how do you look at yourself after mastectomy ?

tim73

And how does the other look at you...do you take your shirt off...what your partners and friends say if you do, what their eyes seem to say if they don't find voice at that moment...what  do you do when you change your dress , wear a tie...do you do it while seeing yourself in the mirror  or just avoid looking at your self ? do you take bath as often as you used to or you hesitate now.

I know this all has been and is terribly important for women for obvious reasons. Breasts are part and parcel of their sexuality which is indispensible for them and their spouse alike but what about men ? how do they perceive themselves without one nipple, or with one nipple , with little flatter ,hollow and as if empty one side of chest ? and how do you cope with this. ? or you don't feel any thing and are as confident as ever.? would you still wear a T shirt or can take your jacket off as comfortably as ever if it feels little hotter in summers ???

Just a week before I have had my  left sided mastectomy done because of a diagnosis which both stunned me and turned my world upside down..I am still in a state of sheer disbelief despite now having a drain in place and lots of dressing and numb as if leather like area. I avoid seeing my self in mirror and it just disturbs me what it would be like when in another week time , they will remove my dressings and drain and i will be forced to get used to my altered body shape and by then totally crushed ego or self esteem perhaps.!!!  

Please share your thoughts , experiences and feelings as men without breasts ?   

bobdevito

Tim...I know exactly what you mean. I am 50 years old. I was diagnosed in May 2012 with stage 3A breast cancer. I had a mastectomy and 7 of 14 nodes tested positive for the cancers spread. It was ER/PR+, HER2NEU-. I hate my "new" body. I can't foresee taking of my shirt in public ever. I'm trying to get the word out about male breast cancer. I'm working on a couple of ideas. I'd love to talk to you via email and phone. We need to stick together and get through this. You and any one seeing this are welcome to contact me by email at mymalebreastcancerjourney@gmail.com



Best always,

Bob

exbrnxgrl

I am sorry to sound so ignorant about this, but is there any type of reconstructive surgery for men? Although none of our options are perfect, women do have many ways to go. Still, it is not an easy thing to deal with. Let us know if we can support you in any way.

Caryn

Momine

Not a guy, but just wanted to say that I feel for you both. We women bitch and moan about the pink ribbons and all that, but for the guys it must be quite lonely out there. 

To answer the question, what I find weirdest is the lack of nipples. 

Lily55

Tim - I am a lop sided one and totally understand how you feel - it took me some time to accept showering as I hated touching myself on the non breast side and feeling all the boniness, but now I don´t think about it before I get in the shower or have the same shudder about myself I did in the beginning.  I do not let anyone see me naked and I try not to look at myself like that either but if I do I have perfected the art of only looking at one side at a time so I feel less abnormal.....I am 9 months along from mine - its very early days for you.

Take your time and don´t force yourself to do anything or feel anything - when I was first out of hospital I would literally hide from people and if anyone visited I would get in bed and hide under the bed clothes and talk to them from there....!!!

I googled and there are stick on nipples and prosthetic breast forms for men too, hope you don´t think I am being insensitive in telling you this......

tim73

thanks everyone for your so thoughtful replies. you know what is so weird about me ? I am just 39 and to me it was just a shocker to have this mortal blow at this early stage of my life and from such and most unlikeliest quarter. it was revealed to me just five days after my birthday and as somebody so rightly said on this forum , everything happened just at once. I don't say that before all this i was the most happy person but i was the most ambitious person and now i seem to have lost the very purpose of living whatsoever.  Writing in this forum was just like groping in darkness , not even knowing what I am looking for. 

The second most amazing thing you will find about me is that I am a doctor and a surgeon myself. I have been doing all this myself..you  can imagine that how would it have felt that i had known right from the very outset what might or did lie ahead. Its not just those number of years which I may have because of  little presumably  earlier diagnosis and supposedly adequate treatment which matter but this is my quality of life , my self image , my arrogance which has been irreparably dented. 

Thanx bob and everyone for your support and proposals. I am already fighting myself day in and day out , trying to finds ways to get distracted, get busy, to indulge myself in something silly , something spiritual ......but all this seems to be just trash right now although this is ironically what we stubbornly tell our own patients to do and when they don't , we usually get annoyed.

