Breast Cancer Gave Me the Boobs I’ve Always Wanted

It took a cancer diagnosis to finally get the breast reduction I have wanted since I was a teenager.

The way I see it, my breast cancer story begins way back in fifth grade. I’ve just moved from a very small school in suburban New Jersey to a much larger school in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia. Luckily, a pretty girl named Beth comes to my rescue on my first day in this bewildering new environment. Tall and slim, with perfect bangs and a soft-edged Southern accent, Beth declares herself my guide and new best friend. She spends the first few weeks of school sitting next to me and telling me which teachers and kids to avoid and which are “so sweet.”

Then, without explanation she drops me like I’m poison. I don’t blame her. I’m a weird, feral kid being raised by hippies. I don’t go to church and church is everything in Lynchburg, Virginia (if you don’t know the history of the Moral Majority movement, look it up). And while Beth is a girly girl, I’m anything but. I’m a tree-climbing, woods-wandering, wild child.

I’m also oblivious to the fact that my 11-year-old body has recently decided to sprout noticeable breasts. But Beth is not oblivious. About a month into my tenure as the class new girl, Beth notices the change. And that day in the cafeteria she makes sure everyone else does, too.

Here’s how it happens: I’m carrying my lunch tray across the cafeteria when a group of mean girls, led by Beth, starts pointing at my newly acquired breasts and claiming I’ve stuffed my bra. I wasn’t wearing one. But in that mortifying moment, looking down at my favorite T-shirt, the one with little blue flowers sprinkled across it, I finally notice what everyone else couldn’t possibly have missed: Seemingly overnight, I’d been transformed from a flat-chested, skin-and-bones little girl into a self-conscious preteen with full-on B cups.

It was a warm early spring day and I hadn’t brought a sweater or jacket to school. So, I did the only thing I could think of—I hid in the girls’ bathroom until a teacher found me huddled in one of the stalls ugly crying. Welcome to womanhood!

By seventh grade, my still-growing breasts were barely contained in C-cups. By high school, I was wearing underwire double Ds. By college my girlfriends were buying lacy bras, skimpy bikinis, strapless dresses, and spaghetti-strap tops. (I have spent decades of my life coveting spaghetti straps!) I spent my late teens and early twenties wearing bulky utilitarian minimizer bras under oversized layers of clothes in an attempt to hide my breasts and shield myself from the lewd comments and sneers I got when I didn’t.

Growing Pains

Humiliation and unwanted attention is painful. But having large breasts caused me physical pain, too. I am a very petite person. I also have significant scoliosis. So I was essentially twisting myself into pretzels to compensate for the weight of my breasts. Otherwise, I would hunch forward and to one side. By the time I was in high school, I was dreaming of the day I would have enough money to pay for a breast reduction. It would be years before I learned that, given the right circumstances, insurance will often pay for the procedure.

The technical term for the condition I had is macromastia, which occurs when disproportionately large breasts constitute at least 3 percent of a person’s overall weight. I did a bit of math, and a conservative estimate, based on the probable weight of my double Ds, means my breasts constituted at least 15 percent of my total body weight.

I experienced many of the symptoms of macromastia: chronic back, neck, and shoulder pain, and frequent migraines. For some women, the weight of their breasts causes their bra straps to carve grooves into their shoulders, leading to skin irritation and even ulcerations and nerve paralysis.

Because its sufferers tend to have dense breast tissue, women with macromastia have an increased risk of developing breast cancer, according to the American Society for Breast Surgeons. Dense tissue can also make it harder to spot the kind of anomalies that might be cancerous. For me, this meant I often had to go back after my annual mammogram for follow-up ultrasounds. So, in addition to the annual smashing of boobs between two cold plates, I also had to be slathered up with jelly and poked with a wand.

Seeking a Solution

After I turned 40, all the call-backs for additional testing only made me more determined to get insurance to pay for a breast reduction. But the process was filled with obstacles. I needed at least two doctors to attest that my overall health was significantly impaired by my macromastia. Getting signoff was easy. My doctors agreed that double D breasts were too much of a burden for my small stature. The biggest obstacle was that I kept getting derailed by more critical health issues I needed to address first.

In 2015, I was diagnosed with Stage 1 endometrial cancer. A total hysterectomy left me cancer free, but threw me into full-blown menopause overnight, creating a hormone storm that caused my breasts to balloon again. Now my bra size hovered between a triple D and E or H, depending on the brand.

