Hi, My Name is Cameron and I Have Gynecomastia

I’m a guy

And I just bought my first bra

As a guy who has been overweight for my whole life, I’ve just sort of been used to having a larger chest than usual. I’ve also taken some medication for chronic conditions have not been kind to my hormones. As a result, I developed breasts. I never minded the jiggle, the wiggle, or anything else. I just went about about my life. However, I did try compression shirts and compression wear with mixed results. Any woman with breasts, particularly large breasts understands the difficulties and problems that compression shirts and wear can present.

One of the first things you understand is that men’s clothing is pretty limited in terms of room in the chest area. Clothing can be difficult. T-shirts are easy but collared shirts and  clothes didn’t always fit that well around my chest. It was frustrating. One day I decided to google “men’s bra” just to see if anyone had invented anything that could solve my problem. Fortunately, I found gynecomastia.org. This is how short sighted a man can be. If I had given thought to the problem I would have realized that the sports bra already exists and my google search was unnecessary.

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Gynecomastia affects almost 60% of men. Puberty and a variety of medications can cause benign enlargement of the breast tissue.
[/pullquote] For many guys it’s just a bit of a lump under the nipple. For others, it can lead to full breasts. If you add on weight gain to that, breasts can get larger from additional fat deposits and also from additional estrogen produced from being overweight.

My chest started developing around 12 or 13. Thanks to years of asthma medication, my adrenal and thyroid glands have seen better days. My hormones were not quite right through the process. Biological wires were crossed and I developed breasts. I never gave it much thought, except when I had to do anything in front of people. Loose t-shirts, generous sweaters, and vests or jackets minimized the look and I tried to wear those things regularly. I didn’t grow up with many clothes and so my options were limited. I did my best or at least so I reasoned.

After reading more at Gynecomastia.org, I decided that I was going to try this out. I got on Amazon and target and selected some sports bras. I even ordered a recommended model from the website and started trying them on. I’m a big guy anyway so I was prepared for things not to fit and I was right, however, I did land some simple cotton sports bras from fruit of the loom that changed my life.

I had no idea how my whole body movement had accommodated my chest and that how with a simple garment I could have far fewer problem. I was sold on day one. I wear my bras every day. I found a garment that I love and I enjoyed the comfort that came with it.

Most guys with gynecomastia will opt for the surgery. I will confess that I looked into the surgery a few years ago. It’s expensve ($6-10K) rarely covered by insurance, and I wasn’t excited about having to wear a compression vest for 6 weeks after the surgery as well as seeing videos of what it all looked liked and the high risk of infection. As one commenter at gynecomastia.orgsaid, “I’d rather spend that money on a motor cycle.” I decided I liked this guy immediately.

I discovered there was quite a big larger community of guys than I realized. I went from feeling alone and weird to being pretty ok with simply wearing a garment that I found helpful without getting caught up on the genderization that often comes with clothes and the cultural hang ups we get from those perceptions. Thanks to hormones in food, pesticides, and plastics, more guys are developing breast tissue. Some will develop a small lump under their nipple and many more will develop larger tissues. Most guys over 65 will also suffer from this condition. It’s not the end of the world but you might want to consider getting some support.

I was uncomfortable with the gender aspect. Could I still be male and wear a bra? To some, this is a silly question. Masculinity is deeply performative. What I discovered after the first day is that no one is performing underwear inspections and as long as my garments aren’t stretched, no one noticed. It was private and for my comfort and ease only. My masculinity remained intact.
I was surprised with how comfortable it was and while on the first day everyone reports first-day jitters (myself included) the comfort melts those away almost immediately. The only place I’ve been cagey about putting my bra on was at a locker room for a spa. Slipping it on in front of other guys wasn’t for me so I skipped it at that juncture but most days, you’ll find me running my errands and living my life, bra and all.

If you’re a guy who has gynecomastia, you’re not alone and I welcome your comments!