My whole set of beliefs which sustained me or characterized me throughout my life and have always been paradoxical seem to have evaporated in just few days and my whole self has come to a naught where there is neither God nor Evil , where there is no heaven or hell.  I am just in a limbo or in a vacuum.

At best , for now, I just want to stay anonymous, or an ordinary being. Don't expect an angel or a missionary out  of me or some super humanism where i should rise above all my person and help those around me. I just can't .....One, because i have already been doing this and second I am just shredded now.....As lily said, years have to go by before all this becomes blurred and my self will start receding into oblivion while others would , of necessity, start taking the driving seat and over shadow me, when i will get used to my  distorted self but it is too early for me now and others are not ready yet !!!!

Momine

Tim, you are so very young to be dealing with a potentially life-threatening disease and it just plain sucks. I find it freeing to go with "it sucks!" a lot of the time instead of trying to tease some deep meaning out of it.

Also, I know you doctor guys think you can control it all , but please, please, pretty please, try to find some psychologist type who deals with cancer patients to talk to about all this. There are things in life you can't do all by yourself. 

The freaky thing is that even if the cancer is treatable and you live a long time after, it forces you to look death in the face. As far as I am concerned, the trick is to actually look long and hard, then spit in his face. Once you come through the fear and anger, it is a very freeing place on the other side. You will get there, I promise.

Lily55

Tim - do read Anti Cancer by DAvid Servan Schreiber - he was in the medical world too when he found out he had brain cancer and that enabled him to do GREAT things afterwards......

The fact you now have experience as a patient can only make you a much better, more empathic and understanding doctor from now onwards and you sound a bit like me, pretty hard on yourself (and probably on others too!).  I like your honest self awareness but try not to fight yourself, just go with what you need and that may be something very simple like sitting in the garden or something very simple.  I did a dance class 8 days post mastectomy, despite how I felt about myself as I knew I would never do it if the fear of it grew any bigger in my mind and I used a sock for padding as I was still too tender.....there are women in the USA who sew pockets in to ordinary clothing to avoid the need for prosthetics so maybe this is a route for you to follow as I am guessing you may need to do something physical yourself too?

Please stay with us and let us support you - I don´t think it is a lot different for men than women as I know lots of men also like nipple stimulation in sex........and most men are body proud too.....be kind to yourself x

stride

Tim, there is a good book out there about cancer survivorship called Dancing in Limbo. Many of us on the 2013 Survivors thread have read it. You might find it helpful. It was written by a couple of cancer survivors, and they interviewed people (men and women) who recovered from all sorts of cancer.

Lily55

I have just downloaded this book on Kindle - its not cheap but looks good and the Kindle version is about 25% cheaper than hard copy

bobdevito

Tim....

Dr Oliver Bogler works at a cancer center and writes a blog. Per you and he can talk. Look at his blog http://malebreastcancerblog.org/

I wish you the best. You got this. You too will not only be a survivor but a thriver as well.

Reach out if you need to talk or vent!

Bob

melmcbee

Im 43 Tim, just a few years older than you and was diagnosed 9 months ago. I was p**sed too. I have worked in the medical field for the last 15 yrs and had to take short term disability thru all my treatments because I couldnt do my job. I couldnt physically do it but most important I couldnt be a good patient caregiver because of my mentality. Pretty ticked at everyone especially God. It all is stages of grief. We have to go thru it to get to the other side. I am finally returning to work this week after being out for almost 9 months. I hope I can take the knowledge and care that I have learned by being a patient. Oh and Zoloft and Xanax help too. lol. Hugs

Anonymous

I am not quite 5 months out from my double mastectomy. Some days are harder than others. One of the first times I knew I would be ok was when I returned to work. Nobody noticed. I did my job. I felt "normal" or at least I felt like feeling normal again was possible. Then I stopped at a mall after a doctor's appointment....and nobody looked at me strangely. I realized I could be out in a crowd of people and nobody had any idea...



Another thing I did (and I know it sounds very silly, but it really helped me!!) was to look back at my surgical notes. I read how many grams of tissue were removed. I converted the grams to pounds and figured out what percentage of my former weight had been removed. I discovered that I was still more than 98% all original me!!!



When you realize what a tiny fraction of YOU was actually removed...well, for me it helped.



But it is all a process that you have to work through one day or one moment at a time.



While I was researching nipple reconstruction I did see several pictures of reconstruction for men if that is something you feel might help your healing.