None of my clothes fit me anymore. Any dress or coat that was large enough to accommodate my chest was way too long. I had to wear T-shirts over my old lady swim dresses. And my breasts were still growing!

Then COVID hit. Like a lot of women during the lockdown, I fell behind with my mammogram screenings. Due to my previous endometrial cancer diagnosis, I was at higher risk for breast cancer and the further I fell behind in my screening schedule, the more nervous I became.

Once I could make in-person appointments again, my OBGYN was one of my first stops. While I was there, I asked him to sign off on a breast reduction. He took one look at me and declared me a perfect candidate.

Next, it was time for my overdue mammogram. After years of callbacks, I wasn’t all that alarmed when I had to return for an ultrasound. Then I was called back for biopsies on both breasts.

A core-needle biopsy on my left breast was painful, but quick. Next came the spiral biopsy on my right breast. If you ever have to get one, do yourself a favor and take ibuprofen ahead of time. I, of course, forgot all about it until halfway through the procedure when I almost passed out from the pain.

It was the comparatively less painful core-needle biopsy on my left breast that came back positive for ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS) breast cancer. My panic at being diagnosed with cancer for a second time in 10 years was acute—like an icepick to the sternum. But my very kind breast surgeon allayed my fears in a soothing voice, assuring me that DCIS is the most treatable form of breast cancer there is and that she was confident I would soon be cancer free, again.

The Road to Recovery

After that, things went very quickly. Within a couple weeks my surgeon performed a successful lumpectomy. My margins and lymph nodes were clean. At my follow-up, my surgeon asked if I wanted a procedure to match my slightly dented left breast to my still enormous right one. I nervously asked if she thought a reduction would be covered by insurance, my inner voice whispering, please say “yes.” She responded, as evenly as possible, “Oh yes, with your frame, that makes sense,” and referred me to a plastic surgeon. She noted that she believed I easily fit the criteria for macromastia, but had not wanted to assume I was unhappy with my figure. Polite and technically talented—a perfect and rare combination in a surgeon. I was as pleased by her tact as I was by her answer.

I initially told the plastic surgeon she referred me to that I wanted to go down to an A cup. He said that if he cut away too large a proportion of the breast tissue and its various vessels, it might risk blood supply and cause nipple necrosis. I boldly said I was willing to risk it. He told me to go home and look up the condition on my phone and get back to him. He was maybe a bit smug, but not wrong. I opted for his surgical plan, and ended up somewhere between a B and C cup. 

The first days and nights after the surgery I was in some pain. It didn’t compare to the Stage 4 endometriosis I had suffered from for years and it couldn’t touch the pain that followed the hysterectomy I had following my endometrial cancer diagnosis. But it wasn’t nothing. My breasts felt puffy and the skin felt tender to the touch. My incision sites—around my nipples and under my breasts along my rib cage—were even more tender. This pain lasted only a few days. 

But other sharper pains, almost like small electrical shocks, would “ping” inside and outside my breasts for months. These strange, short-lived sensations indicated when a severed nerve had repaired itself and “come back online,” according to my plastic surgeon. They were “good” pains, he said. Not only were they indicating that I was healing, but also a hopeful sign that nipple sensation was being restored.   

Within a few weeks of my breast reduction, my back and neck hurt less and I was experiencing fewer, much less severe migraines. As my bright red scars began healing, I spent three weeks getting targeted radiation, mostly as a precaution. 

I celebrated being officially cancer free again by throwing out all my drab, utilitarian bras. Now my wardrobe consists of off-the-rack bathing suits, lacy bras, and spaghetti straps! For the first time in my adult life, I like how I look in clothes. I have a silhouette that matches my otherwise small frame. I no longer catch sight of myself in storefronts and immediately hunch my shoulders forward to hide my bulging chest. I finally have the figure I’ve wanted since I was a self-conscious kid fleeing from the cafeteria. 

I didn’t expect my path to get here would include a detour via cancer diagnosis and treatment. But having fought my way through cancer twice now, I’ve come to the conclusion that we don’t always get to select our path. The best we can do is seize and celebrate any small triumphs those paths offer up to us.

As one of the 4 million U.S. women who have survived breast cancer, I’m a member of a club no one really wants to be part of. But I’ll admit that membership does make me feel like a bit of a badass. A small-breasted badass.

Lisa Pierce Flores is co-host of Another Bloody Podcast, which features candid conversations on women’s healthcare topics. Lisa talks more about her experiences with macromastia and breast cancer in a recent episode.

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