according to researchers from the University of South Australia; Ken’s bod, by contrast, is found in one in fifty men.) Big, fake breasts have so thoroughly saturated mainstream entertainment and media that they’ve created a new standard by which boys judge girls and girls judge themselves.
Thanks to the alliance of two kinds of silica-based technologies—breasts and computer chips—most young people learn about bodies and sex from the Internet; they have seen many more factorymade breasts than real ones. In this crowd anyway, natural breasts just keep losing traction.
THE PATIENTS IN DR. C’S SURGICAL SUITE KNEW AS MUCH. THE first patient I met was a twenty-nine-year-old named Gloria who weighs ninety-nine pounds. A recent college graduate, she has a two-year-old. When Dr. C came in for a pre-op review, she took off her robe to reveal breasts that are quite fantastic: firm and nicely rounded, probably a B cup. A delicate butterfly tattoo lay between them, and her back sported a geisha surrounded by cascading pink blossoms. She would be getting 275-cubic-centimeter implants, for “a full C.” I asked her what made her decide to do this. “I just want to put back what I had before my son was born,” she said.
Gloria was, explained Ciaravino later, ideal for surgery. “You want the little skinny ones,” he said, reflecting a truism among all surgeons. “The ideal patient, she’s had a couple of kids, she’s good looking to start out with. If you have funky breasts to begin with, they’re going to be funky after. It’s not going to be picture perfect. It’s all a relative improvement.”
As Gloria went off to meet the anesthesiologist, Dr. C strode to OR1 to place saline implants in a forty-one-year-old Filipina nurse. I watched as he rolled up the silicone shell like a pirouette cookie and then pushed it through the incision. After he flattened it out with his fingers inside her breast, he connected some tubing to its valve. He talked as he went. “With silicone, you have to push it in. You can get a little wear and tear. And you can see her filling up here before your eyes. She’s blowing up like we’re filling up a balloon here.” A machine was pumping in 340 cubic centimeters of saline fluid through the tube and into her breast. When she was fully inflated, Ciaravino stuffed some escaping yellow breast tissue and fat back into the incision, and then he and a nurse took turns sewing her up. She moaned and thrashed a bit. The anesthesiologist by her head adjusted her dose.
Next we went to have a pre-op with Courtney. As always, Ciaravino had a half-dozen patients rolling through the surgical suite in a conveyor belt of calm efficiency. Courtney was sitting with her husband, who wore a T-shirt and baseball cap. They were both in their mid-twenties, from a small town not far away. Courtney, a former cheerleader, now owns a tanning salon. She has dark shoulder-length hair and strenuously plucked brows. A mother of two small kids, she was eager for a better body. In a Texas accent, she explained what brought her here. “I’m a very small B or A, probably A. When I was in high school, I probably had a small C. My sister, she didn’t have big boobs, but after her daughter was born, hers stayed big. But mine, they got smaller every time. My sister-in-law used him,” she said of Dr. C. “Some of my good friends and customers have implants. I just want a full C. I don’t have to look good for anybody else, just for myself, I guess to help me feel better about myself.”
When I next saw Courtney, she was lying asleep on the surgery table. Her uncovered breasts had been marked with a blue pen. The ink made dotted lines along the contours of her flesh like rivers on a topographical map. Her torso had an orange-tinted tan, and her breasts were indeed small. She’d be getting 350-cubic-centimeter Mentor MemoryGel implants, bigger than the old-fashioned Burlesque. Dr. C explained that Courtney was a bit of
Thanks to the alliance of two kinds of silica-based technologies—breasts and computer chips—most young people learn about bodies and sex from the Internet; they have seen many more factorymade breasts than real ones. In this crowd anyway, natural breasts just keep losing traction.
THE PATIENTS IN DR. C’S SURGICAL SUITE KNEW AS MUCH. THE first patient I met was a twenty-nine-year-old named Gloria who weighs ninety-nine pounds. A recent college graduate, she has a two-year-old. When Dr. C came in for a pre-op review, she took off her robe to reveal breasts that are quite fantastic: firm and nicely rounded, probably a B cup. A delicate butterfly tattoo lay between them, and her back sported a geisha surrounded by cascading pink blossoms. She would be getting 275-cubic-centimeter implants, for “a full C.” I asked her what made her decide to do this. “I just want to put back what I had before my son was born,” she said.
Gloria was, explained Ciaravino later, ideal for surgery. “You want the little skinny ones,” he said, reflecting a truism among all surgeons. “The ideal patient, she’s had a couple of kids, she’s good looking to start out with. If you have funky breasts to begin with, they’re going to be funky after. It’s not going to be picture perfect. It’s all a relative improvement.”
As Gloria went off to meet the anesthesiologist, Dr. C strode to OR1 to place saline implants in a forty-one-year-old Filipina nurse. I watched as he rolled up the silicone shell like a pirouette cookie and then pushed it through the incision. After he flattened it out with his fingers inside her breast, he connected some tubing to its valve. He talked as he went. “With silicone, you have to push it in. You can get a little wear and tear. And you can see her filling up here before your eyes. She’s blowing up like we’re filling up a balloon here.” A machine was pumping in 340 cubic centimeters of saline fluid through the tube and into her breast. When she was fully inflated, Ciaravino stuffed some escaping yellow breast tissue and fat back into the incision, and then he and a nurse took turns sewing her up. She moaned and thrashed a bit. The anesthesiologist by her head adjusted her dose.
Next we went to have a pre-op with Courtney. As always, Ciaravino had a half-dozen patients rolling through the surgical suite in a conveyor belt of calm efficiency. Courtney was sitting with her husband, who wore a T-shirt and baseball cap. They were both in their mid-twenties, from a small town not far away. Courtney, a former cheerleader, now owns a tanning salon. She has dark shoulder-length hair and strenuously plucked brows. A mother of two small kids, she was eager for a better body. In a Texas accent, she explained what brought her here. “I’m a very small B or A, probably A. When I was in high school, I probably had a small C. My sister, she didn’t have big boobs, but after her daughter was born, hers stayed big. But mine, they got smaller every time. My sister-in-law used him,” she said of Dr. C. “Some of my good friends and customers have implants. I just want a full C. I don’t have to look good for anybody else, just for myself, I guess to help me feel better about myself.”
When I next saw Courtney, she was lying asleep on the surgery table. Her uncovered breasts had been marked with a blue pen. The ink made dotted lines along the contours of her flesh like rivers on a topographical map. Her torso had an orange-tinted tan, and her breasts were indeed small. She’d be getting 350-cubic-centimeter Mentor MemoryGel implants, bigger than the old-fashioned Burlesque. Dr. C explained that Courtney was a bit of
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