An Open Letter To My Breasts

Dear breasts,

I don’t miss you.

I know people are expecting me to grieve over my loss of you, to spend my nights up wondering if I did the right thing by getting rid of you. I did. A thousand times over, I did. I live without fear now. Not in the way that I’ve taken up bull riding or driving without a seatbelt, but in the way where I can look at myself in the mirror and appreciate what I see. Now I don’t view my body as out to get me, I view it as the thing that’s been through hell and is still, somehow, healthy and thriving. I view my scars as tiger stripes and delight in the fact that I never have to wear a bra again.

I laugh when I play a good game of “Can you feel that?” with my boyfriend (who, by the way, doesn’t miss you either) when trying to figure out exactly where the scalpel scraped you away. I never liked you, even before I found out you were trying to kill me. You were asymmetrical and too big for my body. You reminded me of the very organs that ended up putting some of my favorite people in the ground. I am grateful now, because losing you has put things in perspective for me. I can brush it off when the scale is a few pounds heavier or my face has a couple more pimples than it had the day before. I don’t hold grudges after arguments and smile at strangers. I eat more chocolate and read more good books, I spend more time with my family and am even more determined to become the best teacher I can be.

You’re in good company, wherever you are. Joined by part of my right eye and both fallopian tubes. Other organs that, given the chance, would also try to kill me. Eventually more of myself will join you in that biohazard dump, but the more of physical self I seem to lose, the more heart and personality I gain.

Breasts, I know you didn’t mean to hurt me, I know you didn’t really have a choice in the matter, it was pre-determined before I even took a breath or opened my eyes.

Thanks for understanding that you had to go.

Thanks for putting up with years of being squished around, poked at, and prodded by cold doctor hands.
Thanks for taking one for the team. My other organs thank you, too.

Signed,
Kelly