To think that the West is seriously fucked up on the bosom front?

[Hullygully]

Bags of poison sewn into our infant feeding parts.

How fucked up is that?

Willow

Having small breasts is not a deformity. Having no breast on one or both sides due to illness is.

I am puzzled why you deliberately mix these...

...(and pregnancy)

Deformed...are you suggesting my friend is deformed ? She'll be pleased.

midori -

poison = the current pip scandal

Willowisp

I have no breasts - I have had breast cancer and bilateral masectomies.
I have been through every gamut of everything tit related.

When women who have had cancer have reconstruction (NOT just implants but all types of recon including DIEP, FLAP etc) they are approaching the whole issue from a VERY different perspective.

For one thing they are facing/have faced death. For another they have been through a year of chemotherapy and radiotherapy that has ripped the guts out of them.
Breast recon in many is an attempt to reclaim some hint of normality in their lives - it is NOT the same as women who opt to have unnecessary surgery to get bigger tits.
BC women also use reconstruction as a psychological weapon against the cancer - a way of fighting back. Again it is NOT the same as women who have surgery purely for vanity.

Plus, I very much doubt that even medical grade silicone leaking out into the body does it the world of good...

I agree, Mishtake. My cousing had a breast removed (cancer) at 30. Her other breast was large, so she chose reconstruction so she "matched." Another friend (older) chose to have the second breast removed and when she feels it necessary (ie not with close friends), she wears a bra with small padding under a t-shirt just to escape observation.

Both of these, interestingly, are about avoiding attention rather than attracting it.

Old Mumsy - I think your point is frankly mad and out of date!

I am beginning to think that people are looking for reasons to get huffy and take offence. Please don't. It is much more productive to remain calm and explore all the different points of view.

I'm slowly catching up on this very interesting and insightful thread.

I agree with Xenia and also wonder what happened to those phrases. When I look at the way teenagers dress these days and see my DD gasping to look like that, I particularly miss, "less is more" and, "the simpler, the better"

"Deformed...are you suggesting my friend is deformed ? She'll be pleased."

I do not know your friend and do not suggest she is deformed.

Also, English is not my first language, so if "deformed" implies "ugly" to you, I apologize and invite you to suggest another word...

What I meant is "altered" body ("de-formed" as removed from normal form) and I am sure this is exactly what you understood, but just decided to be difficult.

It is an attitude that is changing very quickly and I wonder why.

My friend (about 25 years ago) was tiny with huge boobs. At the time she got masses and masses of comments because her shape was so unusual.
Now seeing huge boobs on a tiny frame is so common as to be unremarkable. It has skewed our vision of what constitutes average.

So I think as they commonality of large breastedness increases, the extent to which younger flat chested women feel unusual increases. So the process of accepting that some women have big boobs, you just don't gets harder and harder.

bemybebe, I can see what you're saying and certainly the plastic surgery needs to be much more tightly regulated, but I don't think enough women undergo surgery for cosmetic reasons to alter perception of what is 'normal'. I think the media and the fashion industry do a much better job of that.

Hully, that a good question and one I can't easily answer without giving it a lot of thought, partly because it was a long time ago when I had my first surgery and partly because I don't really give my breasts a lot of thought in the scheme of things.

As for implants being poison, I do disagree. Silicone is found in the body, in breastmilk, in water. Medical grade silicone is not poisonous and even the industrial grade silicone found in PIP implants has not been found to be poisonous. That's not to say possibly women haven't had or aren't having problems because of it, but that is because the non medical grade silicone can be an irritant within the body. In a similar way, some people have horrendous reactions to penicillin, but that certainly doesn't mean it's poisonous. I appreciate you probably didn't mean the term literally (or maybe you did?) but it is incorrect.

I agree with Pag, a friend of mine had hers reduced as soon as she stopped growing (c 21 or so) as she was so abnormal (thin, huge boobs).

Now everyone wants to look like she did....

I'd not blame small chested women today if they wanted to get bigger boobs.... (in fact I suspect a lot of the frothing on here is by peopel who have never been in that position)

And IMO if it wasnt boobs it'd be something else, women seem to compete on all sorts of things irespective of whether men thingk its attrative or not.

"I think the media and the fashion industry do a much better job of that."

But midori this is just no true any more. 50,000 women with PIP breast implants alone, and if you look into South America (affluent parts of Brazil, Argentina in particular, not poorer rural regions) you will see what can happen here if cosmetic surgery industry is given free reign.

Obviously media has played its role. Fashion - I am not so sure, I certainly had much easier time buying designer clothes when I was 32AA size 6 - those super attractive clothes that still linger in my wardrobe . I cannot buy anything in those places anymore being 12-14 and 36C.

"50,000 women with PIP breast implants alone" in the UK

Hully

Yes - probably it is about concealment more than anything.
Most women only have the one breast removed - I felt incredibly lopsided and unbalanced.
When you have lost a breast entirely it ISN'T like being small breasted. You are almost concave - the skin rests directly on your rib cage. And you have no nipples - even men have nipples.
It isn't elegant and neat either - the scar puckers and there are "dog ears" of skin under the arms.
It is painful too.

There is actually a lot of pressure for BC women to reconstruct their breasts - thankfully things like breastfree.org/ exist to provide some balance and perspective.
I think the increased pressure for BC women to reconstruct is tied in with the escalation in cosmetic boob jobs. Given how much surgical intervention and appalling treatment cancer patients have had to undergo - 10 hour ops to chop their stomach off and stich it to their chest is really the last thing they need.

What if I had breast implants to restore me to my original cup size? I already had large breasts on a small frame. What difference does it make to society and statistics if I maintained them through luck or surgery?

Am I therefore entitled to large breasts because of my genetics? And y'all with smaller chests just have to put up with the hand you were dealt? The same would go for anyone with large boobs wanting a reduction. Put up or shut up. For the sisterhood!

Have we got tits or a medium to project a message to the world with?

why does everyone think for you on this site ?

Bemybebe I don't know about your first, second or third language. You wrote deformed, I read deformed. If you're unsure of a word, google it. Don't accuse me of being difficult. I still don't understand what you are trying to get across ?

mishtake - I'm sorry about your cancer. But please speak only from your pov. My friend has been through the same scenario & has an entirely different pov from you, which i am speaking about.

All opinions welcome, but please do lose the bullying & I know best tone. You only know what's best for you.

My friend is not concave & neither does she have to have bits of her back removed.

Her treatment was painful, draining, her mouth filled with ulcers & she felt terribly ill. But this treatment has (hopefully) saved her life. She doesn't refer to it being appalling, she calls it life saving.

She'll have her reconstruction (including new nipple) for herself & not because of an escalation in cosmetic boob jobs. She can't wait to feel normal again....her normal.

willowisp - aggressive much?

"fighting back" yes, that's another phrase that my friend hates. She had cancer, she was treated & she is living. If the cancer (please no) comes back, will you suggest she didn't 'fight' it enough ?

Maybe that's the difference...she's had it, dealt with it & moving on. I hope you can do the same.

BTW it's interesting you state that having breasts give you some sort of normality - welcome to my world.

Florie, I think the point is that people who have not had breast implants in order to send a message to the world, by definition, are not going to talk about it on this thread.

If someone, whether they have had implants or not, talks about the appearance of their breasts through messages on an open internet forum read by many people, I don't see how it can be argued that those people aren't making a social statement about their breasts.

Yes Mary, quite.

willow

You are extremely aggressive and unpleasant.
I do not speak for all women with breast cancer. I never claimed to.

Hiding this thread now because the level of ignorance and abuse is overwhelming.