Since My Body is No Longer Mine

Kate Castello

It’s hard to forget the first time I got catcalled. I was only 14. 

That summer I was working in Queens, New York to get volunteer hours, and the hot sun beating down on the city pavement was making me sweat more than anyone else in my group. While walking to the nearest YMCA to shower, a man at least three times my age looked me up and down and made a suggestive comment about my body.

I was stunned. 

I had heard about catcalling in TV and movies, but I couldn’t wrap my head around the fact that anyone could say something so degrading to a person in real life. Even now, sitting in a classroom in Pittsburgh, over 300 miles from Queens, and that man, his comment makes me feel uncomfortable. 

It makes me feel unsafe. 

Later, as I stood in the shower at the YMCA, I turned his remark over and over in my head, my anger growing. Who is he to think he has the right to comment on my body? How fucking dare he?

I knew my anger was useless—it hadn’t stopped men in the past, and it certainly wouldn’t stop them now. If anything, I’d just put myself further in harm's way. 

But that didn’t stop me from getting angry when the catcalling got more frequent when I moved to the city for college. It didn’t stop me from getting angry when guys touched my friends at parties where they were barely sober enough to stand—expecting my friends to like it, expecting them to be grateful. And it certainly didn’t stop me from getting angry when two men denied me the surgery that would fix my agonizing back and shoulder pain—not to mention my self-esteem. 

My chest has always been an insecurity of mine. I know so many girls wish for big boobs, but I’d wish mine away in a heartbeat if it were possible. It always feels like a silly complaint—“Oh, you mean the body part people constantly talk about being attracted to? The one that would make so many people feel more feminine and serve as affirmation to them? That one? You must have it so tough.”

They’ve never made me feel feminine, they’ve only ever made me feel exposed. I can be fully dressed and still feel completely naked. 

And don’t get me wrong, sometimes they make me feel pretty or desirable—I’m 21 and vain after all—but most days I fantasize about being free. 

One day I got tired of fantasizing, I wanted it to be my reality. So I made some appointments and tried not to get my hopes up. 

I answered the same questions over and over: 

Where did you say you were experiencing pain? My back. My shoulder. My neck. I get headaches, my bra straps cut into my skin. 

Have you tried getting fitted for a proper bra? Yes. Of course. 

Family history of it? No.

Do you take any pain medication? Definitely more than I should be.  

I got tired of hearing myself talk about what felt like phantom pain. 

Some days, the pain is barely noticeable, but other days I can’t turn onto my side in bed because my back feels as if someone is sticking thousands of needles in it. Some days I feel like I could live like this for the rest of my life (though I’d be Advil’s number one customer) and other days I cry and know surgery is my only option for finding peace in my body. 

It’s been years since I’ve looked at my body and not seen angry red lines across my chest where straps and underwires chafe against my skin. I’ve tried every bra out there, underwire, no underwire, bralette, sports, etc. Nothing makes the pain—or my self-esteem—better. 

So, I met a surgeon. And I stood there in a cold office while a nurse took photos of my bare chest on her iPad (yes, an iPad, as if the topless photos weren’t uncomfortable enough, you had to take them on an iPad?) all in the hopes of getting help. I felt like a stranger watching myself from above, cringing at the awkward silence and the way I tried to crack my back nonchalantly—anything for a little relief. 

That day I realized just how badly I needed surgery. The nurse knew I needed it. The surgeon knew I needed it. And yet, 

My insurance company needed less than two days to decide I didn’t qualify.

 I sat, dumbfounded as I read their decision, tears already rolling down my cheeks before I’d even opened the letter. I looked at the name of the doctor—the man—who had made the decision. A man who had never met me, who had only seen photos of my condition and didn’t know what it was like to have to get used to pain caused by two fucking sandbags on your chest being pulled down by gravity every day. 

My anger came back, familiar but fresh, as if it had been locked away and never seen the sun in the first place.  

But my anger wasn’t only aimed at this insurance doctor, he was only half of this messed-up equation. My surgeon, a man who’d swapped chemistry stories with me and told me he could see how uncomfortable I was, that he’d like to help me—chose an amount to take off that he knew wouldn’t pass insurance requirements. But he wouldn’t go higher, “I don’t want you coming back in here and asking for a boob job because you think you’re too flat now. How do you think that makes me look?” Even after I assured him I’d 1000% rather be flat-chested than be in this much pain and hate my body so much. But he thought he knew my body better than me. 

These men assumed I would get over it. They assumed that I would want these boobs later on regardless of my pain, because what else is a girl good for, right? They assumed I would be grateful to them for saving me from a life-altering surgery I’d dreamed about since I was 14. 

My anger cooled into obsidian resentment. I resented people who’d never have to go through this, who didn’t know this pain. I resented the two male doctors for making decisions on my behalf because they thought they knew better. But god—I resented myself so much more. 

I didn’t look in a full-length mirror for two days after I got rejected. I showered with my eyes closed. I wore baggy T-shirts and two sports bras. I couldn’t think about what could have been, but my body was a permanent reminder. 

It’s now been several months since I was rejected, and I’d be lying if I said I was over it. Every few days, I remember this is the way my body will have to remain and I spiral into a fresh hell. The other day I sat for too long and couldn’t fall asleep that night because my lower back was on fire. Somedays, I can’t get out of bed. Call me dramatic all you want—I know it's just boobs—but really, it's my comfort and self-esteem. It’s my goddamn peace of mind. 

 I don’t know what it’s like to wear a sundress without feeling like I’m showing too much skin. I don’t date or let people see my body. I don't trust my own judgment, constantly asking if my top is too low-cut. 

I don't know who I am or if I will ever know, until I have this surgery.

But for now, I know I have to live with the decision two men made for me. 

Edited by Belle O’Hara & Elisabeth Kay