Mastectomy (transgender and possible breast cancer gene)

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Really don't want to waste NHS time/money with this as I'm genderqueer and not full trans, but I want my breasts removed. I feel like I'm enough of a drain on resources with ASD, depression, anxiety, and suspected other MH problems. My mother is currently in remission for breast cancer, and while she insists no one else in the family has had it, I would like to find out if in our case it may be genetic. (I'm pretty sure our menstrual issues are, by at least three generations.)

Would be the final kick in the bollocks (so to speak) if I were to die of breast cancer when I never wanted to have breasts in the first place. It causes me significant distress, but my friends won't take me seriously about this because as far as they're concerned "You can just get it on the NHS" and "Why would you want to pay?" My feeling that if I've survived to 22 it isn't urgent is ignored, and I cannot seem to get advice on funding this myself. (I definitely can't afford to, by the way, but I would prefer to be able to.)

Interested in the MN take on this as although I don't plan on having children "naturally" (I've wanted to adopt since childhood, and feel that my gender identity is completely irrelevant), I wouldn't want downstairs surgery because I would like to preserve the option to reproduce, should my similar-aged relatives find that they are unsuccessful and wish I had had kids / could donate eggs. (Also, my mother never wanted to give birth at my age, so...) I have suspected endometriosis which is fortunately controlled by Cerazette at this time, but without Cerazette it is fair to say my dysphoria would be unbearable and then a hysterectomy would be well on the cards for, as with the mastectomy, a mixture of medical and psychological reasons. I don't even know if I am fertile.

Am I massively overthinking this? The bottom line is I could take or leave a penis, but I want my breasts gone. The negative association has become unbearable since my mother's cancer, more through a sense of injustice over not only having woman parts but particularly faulty ones at that.

What would you say you to your 22 y/o DC if it was them? Constructive criticism and weak platitudes absolutely welcome; I'm not oversensitive to well-meaning comments. Thanks for reading!

I'm not really sure that I understand what you're asking about the NHS funding a mastectomy. You want a mastectomy, but you don't want the NHS to have to fund it, but equally you can't fund it yourself? If that's the case then this is all theoretical as you can't move forwards?

Getting tested for genetic indicators of breast cancer is a separate issue I think. You could approach your GP about your family history and ask if the testing is a possibility. They may say no, in which case could you pay for that privately?

More generally, there is a part of your body that you dislike, causes you distress and that you would like to modify. This is a common thing in our society, hence the vast numbers of private plastic surgeons that exist that modify people's bodies in a myriad of ways. Can you look into how much it would cost to have an operation like this privately, and then start to save up for it? It may take a while, but you would be able to plan how long it would take you.

To get this surgery on the NHS, I would have thought that there would be a long process to demonstrate that it is the right thing for you, and perhaps an expectation that you are wanting to transition to male. This doesn't seem to be what you want to do though, so that might affect whether you'd be eligible for the surgery? The only way to know is to start a dialogue with the right people in the NHS, and find out what the options are.

Hello fellow GQ person!

I'd get rid of them. No question about it. I hate mine, and if there was a "legitimate" reason like cancer risk to get it done, I'd be there like a shot!

If you wanted to go down the gender identity route, it's possible I think. According to my local GIC, they do see GQ people, but I'd still worry that there was the expectation of needing to lie and say I was FTM in order to get anything actually done.

With regard to the penis issue, I think it's pretty common for binary FTM people to "only" get hormones and mastectomy, as bottom surgery isn't that great, so I've heard, so you wouldn't necessarily have pressure to get phalloplasty etc done. However, hormones, of course, will cause changes down there.