Friend wants top surgery

[Jigglypufff]

One of my closest friends is saying they are non binary and has changed their name. I have gone along the route of not making it a big deal, like "ah that's nice pal, which film shall we go to see this weekend."
I don't know if this is the right tactic. I have been vocal about the fact that I don't understand why we would be boxing gender into stereo types- ie. Makeup and high heels does not a woman make. You can wear masculine looking clothes and still be a woman. Etc.

They now are saving for top surgery. Should I just keep with my current tactic? Im worried about side effects? They aren't on any hormones.

I just feel a bit like it's getting away from them, the name change etc has been very quick after announcing they are non binary.

I'm also a bit sad if I have the right to feel that.

I think you should be honest, I would hope my friends would be honest with be

I don’t like the euphemistic term top surgery
its a mastectomy and really quite radical surgery

I would be honest - removing her breasts doesn’t mean she’s not a woman

I don’t understand what non-binary really means - what does your friend think it is and why does removing her breasts help with this?

be prepared to lose the friendship tho

Whilst it's true that a double mastectomy will not stop your friend from being a woman, no one needs your permission or approval to believe what they want or to have any legal elective surgery they wish to on their body provided they have mental capacity.

If you value the friendship then be a friend. You aren't being asked to recite a creed that you believe this person has achieved some kind of metaphysical status of not being a woman through this surgery. You don't need to announce your lack of belief.

Can you talk to her more about why she wants this done?

I'm pretty sure the number of male non binary people who have had their penises removed is zero.

Be honest with your friend and tell her what you think. Also don't use the infantilising "top surgery", say exactly what it would be - an elective bilateral mastectomy.

How old is this person?

If you value the friendship then be a friend.

A friend would not want someone to mutilate themselves in a way that will cause lifelong pain.

Sorry, I'm used to them saying top surgery all the time.

They are 29.

Does she want children?

No they don't want children.

Offering an alternate perspective here; for reference, I am non-binary and have had a double mastectomy. I am not on hormones, never have been and never plan to be- I consider my "transition", such as it is, complete. I do not believe that stereotypes are what makes someone a woman, and I know many women who wear more "masculine looking clothes" without compromising their identity as a woman. Just because I consider myself non-binary does not mean I think everyone else outside of rigid gender stereotypes should feel the same!

Being over a year post-op, I appreciate I can't say for certain how I'll feel long-term. But right now? I am more comfortable in my body than I ever was beforehand. While yes, most people understandably recognise me as female, in my own image I finally feel right. Like myself. It's not a feeling I can logically explain, or a feeling I think necessarily can be logically explained, but it works for me. Though I can understand why you would feel sad about it in some way, I hope your friend finds the same peace in their choices as I have with mine.

My advice is effectively to carry on as you are; you do not have to compromise your opinions, be happy about your friend's choices or cheer them on in any sense. Keep talking about gender stereotypes and non-conformity, but I'd try t go about it without a view to changing their mind. It'll just frustrate the both of you. As a previous poster said, be a friend! As you said you're not making a big deal out of it, it sounds to me like you're well on the right track.

@nbartist

Thank you some much for this perspective. I really appreciate it. Thank you for your advice. 🙂

Non-binary is a trick. It means that women have to conform to sex stereotypes or they are not women. It means that a woman is someone who 'performs femininity'. It's just another way to allow men to be women and to detach women from woman.

I worry that many of the women who are removing their breasts and choosing an NB identity are rejecting womanhood because of abuse by men. Most f the NB women I know fall into this category. Identifying out of pains and abuse.

@nbartist Ooh - I've wanted to ask this question for ages and never had a chance! What is the difference between a person who is "binary" and a person who is "non-binary"? Is there a difference?

And I do agree with your advice to @Jigglypufff , no-one is going to change someone else's mind about this. A friend can accept that other friends do things we don't understand or even that we don't agree with, and we can still be friends. We don't have to argue it out with them.

And I worry that, in the fullness of time, they will realise too late that they cannot identify out of female oppression.

Removing ones breasts will not prevent lower pay, harassment, the second shift, period pain, etc etc etc

Society knows who we are, whatever size our breasts are.

It's so sad that women want to do this to themselves.

