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I’m 35, and finally coming to the realization that I just really don’t like my large breasts. So, I’ve started thinking about breast reduction, but find myself conflicted. Something about it feels like cheating, or betraying, the body that otherwise has served me so well.I would love to hear from the Offbeat Homies — both from folks who have had reductions or who have thought about it but took another course. -Claire
I have thought about getting a breast reduction since the moment in Junior High where they became DDs, seemingly overnight. One of my closest friends, who had the same size breasts as myself, got hers reduced from DDs to As — and she was ecstatic about it! Yeah, the process sucked, but the end result has been bringing her joy for years. I remember being super-jealous as I watched her pore through porn magazines, getting to hand-pick what her new breasts would look like (breast size + nipple fashion).
90% of the reasons I’ve never lopped ’em off is of my crippling fears of doctors, surgery, stitches, pain, etc. Then there’s the 10% reason of, “aw, I feel like I’d miss the big ‘ol girls.” (They’re good cuddlers.)
Who else here has considered altering their boobies? What all did you take into account when making your ultimate choice?
I had a reduction when I was 20 (am 35 now) and have no regrets. I had 2.2kg of tissue removed, and it made a huge change to my ability to buy clothes, my back pain, and my confidence. The scars now aren’t very noticeable, and I would absolutely do it again – it changed my life! I can run now, go up and down stairs without punching myself in the face, can buy bras off the rack, can buy clothes, and I’m still at a C-D cup, so have a lot left.
I had a reduction done in 2008. It was the best decision I ever made. I agree to make sure that you do your research and find a great plastic surgeon. I went from a G to a B/C. On my short frame my larger breasts gave me life-long back and neck problems. After my reduction 95% of my pain was gone. I would do it 10 times again. If you are even thinking about it and can afford to do it, it would probably be a good idea, but make sure your expectations are realistic. There will be scarring and mine did grow a little due to I had them done before I got pregnant. I say at least look into it.
THANK YOU everyone so much for your amazing comments on this thread. I submitted the original question and just luckily came to the site now and saw it got posted and sparked such a useful conversation. Really, THANKS for your comments and sharing all your experiences. So helpful.
I’m still undecided, and I think part of it is that I am still breastfeeding, and probably will be for another 12 months or so. I’m a small person – barely five feet and about 120 pounds – but my breasts have always been big (I remember hearing the black eye joke while trying out for a track meet in 5th grade). They got way bigger after nursing my first – and never returned to baseline, and now they’ve gotten bigger still while nursing my second (I’m currently at 36G, down from 36H a few months after my second was born). I’m done having kids, and I will wait and see what happens when I’m done nursing and they have some time to stabilize. I am trying to remember that things might still change; and I can’t wear underwire while I’m nursing or I get plugged ducts, so my bras aren’t really doing the job they need to do. I’m at a delicate stage in terms of body image so won’t make any decisions right now.
I’m lucky in that I don’t have pain associated with my huge breasts, but they definitely affect my body image. A lot. And I’m just kind of sick of it. I feel like the first thing anyone notices about me are my weirdly enormous breasts. As a result, I wear pretty much the same four t-shirts day in and day out, and often cover up with baggy sweaters or cardigans, which I know aren’t flattering, but make me feel more comfortable. I also think they make it hard to exercise the way I want to (running is uncomfortable, a lot of yoga asanas smother me – though I try to do both anyway), which feeds into this whole body image thing. I kind of try to pretend they aren’t there, and then when I see myself in a photo or a full body mirror, I’m sort of shocked all over again.
I’m definitely afraid of the surgery, and you guys reiterating that it really is a pretty serious surgery with major downtime afterwards is very useful, especially Meg, your comments about coping with small kids after having it done. It seems like most people agree that it’s hard, but pretty much everyone who has it done is glad they did it. Which is consistent with the other stuff I’ve been reading on the interwebs; I think it has one of the highest patient satisfaction scores of any elective surgery. I know births are so different, but if anyone had a drawn out and difficult natural birth to compare the recovery to, that would be awesome!
Thanks again so much!
You are so very welcome Claire :). I will say that a breast reduction is *major* surgery, in that it should never be done as a same-day procedure. And there are inherent risks with all surgeries that put you under complete anesthesia. All I can say was that my recovery was not difficult. I was off the major pain killers 3 days post-op – 2nd day home from the hospital. I slept most of that first week, and had my little kidlets (ages 2 & 4 at the time) come and spend time with me on the bed. By the second week I was still not allowed to drive, but other than not lifting my arms above my chest, I felt fine. It’s why I went back to work 2 weeks after surgery. I should have stayed home that extra week only because I remember being VERY tired at the end of each day that first week back to work.
I am so happy to hear that you are breast feeding :D. I’ll tell you something cool – my daughter self-weaned at 17 months old, and I had my BR 9 months later. My surgeon told me afterwards that there was still “significant” amounts of milk in my ducts. How cool is that?