Best wishes to you!

Momine

Tim, I wanted to add that I found it helpful to keep a completely open mind. Especially when you are female, lots of people secretly (they think) or not so secretly think that the loss of the breasts must be horiffically traumatic. I decided to assume that it would be OK and go from there. 

It is different, obviously, and in some ways weird, unpleasant, a loss etc. But it can also be seen as a war wound, badge of courage and all kinds of other positive associations. Furthermore, it does not interfere with most daily functioning the way the loss of a leg, for example, would.

In any event, I hope you get to a better place with all this soon.

beacon800

I am a woman with bilateral mx.  My surgery was more preventative than anything, so I had a matter of choice in the proceedings which may have made a difference.

No I would not like to take off my shirt and walk around in a ladies gym locker room.  I would feel uncomfortable and I think others would feel uncomfortable.

But I don't hate my body at all.  I think I look like a cute, flat girl.  Not so bad at all.  It's not as pretty as before.  But it's under my shirt.  No one sees it.  I don't spend a lot of time thinking about how it looks. 

My husband has seen it and he was ok, but I don't show it to him much.  I wear gorgeous lingerie and it all looks really good.  I guess that is not something a man can do!   However, maybe you can experiement with tee shirt looks and tank tops and see how you feel as you get used to your new self.

I am sorry you are facing this.  It is very hard but you are not alone at all.

edited to add: there are quite a few creative things you can do to feel more confident while wearing tee shirts.  For example, using patterns rather than solids helps a lot!  Also, darker colors are better than light.  If you are quite concerned, you can wear two tee shirts layered over each other, like a tank top under a tee shirt to give a  bit more volume and coverage.  Using knits with a fair amount of pattern and movement to the knit will help too.  I would be surprised if anyone noticed anything amiss.  People don't notice stuff nearly as much as we would think. 

tim73

Thank you  so much , everyone of you, bob, lily,momine, dulcigirl, beacon.....In return for  something which has made me now miserable for life perhaps, i have some most sincere and beautiful people , friends who are more complete humans than many normal walking out there on the roads. 

Today got my stitches and drain out and this was my first post op visit. what they did chop off me did n't contain any trace of tumour. I underwent SLNB and they cherry picked two lymph nodes which also were negative on frozen section, so it spared me a throrough axillary dissection at  least for now :-)

I argued a little with my surgeon that if the tumour was out in first place , would that not have been enough instead of being more radical with me because currently literature does speak of lumpectomy coupled with post op radiation in select cases , but he rejected the concept outright. So it was  my fate i guess, and  I just could not undo it.

My ravings against God and others , well , havn't stopped but there are times when I am just silent  and in those moments ,I feel myself melting or like drowning inwards.  Melmcbee, I have been on antidepressant now for  more than a month but this has caused me so much constipation that i have finally and abruptly stopped it and I know its not by book but just got fed up with this.

On 11 th, I have an appointment with my oncologist for the first time but despite promising histopathology reports, they don't seem to be too willing or convinced to let me off the hook . So chemo seems to be just around the corner and I am waiting with bated breaths. Sometimes I just think what have I done so wrong that I am being grilled so relentlessly. Why  did i have to be the chosen one. But you see, you become eligible for chemo if your tumour is one or more than one cm in size and/or if more than four lymph nodes are positive for cancer and/or tumour is high grade or aggressive in other ways..So in my case , I guess, it's size which will matter. And they say, my being young will also make them more "savage".

As a result of my rather unpredictable outbursts, just few hour, ago my wife also broke out with me and has abandoned me, to be precise in my opinion. So blessings from all sides. Her father talked to me on phone and said he was quite happy in any case , if I decided to divorce her or not. 

To begin with, I had gynaecomastia which is just a benign enlargement of one or both breasts in many males. All the books in the world say that this is not the pre-cancerous condition and so I believed. But well here I am , with this as more than supposed culprit. Better be on gurards about this. 

For now as it unfolds , mine is stage 1 , heavily positive for ER but neg for her 2 neu. So sounds not that bad. Frankly I fail to understand what I should say to myself. Am I the most lucky unlucky  or other way round. Just lost for words really. As momine said and I agree, it plainly sucks.

