now of wearing boxers, or maybe I grew, but I was taken back by how tight the jockstrap felt. I thought my cup supporter was too small for me years ago, but this thing seemed to put that to shame. I ran in place, jumped around, and whatever else I could muster, and nothing moved a muscle. It felt really tight, but I liked the secure feeling of not bouncing around. This was the “support” a supporter was all about; not just holding a cup in place.
I kept the Adams supporter till sometime in college, when I actually started working out. I picked up some new jockstraps in Adult size, and continue to wear them today when I run or work out. I wish I realized the benefits of wearing one much earlier in life.