Adolescent Sexuality by Dr. Karen Rayne

Today, a story from Scarleteen, titled Frankenboobs, by Audra Williams:

“I don’t know,” grinned my friend Amanda,”I think you’ve got a half decent chest.”

Hmph. Half decent indeed. I was about 14 I started to realize that only one of my breasts was developing. That’s weird, I thought. Oh well, puberty is weird, bodies are weird, it will all work out eventually. I was about 17 when I realized it probably wouldn’t. Damn. Somehow I had ended up with one D cup breast and one A cup breast. Imagine, if you will: at this point I am a dancer. I am a teenage girl. I am sexually active. I am utterly mortified. Sort of.

You know, the weird thing is, in retrospect I can’t really remember it being that great a source of strife. I don’t know if it was because of the fact that there were always plenty of shoulder pads around (since even in the early 90s I knew that I didn’t want padded shoulders and tore them out of all my clothes), if it was because the boy I was dating was a tortured arteeste type who probably thought it was very avant garde to have a monoboobed girlfriend, or if it was just because I hung out with the neatest most supportive bunch of people on the planet. It just didn’t seem that big a deal. Probably because it was a gradual development (and lack thereof), as opposed to a sudden loss. It was a hassle, though.

I didn’t go swimming for years, despite the constant nagging from certain insensitive people. I had a tough time finding a leotard under which I could wear a bra, and it was hard to find a comfortable way of sleeping. Covering up the difference, however, just became a routine. Wake up. Realize you have 14 minutes to get to school. Look on floor for clothes. Look on floor for bra. Look on floor for the 2 shoulder pads wrapped in panty hose that have become your left breast. Put them all on and fly out the door with grubby hair and a lot of lipstick. That was me, 5 mornings a week, for 4 years. Eventually I just started to wear a bra all the time, and it became as though that was my body, as though that was me, naked. On the rare occasions that I was without clothing (like in the shower, or other times I won’t go into because my dad will read this) I sort of didn’t pay attention to my chest, the same way I ignore my lips if they are bare. It didn’t really occur to me that it would ever be any different. I always had bigger fish to fry, and I figured that if someone was going to see me without clothing, that person had better like me enough not to care.

There were also some fun bonuses to my asymmetrical state. When I was in high school I volunteered at the local AIDS Committee, and wore a red ribbon everyday. My wonderful friend Mike and I used to perform the following exchange to alarm substitute teachers:

Me: Hey Mike, I just dropped my red ribbon. Could you grab it for me? It is under your desk.
Mike: Sure thing. Here ya go.
Me: Arg. I’ve totally got my hands full. Could you just pin it on me?
Mike: No problem. (at which point he would appear to be obligingly plunging the pin deep into my chest.)
Me: (Very bored sounding) Ummm, ow?
Mike: Geez! Sorry. (Then he’d pull the pin out slowly, and re-pin it on me properly).
Me: Thanks!

It never failed to startle. Then there was the time I was at a party and a really annoying Morrissey wannabe guy was consistently groping me, within 10 feet of his alleged girlfriend. The look on his face was priceless when I glared at him, yanked out my home-made boob, handed it to him and suggested that he take it elsewhere and leave me alone.

When I was almost 20, I started to get fed up with the situation. I began to feel off kilter all the time, and annoyed that certain clothes never hung right on me. I hated having constantly to wear unsexy underwear in favour of stretched out training bras which seemed to offer Maximum Stuffage Realism. I decided to see if there was some way I could be even chested.

I went to speak to my doctor about it, and I was part way through my explanation when she cut in with “Everyone has one breast a little larger than the other, you know.” Well, of course I knew that. Had I not read countless advice columns in YM Magazine? Yes I had. “Can I just… show you?” I asked, wondering how I could have phrased that to sound less like a proposition. When I did, she did a bit of a double take. “Oh,” she said “I see what you mean.” I smiled patronizingly. We talked about plastic surgeons. Oddly enough, my friend Mike’s father is a plastic surgeon, but imagining future meals around the Pierson dinner table, I opted against having this man revamp my boobs. I chose a local (Oshawa) female plastic surgeon and was put on a very long waiting list. When I finally got to see her, I asked if she could just reduce the larger breast to the size of the smaller, and I could just be tiny. She didn’t feel this was an option, because of all the scarring involved in taking a breast down 4 cup sizes.