I still have " shudders"  while having showers. And I guess, I avoid taking one at all. I probably should not see my self in the mirror for some time. I also tried to get my self busy in movies. To certain limit, this was not uselsee but more often than not, I found myself envying all those in movie and with nipples :-).  At least they are " complete". Dulcigirl , I do these calculations and this is very smart of you to do this but you know, all my life I have been very perfectionists though without achievements, I confess.

At all times I catch my self looking down at my chest and trying to figure out how do i look to myself and others with this slight bulge on one side and even when others console me or don't seem to notice, at least I know that I am now a "flagged error" on the map. But whose !!?

well folks despite being the doctor myself and in the same field, I didn't know about this "underworld" of yours and I just accidentally hit this site and at first I thought nobody including this was going to help me but It really did and does help to be with you....  You all are wonderful people and it feels good to be with you.

bye for now. :-)

Anonymous

My breast surgeon (after all reports were in) said "If you're going to have a very bad thing, you had it in the very best way." Sounds like you may be in the same boat. Cancer/surgery=bad.

Catching it early and having the chance to take care of it and get on with your life=GOOD!!!



I'm a perfectionist too. My dad (untreated bipolar) told me when I was 10 that I needed to be careful not to get "all scarred up" because nobody would want to marry me!! I also saw his reaction to my mom's single mastectomy. All of that was swirling around in my head as I faced diagnosis, surgery, reconstruction, etc.



But guess what? I'm trusting that God put me here for a purpose and I'm focusing on the people I meet while I walk this walk. And it helped immensely that God gave me a husband who is proud of the way I'm handling this....and he said my scars are hot cuz they make me look like a bada$$. Ha!!!



What would you tell one of your patients if they were in your shoes? Attitude is SO crucial to fighting this fight! We're all here to listen and be supportive. I'm betting your wife is afraid and has no idea how to deal with your depression. I think the cancer and surgery are just things to get through....but how you face them and choose to fight them??? THAT is what is truly attractive or not attractive to others.



Wishing you an unexpected blessing today....watch for the little things in your life that are good and valuable and worth fighting for!!! Some days they feel harder to find, but they are there!!!!! Sending you a big smile...you CAN get through this and be happy!!!

Lily55

Tim - i may be speaking out of turn but i guess you are used to being a decisión maker and you seem to think now that you must be passive but its not the case. You can make decisiones for yourself too so that you are a partner in your treatment plan and not a victim.



Look up cáncer active dot com and the moss report too - i took weeks to decide about chemo doing my own research and i refused it despite stage 3 and positive nodes. No one can deal with everything at once so focus on one thing t a time....right now its your treatment that matters - look up 5 HTP for depresión - i took it for 3 months a few years ago and it works



On iPad sorry spelling

ssydor

I am a 41 year old male.  I was diagnosed with stage 2 BC 2.5 years ago.  Like you, I was pretty shocked, as were my doctors (they had never seen a male my age with breast cancer).  I had a mastectomy, chemo and radiation.  And I am just finishing up my 2nd year on Tamoxifen.  It was tough, but I got through it and so will you.  It actually seems like a really long time ago now!

I have a 12" scar accross my chest, and I am missing a nipple.  I get some strange looks when I take my shirt off.  But I really don't care anymore... as I am sure you have figured out, life is to short to give a crap about what other people think!

I figured my options were to either stop taking my shirt off... which isn't going to happen (I spend a lot of time up at our cottage in the summer, and down south during March breaks), or just ditch the vanity.  It is easier said than done... but it is enlightening!

On a side note, my massive scar and missing nipple has been the source of a few conversations with strangers, it is a great ice breaker!  And it has now become a source of good natured ribbing with friends.  I never thought I would see the day when I found it "amusing"... but I do!

Take care of yourself, and hang in there!!!

1NippledBandit

Tim,
I am a male and was diagnosed at 37.  It was a whirlwind experience and came at a time in my life that couldn't have been less ideal.  I was a general contractor (home builder) and the economy dive took me down as well.  We lost everything... savings, house, business... it all went.  The worst part was that in my profession there simply was NO work.  I held on as long as I could before the bank came and took everything I had worked for away.  Later that year I was diagnosed with breast cancer.  I felt like I was kicked while I was down.

I am 40 now and passed my 2 year mark last summer.  I am back in school to become a nurse and was heavily influenced by my experience to choose something in medicine so I attribute my new career to having had cancer.

