Chest Surgery

I had my breasts removed because I hated them. At the time of the surgery, being able to feed a baby from my own body was the last thing on my mind. I was a transgendered man in a gay relationship. It had taken me years to figure out who I was, and now that I knew, I couldn’t get the surgery done fast enough.

I was more than embarrassed by my breasts. They horrified me. I slouched to hide them, and wore baggy shirts and sweaters that disguised my shape. I overdressed in the summer time to avoid people seeing the lumps on my chest. I hadn’t gone swimming in years.

For a female-bodied person, my breasts were quite small, but they were big enough to give me away. Before I had my surgery, strangers often identified me as female even though I’d had hormone therapy that lowered my voice and caused the growth of some facial hair. I didn’t “pass” consistently as male.

Some sex reassignment surgeries are now covered in Canada by public health insurance, but at the time mine wasn’t. I did some research and found a plastic surgeon in Vancouver who had experience doing male chest-contouring surgery, as they call it. This procedure is different from a mastectomy or a breast reduction. The aim of a mastectomy done as a cancer treatment is often to remove as much tissue as possible so that there is a better chance of completely getting rid of the cancer. In a breast reduction, the client is happy to have female breasts, but just wants them to be smaller. With male chest-contouring, the goal is to create a male-appearing chest. This means leaving some of the breast tissue to look like pectoral muscles and trying to carefully preserve the nipples. It was a work of art that would cost me four thousand dollars.

My breasts were small enough that the surgeon was able to remove tissue via an incision going around each areola. This makes scarring minimal. The nerves and milk ducts directly underneath my nipples and areolas were never cut, so I regained sensation in my chest soon after the surgery.

Recovery went quickly and I was thrilled with the result. I now felt comfortable taking off my shirt in a locker room and splashing around at a public pool. I could wear fitted t-shirts without becoming a woman to the rest of the world.

A few months later I found myself in a cramped changing room with both male and female colleagues and, for the first time, I didn’t need or want to hide myself. I saw one woman looking at me, and so I said, “What? This surgery cost me four grand. I better show off my chest, don’t you think? Milk it for all it’s worth?”

She smiled and pointed out that milking it was exactly the one thing I couldn’t do anymore. Her comment gave me little pause at the time but it would sure sting later.