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Breast Implants: The Look and Feel
My Life as a Breast Implant
Are you unhappy with the size of your breasts? You aren't alone.
Many women are unhappy with the size or shape of their breasts,
so they decide to get breast implants. Obviously, there are many
issues that a woman must consider before deciding to get
implants. These issues include considering the effects on her
general health, the effect the implants will have on accurate
mammograms and breast self-exams, breast feeding, and of
course the change in appearance. These issues will be discussed
over the course of several in depth articles.
There are two different kinds of breast implants: silicone and
saline. These days, only saline implants are being used, except for
some studies using silicone implants. A moratorium was placed
on silicone implants in 1992 due to increasing evidence that they
may have had a role in causing various autoimmune and
connective tissues diseases in some women. Since silicone
implants were pulled from the market, several studies have been
conducted to determine the safety of silicone implants.
Unfortunately, most of these studies conflicted with each other.
Some showed that silicone implants did, indeed, correlate with
higher incidence of certain diseases while other studies showed
no link between the two.
The Look
The first thing to know before you decide to get breast implants is
what they are really like. The look and feel is different in many ways
from that of real breasts; they are not exactly like yours, and they
are bigger.
Have you ever paged through a lingerie catalogue and been sure
that one of the models had breast implants? Well, that's probably
because implants can make the breast look unnaturally rounded.
Implants are half spheres. A sphere is the shape of a ball. Normal
breast shapes vary and are more parabolic. If you think back to
geometry, you will remember that this is more of a U-shape. A new
version has just come out. It's supposed to be more naturally
shaped.
Women who started with breasts bigger than a B cup size may get
a "double breast." This is because the normal breast hangs, but
the implants stick straight out from the chest wall. This makes the
breast look like it has a hump in the middle when looking at it from
the side. When a woman's breasts swell, her implants will stay the
same size, causing her natural breast to swell over the top of the
implant. This also causes a "double breast." In addition to the
swelling associated with pregnancy, many women note that their
breasts sag after childbirth. This is because the skin of the breast
was stretched while swollen and the substance of the breast now
hangs lower. This can result in changes that are more noticeable
for women with implants, as implants will not change with the
breast.
When pushed up, the implants' upper border will show through the
skin. Two deeply curved upside down lines get etched in the skin.
When pushed together, well... they don't push together. It is like
putting too balls together; they meet in the middle and leave a gap
on either side. This is in contrast to the straight line formed by
natural breasts. When left alone, implants leave a flat valley-like
gap where the breastbone (the sternum) is, between the implants.
Natural breasts slope more gradually towards the center.
The Feel
When doctors tell you that implants feel the same as normal
breasts, they are talking about how it would feel to others touching
your breasts, not about how they will feel to you. Saline doesn't
have the same density as tissue so the weight feels different for
the size. They can make it harder to sleep on your stomach and
they often feel cold. In some cases, the body forms scar tissue
around the implants, causing the breasts to feel hard.
The difference in the feel of the breasts can also have an impact
on cancer screening. If the augmented breast does not feel the
same as the natural breast, it can be difficult to determine if there
is a change in the breast that should be checked out. Also, there
are changes that will occur in the breast due to the implant that will
have nothing to do with cancer, but these changes can cause
alarm when they are first noticed.
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