This life comes with no guarantees.  Some die young, some die old.  We all hope that we are in the old group when we die but the fact is that we all will die one day.  God does not tell us which group we are in but He expects us to make the most of our time while we are here.  This is the philosophy that I have developed through my experience.

As far as my appearance and how I deal with it... you can probably guess how I handle it by my user name.  I flash people all the time who don't believe me when I tell them I have had breast cancer.  I did it to my whole Anatomy class last year.  It is part of who I am but it does not define me.  I have given myself the name of the one nippled bandit, winky (my chest is winking), and define all other males as feminine because they have two mamory glands.  By default, I am more manly than 99% of the men out there.

The only advice I can give you is to give it time.  You will settle into your new body image.

We have done what most men have not.  We have stared death in the face and if you are reading this... you have not lost (breast or no breast).  What you do now is up to you.  Live in fear of the inevitable, or make every moment count until you are called home.  We have been given a gift.  We will live for years and years before we die but we are more aware of death.  Many people out there are obvlivous and are wasting time with trivial pursuits (not the game) and could die tomorrow having wasted their lives.  Get out there!  Do something that makes you truly happy!  Live!

Brent

tim73

thank you brent.....you are an inspiration and I literally mean it......the way you described yourself helped me quite a lot......Of course I am also betting on " time" and time alone with fingers crossed in hope that if I would or could get over it !!!......Some times I just terribly wish as a  child  to go to sleep and then waking up to find it all as just a dream , a very bad dream....Anyways that is it.....life goes on...

Please do tell me if this numbness and heavy feelings in your chest after mastectomy as if something is permanently strapped there ever goes away or or i'll have to get used to even this altered sensory experience too....At present, this is the most annoying thing, I really want to get rid of.....

LibraryLynn

I have nothing of note to add here but my support and respect for all of you. I am not positive, but I believe Peter Criss from KISS is also a breast cancer survivor and writes about it in his new biography.



Tim= even though cancer really does suck, you are right about it leading you to amazing people. That has definitely been my experience.



Love and light,

Lynn

Lily55

Tim - i had that feeling for the who le quadrant but that is less now as i have weekly physio to help with scar tissue and it is getting better...slowly but undoubtedly......



Do you exercise as that does help?



I know it does not help much but i think of you most days ....

Momine

Tim, the annoying heaviness etc does ease, but it takes a long time and can get very annoying, as you say. It comes and goes and as it does it comes for less time and a little milder each time. I am 18 months out and although it is not 100% gone, it is immensely much better than it was a year ago, for example. I ditto some massage from a lymphedema/vodder PT. It works wonders.

1NippledBandit

At first there was a huge numb area.  It has shrunk considerably and I have become accostumed to it.  I don't ever think about it.  The thing that drives me crazy is the feeling that I have an itch over the scar and no matter how much I try and scratch it, I can never get it.

You are lucky.  I didn't stumble onto this site for until a year and 1/2 after my surgery.  I found it as part of an assignment for a communications class and I just keep coming back.  I'm glad to hear I have lifted your spirits.  If there is anything I can do to help, let me know.

Brent

Ariom

There isn't really anything that I can add here. I am just so interested in the male perspective, and how it is being handled by them.

I have read all the posts here, and yes, Lynn, I read too, that Peter Criss from KISS did indeed have BC, as did Actor, Richard Roundtree who was originally a model and then actor who played John Shaft in the Movie Shaft, and sequels.

Hey NippleBandit, (love that name!) I have that itch too! A close friend of mine lost an arm in a motorcycle accident, and he is driven crazy by an itchy hand. My surgeon calls it Phantom Sensation.

I do agree with Momine, massage is the best thing. I massage the whole chest and then concentrate on the scar itself at least a couple of times a day with massage oil and aromatherapy oils. I also go to a massage therapist who does scar release massage so I don't get any adhesions. It is looking better all the time.

Tim, the one who started all this, I am so sorry that it has been so difficult for you. I have read your posts and have felt for you, as you have described how you have been affected by this. I do hope that it gets easier for you, especially the way you see yourself.

