'I've never liked my boobs. Then I had a breast cancer scare.'

Listen to this story being read by Melissa Mason, here.

I can remember with vivid detail the day my flat chest sprouted little buds. I was 10; I was still climbing trees, and I thought they were revolting. These puffy nipples I wanted to hide from everyone, especially my family and friends. 

From the moment my breasts became breasts, I hated them. I asked mum for a crop top under the guise of "everyone wearing one" under white sports t-shirts, but really I wanted to flatten my chest for as long as possible.

This charade continued into high school – I kept up with the crop tops because I couldn’t bear asking mum to take me to a bra store. To me, there was nothing more embarrassing than admitting I had breasts. Finally, in year 10, I found the courage to go on my own, using pocket money to buy the first bra I tried on that fit, spending as little time as possible in the store.

It’s easy to see why I had such derision for my bust at such a young age. As soon as they started developing, the shame started. Not from within me, but from outside of me.

Watch: A quick guide on how to check your breasts and what you need to look out for. Post continues after video.

There was the family friend who commented loudly to my mum that I needed a real bra, because you could see the outline of my pubescent bust through the singlet I had on. The boys on the school bus flicking the straps of my crop top from the seat behind. The pastor at church telling me and other teenagers that we had to wear button-up shirts.

If I wasn’t feeling ashamed about my breasts, I was wishing they looked different. I wanted my sister’s bust – a petite 10B, so dainty compared to my 12DD, bringing with it the ability to wear strappy backless tops and plunging slip dresses that were in all the magazines. 

I wanted Keira Knightley in Bend It Like Beckham dancing the night away in a glomesh cowl neck. I didn’t look like the girls in magazines when I wore these tops. My breasts sagged while theirs sat perky and bounceless, just a hint of curve on the sides. They were so overt, falling out of the plunging tops and poking out the sides of handkerchief styles.

I wanted to wear prairie dresses without looking like a milkmaid. Triangle bikini tops that didn’t just cover my nips. I wanted fashion boobs and instead I had sex boobs – the kind men leered at, not the ones on the catwalks. Boobs women wanted me to cover up.

Then, earlier this year, I went for a breast check because I’d had some shooting pains on my right breast. Instead, the specialist spent a long time on my left side.

"Is it this area?" he asked, pressing the ultrasound contraption in hard as I took deep breaths.

"No?" I said. "It’s the other side."

"Oh... hmmm."

I tried to make out what was happening on the ultrasound screen but it was just a heap of white and grey lines and black bits. I felt so vulnerable lying on the cold examination chair with this man grinding a plastic and metal thing into this private part of my body.

He pointed to a random black spot on the screen and explained that it was a mass that needed to be checked. "There’s no need to worry at this point," he continued while I immediately started to panic internally. 

Thankfully, the mass was fibrous tissue – not cancerous. I am, of course, so thankful that it wasn’t cancer. But it was still such an awful experience, and a lot of that had to do with having this part of my body get touched and examined.

No examination is fun. But as someone who has gone through a fair amount of invasive procedures – cervical screenings, a knee reconstruction, that time a doctor had to dig out an ingrown toenail – this was by far the most traumatic. I wish the specialist I saw understood the complex relationship a lot of women have with their breasts. I cried, because I felt discomfort, sure, but also because I’d never felt so completely exposed. I wanted to cover myself with my arms and instead I lay there with a stranger seeing everything, poking and prodding it all.

I don’t want to scare anyone off getting breast examinations – they’re crucial, I’d do it all again tomorrow if I was told I needed to. Like cervical checks, the benefits far outweigh the sh*ttiness. If you need one, don’t put it off. Book into your GP now.

I’m glad I got checked, and I’m so thankful it was nothing in the end. But the experience made me realise I had this toxic relationship with my own breasts. Do you know what the worst part of this was? I could feel the small lump. I’d just never checked my breasts regularly or properly, that’s how avoidant I was regarding them. It was a lucky find thanks to random pain on my other side.

All my life I’ve hidden my breasts, ignored my breasts, despised my breasts. I’ve avoided touching my breasts. I’ve treated them like a bodily attachment I wish didn’t exist. How deeply, horribly sad is that.

My hatred for my boobs doesn’t come from me, some inbuilt attitude from birth. It all stems from how other people perceive them. I want to hide them from men and feel embarrassed by them around everyone else, because of how people have treated them in the past.

If I’d never had those experiences, would I embrace their size, how they looked, that they were a part of my body? Would I love their curves and their individual uniqueness, how one hangs a little lower, the size of my nipples, the way they look without a bra?

How have we gone so long allowing not just men, but everyone, including other women, to define what our breasts mean to us?

I’ve made a conscious decision. I’m going to celebrate mine. It’s a long road – I’m not yet comfortable with cleavage and fitted tops still give me some anxiety. But I’m trying. I do my breast exams at home, properly now. I look at my boobs in the mirror after a shower and mentally; I speak positively about them. I don’t critique them. 

I want to throw off all this shame brought on by misogyny, the crude comments and leers and awkward glances. They don’t define me and how I feel about myself. 

My breasts are a part of me, and I will love them accordingly.

Feature Image: Instagram @melissamason_.