[Fit Check/Measurement Check/Recommendations?] Currently in a 40G, but the gore never sits flat, gapping at top of cup, and a host of other issues.

Hey everyone - I'm new to this subreddit, though I've been a lurker for a bit... I have no idea which tag this falls under, as I'm kind of asking about all three issues. Please forgive me (and inform me) if I should do anything differently in future posts. Also, sorry in advance that this post is so long. I could go on about bras for a while and I'm really frustrated with how hard it is to find ANYTHING in my size, let alone something that actually has the features I like.

Body shape/size: I'm a very busty/top-heavy girl with a pretty wide ribcage, so while I certainly could do to lose a few pounds at present, when I first graduated to underwire bras from all-sports-bras all the time at age 15 (when I weighed about 120), I was already in a 36B, and I graduated to 38s and the land of D+ before graduating high school while weighing under 150. This has made it very difficult to find bras that fit my entire life, since it excludes me from most "normal" shops' size ranges, and I'm not comfortable buying a bra online that I haven't tried on first. (I've done it before and really don't want to go that route again.) I'm 27, no kids, no implants, nothing unusual.

For the last year or so, I've been wearing the Soma Stunning Support Full-Coverage in a 40G. When I was fitted, I was heavier than I am now, and the saleswoman told me I could go up to a 42, but the straps fell off my shoulders and the wires poked my underarms, so I went with the 40. Plus I had read stuff about bras online, and figured a tighter band was going to give me better support in the long run as the elastic stretched out. I almost always wear the 40 at the middle hook, with the shoulder straps tightened almost all the way (since they slide off otherwise). The band is level and doesn't ride up when I raise my arms; the bra as a whole is generally comfortable and sufficiently supportive for my sedentary office job, although if I start doing a lot of walking or stair-climbing it will need adjustment.

However, the center gore never sits flat against my chest. (In fact, I've never in my entire life had a bra that did.) The bottom part is tight against my chest, since it's in line with the rest of the band, but from there the gore angles up and away from my sternum, so where the underwires end in the center is about an inch off my breastbone. [This has even been an issue in the past when I've worn front-closure bras - the bottom of the clip will sit against my chest, but the top part of it (a centimeter above) doesn't. I've seen suggestions for other people with center gore issues to try plunge bras, but anytime I've had anything remotely low-cut, I end up falling out of the cups toward the center on both sides, so I have simultaneous empty cups on the outsides and quadboobs in the center - so they're really not comfortable, and I need some sort of support in the middle.]

I didn't really care about the gore-flatness much in general, since it's always been that way and I just assumed I had a weirdly-shaped sternum... BUT. Last weekend I was at a gun range with my dad and had a casing escape down my shirt - which wouldn't have been that much of a problem, except that it managed to go straight down that opening at the top of the gore and settle in my cleavage. Long story short, I ended up with burns on the inside of both breasts from the hot metal. And in trying to research whether my technique was the issue, I thought maybe it was actually my bra. So, now I'm here looking for advice, because I'm suddenly very concerned that the gore not sitting flat on my chest is actually a much bigger deal than I'd thought it was. (And once I start thinking that, I start wondering if maybe my back problems are also due to a poor-fitting bra, maybe I should be able to go up and down stairs without bouncing around, maybe the straps shouldn't always be falling off my shoulders... et cetera.)

From what I've read on here and elsewhere, the gore not sitting flat means you should go up a cup size. But I already have gapping along the top edge of the cups in a 40G, so I'm not sure that's the way to go; if anything, I'm thinking I should go down a cup size (I've lost weight recently, so possibly just going down a band size to 38G might fix the gapping?). But will that just make the gore stick out even worse??

I've done my homework: I do know to scoop when I first put it on, and I haven't seen any folds at the bottom indicative of the "orange in a glass" shape issue. If anything, it feels like every bra I've ever worn expects my boobs to be spherical, when they're actually teardrop-shaped, so they fit right on the bottom but not on the top, if that makes any sense?

Measurements: 39"/37"/47"/49"/(?) Note: I can't get a lying-down measurement right now because I'm at work, but I'll edit this and add it as soon as I can later today/tonight.

In case it's at all helpful, here are all the brands of bras I've worn in the last 5-10 years:

• Soma Stunning Support Full-Coverage, 40G
• Le Mystere Dream Tisha, 40G
• Cacique Smooth Balconette, 42F
• Ambrielle Balconette, 38DD-40DDD (edit: sorry, the formatting is not cooperating here... help?)

As far as fit/shape of these go... The Soma bras I currently like a lot because the underwire goes all the way up the outside of the cup, rather than poking me in the armpit, which means my boobs are more projected to the front and less out to the sides. But they gap on the top, like I said. The LeMystere seems to use lower-quality foam in the cups than Soma, because it got all crinkly after a while. The straps were pretty comfy but I also had some gapping issues there. The Cacique, as far as I could tell, was a less-supportive knockoff of the LeMystere; the straps are thinner and I was a lot "bouncier" (in a bad way) wearing them, which also meant more trips to the restroom to re-adjust. Wouldn't buy again. The Ambrielle was my favorite for years, until I outgrew their size range. I think the straps were closer together in the back, so they didn't fall off my shoulders as readily, and that was probably the closest I ever got to having a gore sit flat (but it still didn't, and many a bit of food found its way down there...).

Outside of that pretty narrow range of features, I've tried plain fabric/unmolded cups and they definitely don't give me enough support - my back always hurts within a couple hours of leaving the house. I like molded cups, wide padded straps, and underwire; I need as much support as I can get, honestly. I really don't care that much about the color or lace/appearance; I buy the plainest ones I can find, since they're usually what's on sale (usually some variation on "white person skin" shades). I have always had issues with shoulder straps sliding off my shoulders even tightened all the way, which I think is because they're fastened too far apart in the back, but I don't know how to do anything about that. I've never been able to find a racerback bra that didn't give me the plunge/front closure issue. I hate minimizers because they squish too much and it's uncomfortable. Considering how difficult it is to even find the two or three 40+'s in any given store (which usually turn out to be old-lady-minimizers), I'm pretty much ready to resign myself to never knowing what a good-fitting bra actually feels like, but this is a last-ditch effort before I just buy a bunch more Soma's and call it "good enough".

Thoughts? Advice? Recommendations?

Store suggestions? (I live in the DC area, and I've tried Nordstrom, with zero luck - couldn't even find anything molded in a G cup, let alone 40+!)

Thank you all so much for reading and for any help you can offer!!