“
My small breasts and I” was a programme on BBC 3 last night which was part of their Body Image season. It followed three woman; Sharon Tan, Laura Taylor and Kate Bailey who were unhappy were their busts and showed the steps that they took to overcome this.
Laura Taylor had wanted a boob job since she was 14 but she couldn’t afford it. Whilst surfing the web she discovered a website called “My Free Implants” where men would help towards the cost of silicon implants in return for photos and emails. So she went to meet one of the few women who had sucessfully used the site. It looked a bit dodgy to me. She also visited a doctor to explore her implant options, and sat in on an operation where a new found friend was expanded to a D cup.
Kate Bailey was the worst affected of the three women in the show. She had a very negative image of herself and found it difficult to go out because she thought everyone would be looking at her. Even shopping for clothes was a major trauma. In spite of this, she managed to fly over to New York to see a photographer called Ellen Fisher Turk who provided a treatment called phototherapy. This basically involved having pictures taken of herself to improve her body image.
Sharon Tan was using a bizarre suction cup device that looked like a mini milking machine and needed to be worn twelve hours a day. Her boyfriend was pretty supportive about it even though it meant no “cuddles” for weeks. I am not entirely sure he should have been encouraging her though. The breast pumps started causing soreness after a few weeks but rather than being put off Sharon imaginatively came up some padding for the … erm … suckers.
Thankfully over the course of the show, both Laura Taylor and Kate Bailey changed their minds about their figures. Laura, having talked to a surgeon (and spent a couple of hours walking round her home town with two stockings full of rice down her bra, dealing with the unwanted attention from lorry drivers) decided a boob job wasn’t at the top of her priorities after all. Kate looked at the black and white photos of herself taken by the phototherapist and realised she is quite pretty after all, and her boobs seem pretty normal when viewed from the outside. She discovered a new-found confidence in herself, which is enough to let her take her two daughters to the swimming pool.
Sadly, Sharon Tan was left a little deflated as a consultant told her that there was very little evidence to support the claim that the suction pumps had any long term effects of boob size.
Factsheet and useful links: My small breasts and I, phototherapy.
Technorati Tags: BBC 3, Boobs, Body Image, Documentary, My Small Breasts and I, TV
