i think the first thing you have to know about me is that i have extensively obsessive boob issues. my entire life has been about my breasts. i come from a long line of large breasted woman, but i was a late bloomer. and ever since i was a child, i wanted a set. bad. i was raised watching boobilicous cartoon super heros like wonderwoman, batgirl, catwoman & she-ra and couldn’t wait to fill in my underoos.
in fact, there are pictures of me when i was around 8, dressing up in my mother’s bras. i wanted boobs B A D. i did those crazy exercises, “we must, we must, improve our bust,” religiously every night before bed. i demanded my early bloomer friends show me what they had. i convinced my mom to buy me bras when i was in sixth grade & stuffed ‘em full of undies. That was a brilliant idea until one fell out on the swings during recess. STONE COLD BUSTED. not one of my proudest moments.
then my prayers were answered before my sophomore year of high school, when i was 15, & i sprouted a set of full C’s by the end of the summer. i came back to school with a sweet rack and was thereafter accused of sticking my chest out when i walked around. but, i wasn’t, haters! those were legit! soon the attention got to me & so did the inescapable teenage bad body image. that was the downfall of my super set. i started wearing minimizer bras. oh, the horror! by my senior year of college my boobs hadn’t stopped growing and i was 5’0″ (okay 4’11 1/2″) & 93 pounds, with DOUBLE D’s.
okay, so many did get enjoy them, but even though i had the perfect body, i hated it! yes, i was a DUMB BEYATCH! i began trying to hide the goods with baggy shirts and became more and more miserable. add in the fact that my mom has had gigunda tatas since she was 10 and she always HATED them and told me so daily. so she was on board the same unhealthy body image bandwagon that i was.
one day during a break between semesters, i saw a large breasted friend of mine. she spilled the beans that she was getting a breast-reduction and i was stunned that there was such a thing. sure I knew about implants, but making them smaller? and just like that, i decided i wanted to lop my boobs off too. i told my bff in crime, millie, (no names have been changed to protect the guilty) about my plan and she told me i was nuts & not to do it. “you have what everyone wants, ” she said. but, that only made me more determined, because i thought no one could possibly understand the plight of a petite huge breasted woman. besides the fact, that i am not a chick that ever listened to anybody. once something was in my head, there was no stopping me. i was sure the reduction was the answer to all my problems. the plastic surgeon with whom we consulted convinced me i would develop major back problems and the life before me would be that of an invalid, albeit, a sexy invalid, if i continued to carry those things around on my “petite frame.” what did he care? i was about to lose my tatas, but he was about to make a wad of cash. so after college I did the deed, and this, my friends, (all 3 of you reading this) is where my story gets really sad: the night before the surgery i had doubts about it & wasn’t sure i even wanted to do it, but i stuffed that down & ignored my gut. (exactly like the night before my now failed marriage, but that is another story entirely.) the other tragic twist is this: the insurance company rejected the pre-approval for the surgery at first. my father who would do anything for us & had no boobs himself lobbied the insurance company until they approved it. no one was telling his daughter she couldn’t chop her tits off.
Life Lesson One: Sometimes it is best to leave well enough alone. SIGH.
the ensuing recovery was a painful, awful, terror & when i first unwrapped my new jugs they were TINY. i had a full B & was feeling the first signs of remorse. the scars were hideous. when i gasped upon first seeing them, i said to my mother, “they are so small!” Her response was to say, “don’t let your sister hear you say that.” it was no secret boobs were not evenly assigned in my family. not only did I feel remorse, but i now had guilt too, and i had to keep it all to myself.
so, i tried to be okay with the boob issue for a few years by wearing mondo padded bras but regret slowly began creeping in until i couldn’t bare to even think about it anymore. i could no longer face my own girls in the mirror, but i became obsessed with other boobs, and just like a guy, i was always checking others chick’s racks out. i needed intensive boob therapy to get over it.
well, fast forward to pregnancy: i was now stressing that i wouldn’t be able to nurse because things may not have been reattached right, BUT, i had giant preggo boobs. it was awesome – AND the boobs stayed big & grew with each kid. so naturally, I wanted to have 4 or 5 kids. i was able to nurse, luckily, or not so luckily depending upon how you look at it – my life became even more about my boobs. there is no pain like engorged boobie pain and trying to get an ill tempered infant to latch onto a full boob. it seems logical that employing the fun bags for their actual intended use would be a snap, but its not and i elicited help from anybody within a 5 mile radius. forget the fact, the i went to an actual class to learn how to do this beforehand. useless. once the hungry screamer & i finally figured it out, my life was lived in 2 hour increments of nipple desecration and my life became a blur of boob chores – pumping, massaging, feeding, crying… and don’t get me started on nursing bras.
then several years ago, i found a lump in my right breast & it was terrifying. i had to to get my boobs mashed in the mammogram machine several different times which confirmed a suspicious lump. so, i had a biopsy & was told it had to be removed and they still weren’t sure if it was the c-word. i had it removed and thank God it was benign. of course, i had to have the lump removed from the smaller boob and i am sporting yet another scar which i tell dudes is a stab-wound ( it’s much more mysterious). i really just found the whole thing to be completely ironic. i wondered if there was no end to the suffering of my poor breasts.
the happy-ish ending is that I have made peace with the girls again (back to a DD thanks to the 2 babies), but feel terrible for treating my body that brutally. i hate the scars though they have mostly faded & are hidden by the (dare I say it) sagging (sigh). in a weird way i feel like they are fakes, because they have been altered.
so what is the moral of the story? mamas don’t let your girls screw with their bodies. they just need self confidence & your support to learn to love their bodies. plastic surgery isn’t the answer that we all think it is. i would absolutely discourage my girls from doing anything to their bodies at such a young age. women have it so tough, our boobs are too small or too big, but never just right. so ladies, love your gazungas no mater what size they are! they are part of what makes you, you, but they don’t define you. i finally realized, it doesn’t matter what size your boobs are, men will stare. it doesn’t matter what your body looks like as long as your head is on right. boobs & the women attached to them will always be used to sell stuff on tv. we will always use our boobs to get men to do what we want. men will always be on a quest to see ‘em no matter what size they are. they love ‘em all.
Life Lesson Two: Its all about confidence & good body image.
DUH. thanks epiphany for coming way late, but at least i figured it out. eventually.