Take care!

melmcbee

Hey Tim, I can give you something to laugh about. Im having extreme pain 8 months post mastectomy because of these stupid tissue expanders that must have oh I dont know maybe 500 ml of saline in them. I had to have these torture things in so I could eventually have what I felt at the time was gonna be breast again. I still have 3 more months to enjoy the fun of these monsters. lol. By the time I actually get my implants I really dont think I am going to care anymore. Im hoping you will find the humor in what women will go thru.

Brent I love your signature line and I hope you have that made into a sticker for your vehicle because I think thats the most important thing that I have read recently.

All my love to my new brothers who can actually understand.

farmerlucy

Hey Tim - The only thing I have to add is that I was where you are emotionally just a short year ago. You see I had my breasts removed preventatively, only to find out I already had cancer. It was gone before I even knew about it. As a friend of mine said - that is a real mind trip. I allowed myself to go to hell and back those first few months. I refused to allow myself any hope, because what the heck good would hope do?? I prepared for the worst  I ran the stats in my head over and over and over and over.

I figured I may as well get it over with, and skip the whole suffering stage for myself and my family.

I so understand about wanting to wake up from this terrible nightmare. Sleeping was the only safe place for me early on. I spiraled downhill until my brother (a gynonc) recognized the signs of anxiety and depression. God and I had many a talk those early months. Mostly me telling him to take me now, asking him why? why? why had he abandoned me? I was really ugly to God those first few months. Good thing he has broad shoulders. Two months post mx I started an antidepressant and anti-anxiety med and started working with a Stephen Minister. That did take me out of the darkness for a while, then I figured I was all better, time to get back to life, so I went off of them.

Yep - you guessed it backwards I spiralled again. After the second crash I started a different antidepressant, and anti-anxiety med. That and time and my amazing Stephen Minister started to pull me toward the light. This time I stayed there.

BC has changed me. Physically and mentally. Recently I watched an episode of Guiliana and Bill. In it G talks about her scars. She said that she is not ashamed of them, she's proud of them. It is physical evidence of what she endured AND overcame. With that I've now decided to stop my recon at this point and for now I have no plans to do nipple recon. As Popeye says, "I yam what I yam!"

My PS is positively brilliant. I know that there are many PS as brillant as she is. I have no doubt that one of the brilliant PS could work their magic and make the two sides of your chest match if that is what you desire.

Cancer does not define you. It is just a patch on your life's quilt. (I think I stole that from Guiliana also!)

Hang in there. Don't be so hard on yourself. I KNOW that this experience is going to make you an even more incredible doctor and you WILL do great things for the world. My Stephen Minister asked me "You know how long it is gonna take for you to feel better?"  "As long as it takes!" and she was right!

Big Big Cyber Hugs to you!

firstcall

At first, I was pretty self conscious about my chest.  I exercise very regularly, change and shower at the gym, and I took up swimming to help rehab my chest wall.  I decided that I just needed a good story to go with the scar.  So I asked friends for suggestions, including here.  For awhile, when at the gym I would throw my towel over my right shoulder, which hid my scar for the most part.  Now I throw my towel over my left shoulder.  I don't actually get all that many comments, but most have come when swimming.  The first person who asked, I answered 'They promised me there were no sharks in the Puget Sound......they were wrong!'.    The next person asked me if I had heart surgery.  I answered  'yes.....and if I had it to do over, I would find me a surgeon who knew which side the heart was on.  On another occasion when asked, I simply said.....'thank goodness he wasn't a very good shot'.  

Like I said, I was self conscious at first, but I soon made peace with it.  I decided that I would not hide or shy away from my scars.  Of course, chemo took all my hair away too, but now its growing in a little.    The phantom pains were interesting.....and don't happen as often now, but still occasionally. 

It is a disfiguring surgery for men too, but I think your mindset can make all the difference in the world. 

Ariom

Hi Firstcall, I love your explanations about the scars!

I had hand surgery which has given me a large scar that runs straight across my knuckles. When people ask me what happened, I tell them I had been big game fishing on the Barrier Reef and I put my hand down on the side of the boat as they were pulling in a big one. The line had trapped my hand, almost severing it at the knuckes.

Just as the eyes are getting big, I burst the bubble and say "Nah, it was tendon redirection for arthritis."

My Daughter tells me I am like one of those Amazon women who have a scar from being a warrior. I like the sound of that!

Lily55

I really am not comfortable telling people i had BC and would love ideas on a good cover story for my mutilation.....



Tim here for you...