Self-esteem is a HUGE part of breast reductions. I too felt that it’s the first thing anyone saw on me. True story: when I informed my (all female) coworkers of my impending surgery, I’ll never forget one woman’s reaction. You have to imagine that (1) she’d only been with the company for 3 weeks, and (2) she stood 5’11” and approx. 275 lbs. She replied “After my interview with you guys I went home and told my husband OMG you should see this girl with the biggest boobs you’ve ever seen that I interviewed with!”
Right there I knew I’d made the best decision to have the surgery. Because there was no way in HELL I would ever go home to my husband and say “you wouldn’t believe the immensely obese woman that interviewed today”. KWIM?
Please feel free to ask me any other questions regarding the surgery and afterwards. I *can* tell you that I am now a 5k runner, belly dance, and square dance, both for fun and exercise. I was never comfortable beforehand doing any of that. Especially the running. I am currently training to run my first 10k in May.
Meg, thank you so much for this. That story is like my worst nightmare: it’s what I think everyone thinks about me! A lot of my even really close girlfriends have a habit of sort of teasing me about my breasts and I try to brush it off, but it really, really upsets me, and I’m frankly just sort of tired of feeling that way. I’m so glad you are happy with the results of your surgery and are doing all these new activities. That is so awesome!
Also, breastfeeding all the way. It’s worked really well for our family with both kids, and I’ve really enjoyed it, been super lucky to have no problems at all; my first self-weaned at 18 months and I’m hoping to go at least that long with my second. The only downside is the ridiculous size my breasts have become; sometimes I get sort of sad when I look down and see my enormous boob in my bub’s mouth. It’s way bigger than his head and it’s just so weird. BUT they’ve also served both kids so well, and I’m so so grateful for that. And I feel like it’s part of the reason I feel torn; I feel almost like it’s a kind of betrayal to my body to want to change this part of me so fundamentally. I’m also anxious about the risks of major surgery, especially with two young kids. If something went really wrong…I don’t know. It’s hard to even think about taking that (admittedly small) risk when the problem for me is really cosmetic. Do you know what I mean?
Thanks again for your comments, I really appreciate your insights!
I feel the same way about breastfeeding! I am a 36F and am currently breastfeeding my almost-4 month old. I am barely 5’1″ and I can no longer wear any button down shirts. My chest is huge. I thought about chest reduction for years due to gender identity (I ID as genderqueer), but never went through with it. I was a 36D prior to surgery and it was bad enough, but this is just awful. I look at pictures of myself and ask who IS that large breasted person? Also I could manage to run before and it hurts a lot now. My wife is a 32 K and my breasts seem to be about the same size. I always thought of hers as enormous and sort of pitied her for them because they are so heavy and painful for her (she intends to have a reduction as soon as we are done having kids), and now we are basically the same–it is shocking to me.
I love being able to breastfeed but am 99% sure we are done birthing kids. I think my chest is probably too small to get insurance to cover reduction, but I hate that it is no longer comfortable to sleep without a bra. I hate bras.
My large breasts were quite a hassle to deal with. I was a B cup when I was twelve and gained a cup size pretty much every year that followed. I received a ton of unwanted attention, I was in pain all the time, nothing fit… I liked having large breasts, but it was like life just wouldn’t let me be happy with them. (If that makes sense?) When I was eighteen, my mom got a reduction and was ecstatic about it. With her being so happy, buying new outfits, and telling me I should get one too, I followed her lead.
Shortly after my nineteenth birthday, I had a pretty major reduction from a 36H to a 36D. That’s still rather big, and I had to reassure the doctor several times that, no, I really didn’t want to go any smaller than that.
I’ve gained some weight since then, and my breasts have gotten larger, but they’re still somewhat proportional to my body now. I honestly can’t even imagine how big they’d be now if I gained this weight and hadn’t had the surgery. I’m nearly five years out, and I’m mostly happy with having done it. I struggled for a while because I didn’t really want the surgery, I just didn’t want the back pain and to deal with the constant feeling that my body was wrong in some way (which was how I always felt when I couldn’t find bras that would fit me, even in specialty shops).
Some of the negatives are/were:
– pretty serious scarring. My scars have faded a lot, but they are more prominent than I’m comfortable with, especially in some places where they are raised. The ones across my breasts don’t bother me too much, but the ones around my nipples still upset me sometimes. I also had a lot of scar tissue inside my breasts that hurt and made wearing bras very uncomfortable. That’s gotten a lot better, but if I wear uncomfortable bras, my breasts are a lot more sore than they would have been prior to surgery.
– the tightness. Stretching is a thing I couldn’t do for a very long time. My scars extend towards my back, under my arms, and it still hurts if I try to reach too far over my head.
