Body: Boobs

Deal with It! A Whole New Approach to Your Body, Brain, and Life as a Gurl
by Esther Drill, Heather Mcdonald, Rebecca Odes

Deal With It! offers a whole new approach for dealing with your life as a girl. It's a resource to help you learn about, laugh about, and figure out the stuff you go through on your way through life. It won't tell you what to do, because you'll need to decide that for yourself. But whether you're wondering about your body, your feelings or your changing relationships with the people around you, this book provides accurate information and outlines your options. Hilarious illustrations point out the humor in even the sorriest situations. And with hundreds of excerpts from real-girl conversations on the gURL.com website, you can see for real that whatever you're going through, you're not alone.

This book is for anyone who needs to know what it means to be a girl — from those on the edge of their teens to those who are way past them but still reeling from the trauma.

Chapter 1

Boobs get a lot of attention. There's a certain amount of biological motivation for this — breasts are the first source of human nourishment — but that's only the beginning.

The stress on boobs in our society creates a lot of stress for girls who are growing them. You don't have much control over your breast development and the outcome can be unpredictable.

When boobs start popping up left and right, they can be hard to ignore. Whatever your specific situation, shape, or size, your boobs are bound to be an important part of your female identity.

Growing Them

Breasts start to grow in response to an increase in the hormone estrogen, which causes the growth of mammary glands (which produce milk) and also signals cushions of fat to grow and surround those glands. Much of the volume of the breast comes from these cushions of fat. Also inside the breast is a network of milk ducts connected to the milk-producing glands, which are ready to send milk out of the nipple when it comes time to nurse a baby.

There are roughly five stages of breast development. Everyone goes through them at her own rate. Some girls may go through the whole process in a couple of months and can actually seem to bypass whole stages; others can take almost 10 years to get from the beginning to the (relatively) final product.

Stage I The first stage usually starts between ages 8 and 11 (although it can come earlier or later). During this stage, there are no visible signs of development. Inside the body, though, puberty is beginning. The ovaries enlarge and estrogen begins to circulate.

Stage 2 The first visible thing that happens is the nipple and the areola (the skin around the nipple) get larger and maybe a bit darker. They may also feel tender or ache a little. It can hurt to sleep on your stomach or wear certain clothes.

Next, milk ducts and fat tissue form a little, round, dense, disklike mound under each nipple and areola, making them stick out. One disk might form before the other, even as much as a year earlier. These disks can often feel like lumps.

Stage 3 Fat deposits now start to fill out the area around the nipple and areola. At this stage, many girls' breasts appear pointy. The amount of fat and where it grows vary and will determine the size and shape of your breasts. This is the time when many girls think about wearing a bra.

Stage 4 Not everyone goes through Stage 4. If you do, you will observe that your nipple and areola begin to form a separate mound at the end of your breast and get bigger and more pronounced. Some women keep this characteristic permanently. The breasts continue to fill out and grow larger. (If you didn't get your period during stage 3, you probably will now.)

Stage 5 By the time you reach stage 5, what you see could be what you get. Breast size can change during a woman's adult life, however. Generally the causes of this are hormonal (birth control pills, pregnancy) or changes in body weight, although there are a significant number of women whose breasts continue to change throughout their twenties.

Shapes and Sizes

Breasts come in all shapes and sizes. There is no one normal boob profile. And nobody notices the idiosyncrasies of your boobs like you do. The timing of your boob development makes no difference in what they end up looking like. Breasts also go through cyclical changes with the menstrual cycle. They tend to get a little fuller and more sensitive leading up to the period and stay pretty te der until the period is over. After the period they settle down to their less-full form.

Asymmetry

Your whole body (eyes, ears, etc.) is asymmetrical and chances are that there are some subtle differences between your two breasts, too. In some people it's enough to be noticeable, but almost never dramatically so. In rare instances, a right and left boob may vary a cup size or more. Very occasionally a girl will wear a prosthesis or even have surgery to even out a severe difference in size. Generally, though, it's one of those things that is a lot less noticeable to everyone else in the world than to the bearer of the boobs in question.

Nipples

Nipples also come in all shapes, colors, and sizes. Some nipples are particularly sensitive to outside stimuli.

Changing What You've Got

There's a long historical tradition of women making more or less of their bustlines than nature provides.

Breast enhancers

"Breast enhancers," which aren't that different from the actual implants inserted during surgery, are worn on the outside of the body and are available for purchase in the backs of magazines and at drugstores, promising every girl the silhouette she has always wanted. These products are obviously safer and cheaper than actual implants, but they don't change the way you look without a bra on.

Breast implants

First of all, no one NEEDS breast implants. Women may feel that their life enjoyment is being diminished by insufficient cup size. But that's kind of a limited way of thinking — do you really want to give that much power to two lumps of fat sitting on your chest?

The decision of whether to alter your body for a cosmetic reason is a serious and personal one. Some women have had terrible health problems as a result of getting breast implants, although scientifically the jury is still out on whether they are dangerous. In any event, it's a good idea to wait a while before taking such a drastic step. Most reputable plastic surgeons won't even consider breast implants on a woman younger than 18. The way people feel about their bodies changes over time, and making a big, unnatural, permanent change now might be something you could later regret. Besides, you might still be growing.

Having bigger boobs won't change the kind of person you are, and if it does make more boys notice you, it might not be for the reason you want them to.

Breast reduction

Some women are physically challenged by the large size of their breasts. These problems can include chronic neck and back pain; poor posture; rashes, pain, and discomfort during exercise; and bra straps that actually cut grooves in their shoulders. Some of these women opt for breast reduction surgery to have some of the breast tissue removed. Women who have had breast reduction are said to be about the happiest plastic surgery patients afterward. Reduction surgery can leave significant scarring, usually in an inverted T-shape from the nipple to the underside of the breast, and may affect breast feeding later.

Boobs in society

There are plenty of reasons people like breasts, and focus on them accordingly. Some trace it back to infant oral fixations. Others think it may be the round shapes that are pleasing to the senses. Breasts are the most visible sexual organs. While other sexual organs are developing at the same time, they are (generally) kept under wraps and are not able to be seen. Breasts, on the other hand, make themselves known. Boobs certainly get their fair share of media attention, and the recent explosion of public breast enlargements makes them more obvious than ever. Historically, though, a variety of sizes and shapes of breasts have been considered ideal. Not all cultures share the American fixation on boobs, either. Many European countries present a more integrated view of the female body, and women appear topless on public beaches and in advertisements. On a more personal level, different people are attracted to different breast attributes (just as some people may have a preference for a certain eye color).

But many people seem to think that breasts in general are pretty great, whatever the particulars may be.

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