BOOBLESS AND PROUD

Joanne Jones, 46, longed for a boob job, until she couldn't wait to get rid of them

- 

Lying on my side in bed, I glanced down at my boobs and saw loose skin crumpling and spilling.

'I'm tempted to go under the knife and get these sorted,' I sighed to my fiancé Tony, then 50. It was March 2021 and, having lost 5st 7lb during lockdown, I was delighted with my size 10 frame, but my once DD boobs had shrunk to a B cup and the loose skin was getting me down. My breasts were so saggy I could have tucked them under my armpits.

'I love you as you are, but do what makes you happy,' Tony said. The problem was, we also needed a new bathroom at a cost of £6,000. There was always something!

That was the main reason we hadn't yet married despite getting engaged six years before. Our money always went on home improvements, holidays and doing nice things with the kids - Tony had three from his first marriage and I had Robyn, then 12, from mine.

MAKING PLANS

'Tell you what,' I said. 'Let's go ahead with the bathroom refurb and if they're still saggy after that, the next big spend will be a boob job.' My weight had fluctuated over the years and I figured that it was an incentive to stay slim.

But in June 2021, we were having a Sunday morning lie-in when I found a fingernail-sized gristly lump in my right breast, close to my nipple. 'It's probably just fatty tissue,' I said. Still, Tony agreed that I should get it checked.

The next day my GP confirmed there was a lump and she found a second one in the same breast.

I tried not to worry as I was referred for a mammogram, but during the scan, they found a third lump and biopsy results later that day revealed I had breast cancer.