October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month: Four years ago, my breasts were amputated. Yes, you read that right. A surgeon cut them out of my body on a cold January morning in 2021.
It started 13 years ago when I was diagnosed with breast cancer. I had a double mastectomy—a term that sounds way too clinical for what it really is. I was terrified and just wanted to live. But I also wanted my life and body back, to feel like myself again. So I chose breast implants, wanting to look like I did pre-cancer.
I did.
Until I didn’t.
Five years later, I began having problems. The implants strained my chest muscles and made my upper body ache. They also made me cold. I decided to replace them with newer, safer, smaller implants hoping they’d make me feel like I was back in my old body.
They did.
Until they didn’t.
Over time, my body started rejecting them. The technical term is “capsular contracture” which means scar tissue builds up around the implants. My chest grew tight and sore, and I knew I couldn’t live that way anymore. I made the decision to remove the implants and not replace them. I use the word amputation because that’s what it was—brutal, real, and final.
The real-world term is going flat.
The first time I looked in the mirror after my surgery, I was devastated. The swelling, sutures, and bruising mirrored the emotional impact it had on my psyche. I put a sheet over my bathroom mirror to give myself time to grieve the loss of my breasts and time to adjust to my new flat-chested body—a flatness I hadn’t seen since I was eleven.
It’s a strange thing to live without a body part that’s so tied to identity, beauty, and womanhood, especially when you never wanted the change. But slowly and with time, I’ve made peace with what I see—well mostly.
It’s been a long, uneven process of grief, acceptance, and sometimes freedom. Without breasts, I move through the world lighter—literally—but heavier with what’s been taken and what I still miss. I still care about looking “normal,” but I’m learning not to let that define me. Every morning, I decide how I want to show up in the world—with or without breasts. It’s just another choice, like whether I put on makeup, leave my hair down, or dress up.
I thought once I survived cancer, the hardest part was behind me. Turns out, living in this new body is its own kind of work.
Breast Cancer Awareness Month reminds me how complicated survival really is. I got fake boobs because the real ones tried to kill me, and then my body decided it didn’t want the fake ones either. I’m still learning how to live with all the contradictions that come with survival. I may no longer have breasts, but I’m grateful for my health, my strength, and my voice.