Heavens. That meant that we were talking implants. Well, implant, anyway. This was an entirely different ball game. What about leakage? What about Pamela Anderson? What about my feminism? We sat down and she talked to me about the fact that implants were now made of salt water, not silicone. This meant that if it did leak I would just pee it out. Huh. Also, it would be a natural small shape, not gargantuan orbs. I knew I didn’t want both breasts as large as the larger one, so I decided to strive for an even B cup. I was told that I would be able to breast feed out of the enlarged one, but not the reduced one. I had visions of my breasts turning into salt water taffy if over manipulated. I put the image out of my mind and agreed to the procedure. Yay! I went back to Windsor (where I was going to glorious St. Clair College) and imagined coming home after Christmas with a huge collection of foxy bras. I told no one except my roommates.

About a week before I was supposed to go back to Oshawa for Christmas and the surgery (”What did YOU get for Christmas, Audra?” “THESE!”) I called the plastic surgeon’s office, just to make sure all was well. Yikes. It seemed that OHIP had agreed to cover the enlargement of my left breast, but not the reduction of the right. OH super. As I did during at all instances of stress at that time, I called the increasingly famous Mike. He wasn’t home, so I spoke with his very cool mom. “Don’t worry!” she said, “You’ll get your surgery even if Don [Mike's father] has to do it on the pool table in the basement!”

I-yi-yi.

It eventually did get all cleared up, thanks both to Dr. Pierson and my own plastic surgeon (who’s name escapes me, strangely). I was on my way to symmetry! Around about this time I thought I ought to tell my dad and stepmom and mom what was about to happen. They were surprised, because I’d said nothing, but supportive (heh heh) all the same. Actually, until recently, visiting me in the hospital was the last time my mom and dad were in the same room, I think. Anyhow, bla bla bla preparation, December 11th was The Day. B-Day, so to speak. I didn’t sleep at all the night before because the jerky arteeste (now ex)boyfriend mentioned above had taken pictures of me before hand, a la the ultimate Before and After shot, and we were going to collaborate on something when the whole thing was through. Well, he called me to tell me that he had used film that his girlfriend had stolen from the dollar store where she worked, and quel surprise, the pictures hadn’t worked out. So I spent the entire night awake and mad. If you ever meet someone named Clint Griffin, kick him for me.

At any rate, the next morning, I was all a bundle of nerves and exhausted incoherence, standing in front of my closet, trying to decide what to wear to the hospital. I settled on a sort of “June Cleaver Summer Picnic” dress, took out my 6 earrings and picked off the last of my nail polish (both of which were not allowed in the operating room) and we set off for the hospital. My fashion crisis was perhaps fruitless, because as soon as I got in the pre-op part of the building, I had to strip down and put on a fetching little hospital robe. I took off my bra and quickly wrapped it around the shoulder pad and pantyhose ‘breast’, without it really registering this was the last time I would have to do this. Everything seemed sort of a few layers removed from reality. I had never been under anesthetic before! I had never been cut open before! They were gonna remove my nipple and re-attach it!

This was way worse than the pre-haircut jitters I always got in the salon waiting room.

I was wheeled into the operating room, and drawn on by the nice woman who was now in charge of my bosomy beauty. She said “So we’ll cut here [she draws a circle around my nipple] and here [a line under each breast, one to take stuff out, one to put stuff in] and stitch you all up as good as new.” They put a mask over my mouth and nose and tell me to take deep breaths. I felt like I was suffocating and start to freak out. That is the last thing I remember.

Then I was foggy headed and I going to throw up. This I know for certain. The nurse pushing me down the hallway on a stretcher and asked “Did you have a breast reduction or enlargement?” “Both,” I answered. She clucked her tongue like “Hoo boy, they overmedicated this one!” but didn’t say anything else. I was taken to my room, where my family (except for my probably mortified teenage brother) were waiting. I’m sure I was a charming hostess, stitched up, plastic tubes draining blood from my incisions, and throwing up. Oh, the sheer glamour of it all. I get some sleep, wake up in the middle of the night and drag my IV to the washroom to pee, where even though I have been told not to, I peek in the bandages. I have what a friend will later dub FrankenBoobs, but they more or less match. Wow. I have 2 breasts the same size, and they are both attached to me. This is beyond exciting.