– you can lose the ability to breastfeed or the feeling in your nipples. The former wasn’t very important to me because I have other issues that mean I might not be able to have children, anyway. But the second was a pretty scary prospect. I didn’t suffer any loss of feeling, except for the scarred areas of my breasts. It doesn’t bother me too much, except if someone touches those areas.
– all the general effects of surgery. These are a given. Pain, recovery time, the possibility of infection etc. It’s a pretty serious surgery. I needed a lot of help to do very basic things and the pain was unbelievable. Being younger, I recovered much more quickly than others, like my mother, did. But it was still a long time until I was really okay. Months after the fact, I would still crying if I bumped my scars on a chair back or something.
If your breasts really bother you and the risks seem worth it, then you should totally get the surgery. Everyone I’ve known that had it was thrilled, and I seem to be the only one that wasn’t. But I think I was just really young, and made the decision kind of rashly. I still don’t regret it, though.
Some advice, if you decide on surgery:
– Look for a really talented surgeon. Some are WAY better than others. Ask to see pictures of other surgeries they’ve performed, specifically ones that will be comparable to your before and after sizes.
– If you can, opt for (what I believe is called) the transverse breast reduction technique. (This means incisions around your nipple and one horizontal incision across your breast and no incision connecting the two.) In the anchor style, which is more common, the incisions meet and this affects healing time and makes it more likely for stitches to open up. The doctor I settled with refused to use the anchor technique altogether for these reasons.
– It’s not very common now, but some doctors will sever the nipple completely, instead of preserving the connections to the underlying ducts and such. If your doctor wants to do this, see another one.
– Don’t worry about their size/shape immediately after the surgery. Mine looked very weird for a while, and it scared me, because I’d seen people’s post op pics that looked so much better than mine. Mine seemed flat and almost squarish and I was devastated. It took several months for them to really settle and look normal.
That’s really all I can think of. But I’m happy to talk about it more if you have questions or anything. Sorry this was so long, but I know it’s a huge decision, so I wanted to share.
I’m 17, 5 ft, and 120 pounds. Overnight (literally) I grew from an A to a DDD a few years ago. Then I grew up to a G. I’m tiny and post breast growth, was super athletic. (I’m still pretty active now though) Now I cannot run without significant pain. My goal since I was a little girl is to serve in the Navy. That goal is almost unattainable now. My doctor recommended a breast reduction. My breasts aren’t that big in comparison to some other women’s, but they are very disproportionate to my body and cause significant back pain. Plus, my shoulders have a grove in them now due to my bra straps. Not to mention scars all around my breasts due to wires breaking in my bras and just the bras in general. I’ve received a lot of unwanted attention due to my breasts and I was even sexually harassed and assaulted due to my disproportionate and large breasts (the assaulter even said that) so I just really want to know if it is worth it.
I guess what I’m asking for is advice.
1. Is it worth it? The idea to be able to run again without pain almost brings me to tears, but there is a lot I may be giving up. I still want to have children (and I know they will grow with kids) and I want to breastfeed said children. Is that still possible?
2. Is there any rule that says women with breast reduction cannot be in the US Military? I haven’t heard of one (and it would be a stupid rule) but I want to double check.
3. What other advice do you have.
I know it’s a good idea to wait, but I don’t really have that option. My breasts haven’t really grown at all since they jumped to a G, but I am realistic about the fact that they may grow.
Hi Anastasia,
I can only give an answer two number 3: Even if you decide to have a breast reduction it’s a good idea to get fitted before and have well fitting bras until surgery. Of course, a brafitting after reduction is necessary, too 😉
Especially a good fitting and supporting sports bra would be great for your athletic needs (there are sports bras that go up to N-Cup and keep you supported even while running)!
If you’re in the US I would recommend contacting Erica vom A Sophisticated Pair. In Canada Claire from Butterfly Collection is great! Both also have very informative blogs and Youtube channels about breasts, bras and brafitting.
All the best and kind regards from Berlin,
Anja 🙂
I had one when I was 17. I had a giant chest and was a relatively smaller girl (I had started to gain weight since even double sports bras left me in pain while playing sports). The unwanted attention left me constantly on guard, giant breasts held me back from enjoying sports/swimming, friends got insanely upset when I’d try on their clothes, and when I found clothes that fit I’d end up looking very sexual (hint: giant cleavage makes everything but turtle necks look sexual. I got tank tops banned at my high school)
There are times when I wish for a moment I still had them, but I know I made the right choice for me.
I wear a large B to small C cup. I am very unhappy with this breast size. All my life I have wanted small breasts and I wish to be an A cup. I have very negative body issues so my size makes me very uncomfortable. I don’t feel I am proportioned. I know this all sounds crazy. Would a plastic surgeon do a reduction from C/B to A cup ? I would be willing to pay for this since I know insurance won’t cover it. Not big enough etc…