Breast Cancer in men

Had the surgery, oh aye, that’s right, of course.

 

Yeah, it’s fine – I mean, ok, my nipple’s away and everything, and the consultant said, you know, “you can have cosmetic surgery,” and I went, “at my age? Forget that,” you know?

 

Yeah, I was offered that.

 

Before… When I went initially, you know, they were discussing the surgery and said, you know, “you can have cosmetic surgery.” I says, “…don’t need cosmetic surgery at my age,” you know? If I was a young guy or something, uh uh, but I didn’t worry too much about that. But anyway, they made a very neat job of it.

 

Well it’s, I mean, I’ve got enough scars as well, you know? But the fact that the age I am, it doesn’t bother me at all. The thing is I feel ok – that’s the main thing, you know?

 

I’ve had tattoos, yeah. Yeah, no, I, I, no, I wouldn’t do that. I wouldn’t do that, coz a lot of women have it done, as well, tattooed back on, don’t they?

 

My cousin’s wife, she had it done on one side, and she had a nipple tattooed back on there.

 

Yeah, they can do.

 

I mean, probably, if I sort of said well, “I don’t want to…” They could have probably saved this one, but I think this one had to go anyway coz the tumour was right in the nipple, sort of thing.

 

Yeah – I think that one would have had to have gone anyway, but like I say, you know – especially at my, I mean, it might have been different if I’d been twenty years old, you know?

 

Yeah – coz I mean, you know, I mean, all of us, when we’re young, are vain, aren’t we?

 

You know, whether you’re man, woman, or whatever you are – there’s always a bit of vainness about you, you know? But I think a younger fella might, I don’t know if I would have done when I was young – I don’t know if I would have worried then, or not, I really don’t. Might have done, I don’t know – but then again, we never had time for sunbathing, we had to go to work and earn, you know, and just work. That was your life, you know, just going to work, sort of thing. 

Yes, they said they could tattoo them if I wanted in that area. I said, “Well I ain’t really bothered”. I said, the only time I’m stripped to the waist is usually I sit in here at nights with nothing on because I put the cream on and all that, and I’d rather it soak into me than into me clothing, and of course, weather like this, down on the allotment, I strip to the waist. A little bit, just because there’s three or four young… well, I say young lassies, I mean you know, forty-odd downwards, and it curtails it a bit because I don’t want to embarrass them or myself for that matter.

 

Well, I mean, they’re young lassies compared to me, I mean you know, probably between thirty and forty.

 

No.

 

 

No, no.

 

 

No. I didn’t know you could get it. Well they never asked, I never asked them, fair enough, if a woman might get a nipple, but my wife aint got nowt, you know what I mean? If a woman, fair enough, she get it done but never... I was never asked about it and I never asked them.

 

 

No... It’s different for a woman.

 

 

Coz she’s got bigguns – mine aren’t big. Mine’s flat, aren’t they? You can see where it delves in there, that’s all so you know what I mean, whereas the other one sticks out a bit here – but it’s only muscle, isn’t it, really when you look at it? No, it doesn’t embarrass me. I’d never shout for it, they never offered, so I don’t think they could help you out – I didn’t know they could offer men owt. What can they offer a man?

 

 

Even it up, yeah – well no, I never even was offered that and I ain’t asked about it. Well, it don’t bother me now.

 

 

I know what you’re saying, yeah, yeah – build it up a bit, yeah. Coz that does sink in, know what I mean? It’s flat as a pancake now, where that one stands out a bit but it doesn’t bother me – it doesn’t bother me one bit.

I was offered a tattooed nipple, which I thought hilarious – I thought that was really great. I could have any colour I liked, I presume! But from my point of view, the breast care nurse talked to me about that, and said, you know, did I want to go down any of those avenues, and I said, “No,” I think because I’m – even though I’m 58, and my breasts have grown a little bit, I didn’t have huge man boobs. I didn’t think there was a need for me to have any reconstructive surgery. The actual – I’m a hairy person as well, so a tattooed nipple would have been a total waste of time in a couple of weeks, because the hair would have grown over it. I didn’t fancy the pain of having a tattoo – which is funny when you have full surgery, and you worry about the pain of a tattoo! But, literally, no other issues. I’ve been swimming in a public pool since, I’ve got no qualms about my scar being on view. I know it’s different for a woman, obviously, but from a man’s point of view, you can always say you know, “Look at my scar!” I think, you know, it’s one of these things, isn’t it?

 

Yeah, showing off, yeah, “Look at this scar!” You know. So there’s no...

 

No, not at all. Literally. I mean, from the point, when I said earlier, about showing my, you know, I took my, opened my shirt on the bus. And people are looking on the bus, and quite interested.

 

So I educated quite a few people, yeah, late at night, yeah. Quite funny! But – no, I’ve got no qualms about it. But I can appreciate that there will be people, men who don’t want to bare their chests, but what I say is, you don’t look that different, because you haven’t got big breasts in the first place. It’s just a flat version of the other side, literally. 

They had never talked about reconstruction the first time, and I had insisted on being referred to a plastic surgeon. After the first time, to see what could be done. And that was greeted with some astonishment, I remember. And-

 

Because I was a man, and I was aware that women were offered reconstructive surgery at the point of initial surgery or they could delay it. But they were offered reconstructive surgery. So I felt like Oliver Twist almost, asking for more. But I was determined then that men should be treated absolutely the same as women. And they referred me to- no, they didn’t refer me to a plastic surgeon, they gave me the telephone number of the plastic surgeon, to make an appointment.

 

I did.

 

I phoned the number and the person said, “Oh, you’ll have to hang on until I get my diary, [name]”. I said, “Okay”. So, she came back. “Okay, mister…” I remember exactly, she said, “Okay [name] I’ve got the diary now. What’s your wife’s name?” And… that was obviously as bad as the pharmacist.

 

And anyway it was this assumption that men first of all didn’t get breast cancer, and secondly they wouldn’t bother at all with the reconstruction and…

 

Just no thought that I might be the person looking for treatment. Anyway, I made the lady aware that it wasn’t my wife I was talking about, it was me and I was the very first man… the very first man, that had been referred, or asked to be referred to a plastic surgeon after breast cancer treatment and this is of course before I found out the symptoms returning to the other side and by that time, they had decided a second mastectomy was best and because I had spoken to the plastic surgeon, she said she would do it…

 

… and that’s, that’s how it came about.

 

So, after the second mastectomy of course I was… didn’t have anything, no nipples so there was a serious lack…

 

Well, it does and it kind of looked very neat but there is definitely something missing and I did miss them and I do. Anyway, after that treatment, after that surgery, the plastic surgeon said that she would do something for me but not until the wound had healed and calmed down, and then she would see what she would do and I said, that’s fine, but in the interim, before she did anything, I became very depressed.