The implant feels sort of sloshy, and the reduced boob is bruised and cut up, but I think it looks so cool. The next day I go home, where I am not allowed to get my chest wet for 3 weeks.

It is probably a weird thing for people when their daughter is getting breast reconstructive surgery. My doting father and stepmother ask how I am a lot, but we didn’t really talk about what had happened until my friend Trevor came to visit, bursting in the room with “SO! How’re your tits?” Gay men can get away with this stuff, you don’t even want to kill them. I laughed and laughed. They were just great, thanks!

My first trip out, after lurking around the house for 3 weeks was to The Bar, Whitby’s creatively named gay bar. Upon entering I was descended upon by a drag queen who shrieked my name and whirled me around in a bear hug, until he realized that I, too, am squealing but in agony. “New boobs” explained Trevor. They both nodded wisely. I had a fun evening. I was the talk of the town.

By the time I went back to Windsor, after having my stitches out, I was feeling quite pleased with myself. I am in love with my naked body. I have cartoon boobs. They are funny and perfect and perky and very very scarred. I went on the hugest bra buying binge since my roommate Summer forgot to take her Lithium. I bought push up bras and corsets and all kind of cool shit. I am, it seems, a 34 B. Who knew? I attended an art opening in a velvet bustier and tiny sweater, and when anyone ogled me I would stand up straighter and say “Your tax dollars at work.” I went home one night after an evening at the Eclectic Cafe, having spilled tea on myself. “OH my GOD!” my mother-hen roommate, Theresa, screams. “Audra sprung a LEAK!!” I wondered if having a implant-boob may be as much a novelty as having a stuffing-boob.

Actually, it is a lot more fun. It has been almost 4 years since the surgery, and it is tough to remember the body I used to have. I now wear what ever I like, and as little as I like. I rarely feel self conscious about my naked body like a lot of women do. As a matter of fact I’m quite pleased with it. After ignoring my breasts for so long, I now look at them and feel them often. You can tell which is fake, but who cares? I sure don’t. I can wear leotards and v-neck shirts and bathing suits with glee. I lounge around undressed longer than I have to, and my collection of fancy underwear is only going to expand from here. I wouldn’t have done it if it cost money and I wouldn’t have done it for a boy, but I’m glad it happened the way it did.

For free and for me.

Jill Filipovic wrote for the Huffington Post on why the CBS and Fox executives might have decided not to run the new Trojan ad. I really recommend you read the piece in its entirety, but here’s the first and last bits, to get you really interested:

According to a Fox executive, “Contraceptive advertising must stress health-related uses rather than the prevention of pregnancy.” One has to wonder where this executive got the idea that pregnancy is not a health-related issue (maybe he sat in on a few too many Bush-funded abstinence-only education classes). While the executive may appear to simply lack a rudimentary understanding of pregnancy, it’s more likely that he is bowing to demands of the “moral majority” in the United States — a vocal and powerful political force that claims to be pro-life and pro-family, but doesn’t actually believe in preventing unwanted pregnancy.
…
The vast majority of American women will use contraception at some point in their lives. People of both sexes want to plan their families. Self-determination is a desire that crosses all party lines and ideologies. All of this makes it even more fascinating when a fairly quotidian advertisement makes waves because it attempts to sell condoms, while few of us so much as bat an eyelash at the constant stream of highly sexualized images we see on television every day.

While Fox executives are comfortable airing an ad of Paris Hilton in a bathing suit soaping herself up to sell hamburgers, they refuse an ad that promotes condom use for pregnancy and disease prevention. It’s an interesting twist on the old advertising adage — Sex sells, just don’t try to sell safer sex.

So here’s the thing: we must start serious sex education in our country. Our teen pregnancy and STD/STI transmission rates are abysmal when compared to other industrialized countries. Really, it’s just embarrassing. Its been shown often enough that abstinence-only-until-marriage either has no effect or has a negative effect on adolescent sexuality. I continue to be amazed that in the fact of the high need of our teenagers and the high impact of a relatively simple solution (comprehensive sex education) our country continues to do nothing.

