When I became wheelchair-bound at the end of 2024, the biggest change I had to deal with was not being able to walk any more on my lovely long legs. But, as I surveyed my poor ruined body in the cold light of 2025, I was dismayed to see that there were a multitude of minor indignities which had vandalised my youthful looks since my spine went under the knife.
My lovely, glossy, dyed dark hair was now thin and greying. My teeth were mostly missing. My bingo wings could have flown me to the Moon. My lovely legs were like an old man’s. My bum had disappeared. My lovely vulva was vandalised with an unspeakably common plastic catheter. My stomach was crenellated from rapid weight loss. But the biggest shock was that my splendid rack – which I had been in proud possession of since the age of 14 – had shrivelled away to next to nothing. They were still perky for a pensioner – but they were small! Where’s the rest of me?
The last time I had small breasts, Harold Wilson was Prime Minister. I can’t help thinking how much my rack was an essential part of my persona when I was carving out my career: big tits and a rinky-dink working-class West Country voice contrasted almost comically with the forcefulness of my opinions. If I’d been flat-chested and spoken with an RP accent, I’d have had to try a damn sight harder to stand out; on the other hand, I’d have been taken more seriously.
But standing out was the better deal – and stand out I did. Once, I was walking along Upper Street in Islington with my second husband in a very tight T-shirt and a man literally fell off his bicycle staring at my rack. Nothing bothered my boobs; cocaine didn’t touch them or breastfeeding or Mounjaro. I didn’t wear a bra until I was in my 30s because they were so huge and prominent (I have a massive ribcage) that to uplift them further would have rendered them comical. ‘I saw her in the Groucho Club once – she was like a brunette Jessica Rabbit!’ I read with pleasure on a chatboard once. I wasn’t pleased with the next bit, though: ‘Then she became a lesbian and got really fat – what a waste.’ Miraculously, when I lost all the weight, they stayed where they were; a year into Mounjaro, I tried to mediate in an argument in a post office queue, only to have a man say: ‘You stay out of this, Tits!’
The last time I had small breasts, Harold Wilson was Prime Minister
But becoming disabled has been their downfall. I can’t wear an uplift bra because it would aggravate the long scar on my spine, so I have to wear stretchy sports ones, which flatten them even further. When I started on the weight-loss jabs a few years ago, I wanted to be slender – but I never wanted to be small. Now I’m not five feet nine any more – I’m around four foot in my wheelchair. I’m aware that I’m close to being a Little Old Lady. ‘You’re very frail – you must keep your calorie intake up,’ I was told by a dietician in rehab. The other day, a year after coming home, a community nurse referred to me as ‘petite’. My husband doesn’t like it and is constantly urging me to put weight on – but, on the other hand, I don’t want to be a fat person in a wheelchair. One of the pluses of not being plus-size is that I can move on my hands very easily from one surface to another, like an agile little monkey.
Now, though, the Telegraph says that big breasts are out of fashion. But they’ve always been out of ‘fashion’, ruled as it is by homosexual men with no great affection for cleavage. They’ll never go out of style in the real world because they indicate youth, fun, and bouncy, flouncy frivolousness, embodied by Sydney Sweeney on stage at the Stagecoach Festival, frolicking about like a little girl. It’s a world away from the po-faced pretentiousness of, say, an Emma Watson, just as Posh Spice – flat as a board and never smiling – was the opposite of Ginger Spice with that amazing embonpoint in that Union Jack mini dress: the ultimate confident-nation-on-the-up image.
The latest annual audit from the British Association of Aesthetic Plastic Surgeons (BAAPS), shows that breast reduction and implant removal procedures have overtaken enlargements. ‘For the first time, we are seeing the number of patients undergoing breast reduction and implant removal surpass those opting for augmentation,’ notes BAAPS president Nora Nugent, adding, ‘This reflects a broader shift away from exaggerated curves towards a more natural silhouette, one that better complements active lifestyles and the continued rise of athleisure fashion.’
Breast reduction certainly sounds a grisly business – far more complicated than having a pair of implants whacked in. Writes Laura Craik in the Telegraph: ‘It involves removing glandular tissue, fat and skin, as well as repositioning the nipple. Incisions are more noticeable, usually leaving a permanent anchor-shaped scar. According to the NHS website, the operation takes two to three hours, requires a stay of one to two nights in hospital and has a full recovery time of up to six weeks.’ And what do we get for this, pray?
In 2026, commentators are hailing a trend for showing off braless unsupported breasts, otherwise known as ‘Le Droop’, modelled by actress Charlize Theron at the Apex premiere in New York last week. The craziness of paying for a process that’s going to happen anyway when one gets mugged by gravity! ‘Ballerina boobs’ – small and delicate – are also being mentioned on social media, and while they sound more appealing than ‘Le Droop’ it’s worth remembering that ballerinas go through all kinds of over-discipline to keep their bodies resembling those of adolescent girls.
I can understand why young girls with naturally big breasts want to get rid of them today. Carnal knowledge is not the easygoing free-for-all it was when I was young. Equally, a sex-scared girl who’s been exposed to pornography from the playground might easily feel that knockers like the ones favoured in such scenes will act as magnets to the wrong sort of man and probably get her choked.
But, personally speaking, I had a lovely time with mine. You’ve got all the time in the world to be a flat-chested fashion plate as age hollows you out; summer’s lease hath all too short a date, and similarly the glory days of honest-to-goodness fun-bags are numbered. An ageing lady with big breasts generally looks more like a cross-dresser the older she gets – see Katie Price, who looks like the late Pete Burns with two balloons shoved up his shirt, on his way to a vulgar costume party.
Still, no matter what the size, it’s essential that modern girls see their racks as a source of fun and pride. Contrary to received wisdom, they’re not there for babies (you probably won’t have any, going by the demographics) and they’re not there for men, who’d do it with an eight-nippled robot if they got the chance. A beautiful small-breasted girl I know had a man say the immortal words to her: ‘I’d marry you if you got a boob job.’
They’re yours – what your mama gave you. If you like them the way they are, keep them; if you don’t, change them. But above all, have a good time with them, while you still can.
Comments