OP, what you say really depends on how much you want to remain on good terms with this friend, and also how much you feel you can keep quiet. It's like any other big issue a friend may involve themselves in (eg having an affair, leaving a spouse, borrowing a lot of money) - yes they don't need your approval but if you really feel they're making a mistake it's going to be difficult to spend time with them unless you can find a way to avoid it coming up. It's going to depend whether they will expect your approval/ tolerate knowing you don't really think it's a great idea.

Like the other big issues i mentioned, I don't think I could avoid asking questions to see whether they'd thought it through.

Incidentally, my mum had a mastectomy for breast cancer. It's major bloody surgery. She had to have drains in after, do physio etc. You can lose some movement after if you don't take proper care, or if you have complications. When I see what she went through it makes me angry that people euphemistically speak of 'top surgery'.

It ain't nothing!

It's sad that your friend has decided to adopt an identity invented a few years ago that culminates in her committing an act of mutilation against her body.

But other posters are correct in that it's unlikely you can say anything to stop her going down this nonsensical path of self-harm.

That shouldn't dissuade you from expressing your own beliefs about what she's planning to inflict upon herself though.

My main worries about people wanting procedures like this are that all surgery entails risk, and as someone who’s unfortunately had to have more than a few surgical procedures carried out in my life, I would advise people to avoid elective/medically unnecessary surgery. Our culture is very keen on pushing cosmetic surgery but human bodies are not lego and operating on the body doesn’t always produce optimal results and is sometimes storing up issues for the future.

Anaesthetic carries a risk, there’s a risk of wound infection and adhesion. There’s also the risk of scars coming apart in the future or wound dehiscence where wounds fail to heal. There are too many complications that come with surgery of any kind that someone who hasn’t had any surgery might dismiss. Antibiotics don’t fix everything and surgeons don’t care about your post-op problems after they’ve done their job of operating on you.

As an older woman, I advise young people that if they have a healthy body then try to keep it that way for as long as possible because you will be glad of it when you’re older and start to experience the issues involved in aging. Also, some surgeons think they can fix everything with surgery - it’s very much having a hammer and seeing every problem as a nail - so I would advise that your friend try other less potentially damaging ways to deal with her body issues before considering undergoing surgery.

What makes you non-binary and not just a woman who didn't like having big boobs?

OP - your friend seems to think the physical body has something to do with whether someone is a man, woman, or neither? Aren't they worried this will come across as transphobic?

TRAs are vocal about the belief that being man/woman is determined by your internal gender, and that it's TERFy to think female=woman, male=man.

I'll only answer the couple of questions which have already come up because I hate derailing a thread from the OPs original question, which always seems to happen when I join a thread from the NB perspective 😅

The difference between me, a non-binary person and an identical person who doesn't identify as non-binary is mostly preference. I prefer the term non-binary and I prefer to cope with my minimal dysphoria by using a gender-neutral name, they/them pronouns (among those who are happy to), and this one surgery. I believe that there are many women out there with very similar feelings who fully consider themselves women and don't feel the need for take the same steps as I do to achieve comfort within themselves, or perhaps they're content with the discomfort. Either way, it's not a physical difference but an emotional one.

And secondly, to the other poster who asked what makes me different from a woman who just doesn't like having big boobs- I suppose the difference is summarised best in one of the questions I was asked in my pre-surgery psych evaluation. I was asked why I want a double mastectomy as opposed to a breast reduction, and the answer was that a reduction would feel unfinished. It wasn't the right option for me and I wouldn't have been comfortable with it. The problem was not the size, though that was a secondary factor; the problem was that they made me uncomfortable emotionally more than physically. I no longer have that discomfort, in fact, I've said before that the best result of surgery was that my chest, my boobs- I just don't think about them anymore. They don't bother me anymore. I don't know if women who are simply uncomfortable with the size of their breasts would feel the same way about a mastectomy as opposed to a reduction, though I appreciate my experience is simply one person's perspective.

Tbh of the people I know that I know have done this I just try not to think about it. Not my business.

On a societal level I find it horrible that women get their breasts enlarged, lifted and removed in order to feel some kind of comfort in the world. To me, all of these things are extreme forms of dissociation and self harm. The non-binary man i know has not had any surgery. I would have some expectation that the urge to self harm might resurrect itself further down the line. But on an individual level... my friend is my friend. The best friendship I can offer is acceptance.

Why do you keep referring to her as plural?

Because they use they/them pronouns.

So you've bought into the whole non-binary ideology? You believe it enough to think that you must use her preferred pronouns for a conversation on a website that she is not part of?