So rebel! Go tell all the teenagers you know about safe sex! E-mail them a condom commercial! Send them to a website designed to be really informative! Hand out condoms outside your local high school (be sure to do it just off of school grounds)! Volunteer at Planned Parenthood! Call your Senators and Representatives to say you are firmly in favor of comprehensive sex education, that safe sex must be taught in our schools! Sign the petition to have CBS and Fox air condom commercials! You can have an effect on individuals and on our country as a whole.

This post by Ethan Persoff is making it’s way around the blogs this week. It’s a scanned comic book from Planned Parenthood from the 1950’s-1960’s. Reading through it is pretty amazing - I highly recommend that you take a look for yourself.

The comic tells the story of a couple who have been married for 4 years and have 3 children (ages 3, 2, and 10 months!). They have tried several kinds of “birth control” and the wife is getting sick and unable to care well for her three children. She stops having sex with her husband because she’s so freaked by the idea of getting pregnant again. He is so worried that he is careless at work and sticks his hand into a machine. Luckily it’s just a scratch. However, the accident brings the husband to a doctor who asks why he was so careless and the husband opens ups about his wife’s fear of another pregnancy (the husband, it seems, is only worried about the withholding of sex, not more children). The doctor recommends birth control and a trip to Planned Parenthood. The wife is very nervous that birth control will stop the couple from having children in the future (she still wants more children?!?), but is put at ease by the female doctor at Planned Parenthood. She starts having sex again and six months later is happily having sex with her husband, but is happily not pregnant. She determines to tell her married and soon-to-be-married friends about the wonders of birth control and the ability to plan your family (while still satisfying your husband).

I find this to be a relatively hopeful piece from history. The amazing thing here is just how much mainstream attitudes about birth control have changed over the past 50 years. While it may be that abstinence-only education currently reigns supreme in schools, most teenagers and adults do have some knowledge of birth control - that it doesn’t permanently affect your ability to have children, that there’s a healthy option for everyone, and that it’s legitimate for married couples. Hopefully birth control will be as acceptable for non-married couples as well before another 50 years pass.

In that vein - keep sending your friends and family, both teens and adults, to the condom ads I’m posting. They just keep getting better!

There’s a new condom ad on the block, and it’s getting a lot of attention. Here is a description from Commercial Alert:

In a commercial for Trojan condoms that has its premiere tonight, women in a bar are surrounded by anthropomorphized, cellphone-toting pigs. One shuffles to the men’s room, where, after procuring a condom from a vending machine, he is transformed into a head-turner in his 20s. When he returns to the bar, a fetching blond who had been indifferent now smiles at him invitingly.

Directed by Phil Joanou (“State of Grace”), with special effects by the Stan Winston Studio (“Jurassic Park”), the commercial is entertaining. But it also has a message, spelled out at the end: “Evolve. Use a condom every time.”

The ad sounds pretty funny. Konagod tells us why Fox and CBS decided not to air the commercial (ABC has picked it up and it will air for the first time tonight):

CBS and FOX have rejected a new ad for Trojan condoms because of a focus on pregnancy prevention.

Representatives for both Fox and CBS confirmed that they had refused the ads, but declined to comment further.

In a written response to Trojan, though, Fox said that it had rejected the spot because, “Contraceptive advertising must stress health-related uses rather than the prevention of pregnancy.”

Sometimes the effort to avoid offending a segment of society is offensive in and of itself. I could go on a rant but this media critic summed up my feelings rather nicely:

“It’s so hypocritical for any network in this culture to go all puritanical on the subject of condom use when their programming is so salacious,” said Mark Crispin Miller, a media critic who teaches at New York University. “I mean, let’s get real here. Fox and CBS and all of them are in the business of nonstop soft porn, but God forbid we should use a condom in the pursuit of sexual pleasure.”

This attitude and reluctance to talk openly about safe sex affects teenagers at higher rates than anyone else. Teenagers just have fewer places to go for good information.

I’m going to start posting more condom ads here. Send them to your teenagers! They are, by and large, funny, informative, and attitude changing (i.e., they provide the perspective that normal people carry condoms). The first one is just below this post.