Wednesday, Sep. 19, 2007
Men's Breasts: No Joking Matter

By Michael D. Lemonick



Frank Costanza wanted to call it the "man-ssiere"; Kramer insisted it had to be the "bro." Their bizarre invention, featured on one of the more ridiculous episodes of Seinfeld, was a bra for men. It played off one of the many indignities of male aging: the swelling of male breast tissue known as gynecomastia. It's almost always harmless, even in cases where it's painful — but it can be really, really embarrassing.


It also turns out to be really, really common, according to an article in the latest issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, written by Glenn Braunstein, a hormone expert at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, to familiarize other doctors with the condition. Nearly half of all men will experience it at some point in their lives, and not necessarily at the end. In fact, it's most common during adolescence; 65% of boys have it at the age of 13 or 14. Boys that age already have enough physical changes to wrestle with as it is — imagine taking a shower in gym class if you've got gynecomastia. Worse yet, imagine you're that age, with those symptoms, fearing you've got some awful disease, and being too mortified to tell your parents or your doctor about it.


If you're a teenage boy with gynecomastia, at least you probably won't have it for long. The condition is caused by — what else? — hormones that are out of whack. During mid-to-late puberty, boys' bodies may produce relatively too much estrogen, before testosterone output ramps up to adult levels. But teenagers generally get back into whack within a few years, leaving male breasts back in the nightmarish past along with acne and cracking voices.


Unfortunately, the imbalance does occasionally persist. And in older men, declining testosterone can bring it on for the first time, with no hope of it just going away. The good news is that the swelling is often so minor that it isn't even noticeable, even to the men that have it. Many cases are found by a physician first, during a routine exam. The 67-year-old described in the New England Journal article, for example, was being seen for lower back pain (if the swelling had been off-center behind the nipple, or been accompanied by discharge, Braunstein would have suspected male breast cancer, which is much rarer and not harmless at all). When gynecomastia is accompanied by pain, drugs that block estrogen, like the anticancer drug tamoxifen, can relieve it. When it's just mortifying, there's always breast-reduction surgery — or, of course, the bro.


On the other hand, says Braunstein, if it's not bothering you, don't waste time worrying about it.

I've got this condition and it definitely has affected the way I wear.
Recently I had a chat with a plastic surgeon and she suggested I was "depressed" and should consult a psychiatrist first,before any surgery,contrary to my wishes and statements. My endocrinologist tried to talk sense,supposedly,but it did not help. I guess I'll just have to get more aggressive about it.

I'm sorry to hear that. I cannot imagine how difficult it must be.

From what I understand about plastic surgeons - and most in the medical community - they are very much concerned about their patients coming back to sue them after they have performed a procedure. It seems to be becoming more and more common. It's too bad that docs have to first worry about covering their own asses before worrying about their patients.

I don't think that this is a CYA thing , as far as the surgeon is concerned.
Reason I say that is because the body works in very strange ways, a certain chemical imbalance in the body can and will cause major problems.
Plastic surgery is a very unpleasant thing to have done to you at the best of times (I've had lots of it and it REALLY hurts), think about an alternative before you decide to go under the knife.

You've had plastic surgery due to injuries, or to improve your looks?
Did you get wounded as a firefighter?

Yes, I have skin grafts and various other scars from 3rd degree burns I recieved at work one night.

Now, I will say this, I grew up as a bit of a "fat kid", like anyone, it's easy to put on pounds when your mother is feeding you with all sorts of crap, being a child of the 70's most of it was fried crap, once my parents split, I was down to basic food like takeaways and shit like that.

Once I got a job as a Fire-fighter I really lost a shit-load of weight, I was under a self-imposed training regime and (although I was smoking at the time) I made myself run at least 3 miles a day (first thing in the morning), climb the hose tower 3 times and then roll up 3 100mm hoses.
I used to be at the peak of my fitness back in the early 90's, infact I was the fittest FF on Blue Watch at the time.

I gave the smokes away in 1992 after the Fire Service banned smoking inside any of it's stations. (after a woman complained about it)
I look at men and women these days with thier obesity and think, well how can you be like that?

This is not what you were meant to look like.
It is a real bloody struggle to lose weight, but hell, look at the alternatives.

I'm sorry if this sounds like a rant guys, I'm not one of the pretty people preaching to the great un-washed.
I am certainly not pretty and I could be accused of being un-washed as well.

As an older chap, with a long past history of being very fit and muscular, I have to admit to 'going to pot' over the last few years. My man-boobs do not get any support nor any needed as far as I can tell, but I would reckon I am a 'B' cup by now.

The lack of bras for men isn't my worry, nor the concommitant lack of nice lacy, sexy ones (why should women have all the alluring undies) Although, as a warrior, I could go for a tooled-leather one like Xena's.

Its the lack of a good corset for my fat gut! Now that needs a bit of support!