#breast surgery

For context, I went down about seven cup sizes and still ended up with what I consider a respectable bosom. Insurance "covered" the surgery and getting the approval was far easier than I had feared it would be.

Here are a few of the revelations I've had in the last few months.

Leading up to the surgery, the negative feelings I felt for years towards my breasts got SO MUCH WORSE. And my awareness of them also increased. It was unexpected and severe. The fact that a solution was imminent was the only thing that kept me from cracking under how strong those emotions were.

The first thing I noticed when I woke up after surgery was that breathing felt significantly easier - almost like a huge weight had been taken of my chest or something.

The results looked scary the first time I unwrapped them to shower. On top of the incisions, which looked worse than they were because of the stuff they used to cover and protect the site, there was also significant bruising and a lot of swelling. BUT I was already so in love with how much better I felt that I honestly didn't really care how they looked.

Time has drastically improved their appearance and I think they turned out better than I dared to hope even though it's still early days.

The constant neck and shoulder pain I've had for almost 20 years was gone within a few days and hasn't come back.

After a week of recovery, when I started to dress to return to work, I had a pang of disappointment that my shirts didn't look oversized like I had expected. Since my day to day existence had improved so much, I tried really hard not to dwell on this one thing that didn't turn out how I expected.

Despite telling myself to let it go, I kept studying my reflection. It took another week until something finally clicked and one day I grabbed a handful of shirt and pulled the whole thing to the side and suddenly I could see how much extra fabric there was. My old clothes were too big, I just literally needed time to allow my mental image of myself to shift and adapt around the drastic change that had happened.

I was happy enough with that revelation, but a month after that, I glanced up one day, saw myself in a mirror, there was another click, and I could suddenly see that the very same shirts that seemed like they fit me a few weeks prior were way too big on me. After that, I couldn't unsee it.

It feels like for the first time in years, I've started to see other parts of myself. I keep noticing things and wondering how I managed to reach my current age without actually LOOKING at myself once in a while. I hadn't realized how much I had avoided that more and more as the years passed.

Beyond how I actually see my physical self starting to change, I've found the way I assess myself is also shifting. I used to have this (probably flawed) idea that I was somewhat sturdy. I suspect wearing large or XL shirts gave me the impression that I had moved away from the stick-thin teenager I used to be. But now that I can finally dress in clothes that fit... I can feel myself becoming aware of the fact that I am actually physically smaller than I was previously conscious of.

I had to come to terms with the fact that, for a few months, I didn't know what shirt size I wore. By sheer dumb luck I got asked by two different co-workers on the same day (for valid reasons) what size I preferred and it was kind of surreal. All those years of lived experience I would normally use to formulate a response is no longer relevant for me in my current state and I hadn't gone out yet to try to buy new shirts so I floundered a bit. I had to quickly come to terms with being an adult in their 40s who doesn't know her own shirt size.

I can wear cute bras now! I can wear bralettes! I can walk into a store and find bras in my size and try them on! I have the option to choose something I like instead of settling for something I scrounged up online that might work but looks utilitarian at best and is inevitably uncomfortable.

Going braless is actually something I could do now if I wanted.

I can run! Those three words alone are almost enough to make me tear up. I have a kid. I can run around with my kid without being in pain every step of the way or crossing my arms over my chest to awkwardly hold things in place. It's pure joy. It almost feels like running felt when I was a kid, motion just for the love of being able to move.

Prior to surgery, clothes shopping had become anathema to me. Tops had to be large enough to fit my bust which usually meant at least two sizes too large for all of the rest of me. I suspect this is part of the reason it took so long for me to recognize how badly things fit me after surgery, because things fitting badly on most of me was normal. The avoidant feelings haven't magically disappeared, but a dear friend came for a visit and took me out to get a few tops that fit for the first time in literal years and it was so good. I had fun and I ended the day happy rather than emotional bereft.

At my most recent follow-up, my surgeon showed me my before images and it was bizarre. The body that I used to inhabit, but had disliked for so long I barely bothered to look at it anymore, the thing that used to be my ordinary looked so abnormal that it felt almost incomprehensible. Like my brain was telling me it was a fake, exaggerated image, except I know it's not. But my own mental image of myself has already shifted drastically away from what was and towards how I look now. It's very interesting to poke at. Like a missing tooth but nicer.

And something amusing to end off the list for now - crossing my arms feels strange. In the past, when I did it, my arms would be quite full and now they... aren't. At least not in the same, overflowing way. Which is, so far, the only possible, long term con I can think of, because now, crossing my arms is a slightly less effective way to conserve heat when I'm feeling cold. In the grand scheme of things, that's literally nothing compared to all the benefits, but I cackled when I had that realization, so it makes the list.