Gynecomastia Liberation Front - helping them put the eyeballs back in

[Alchemist]

With decades of illness, I didn't go out much and have been wearing 20 year old clothing except for a batch of t-shirts and shorts from 9 years ago.  I bought a new group of t-shirts, soft Puma 100% cotton, and shorts last week.  I washed them and they tightened up a bit.  YIKES.  They are far more form fitting than anything I have ever worn in my life.

I had to make a run to Home Depot.  That turned out to be gyne central.  In the morning at HD it is almost all working guys and retired guys.  Almost all the guys were in t-shirts and half at least had gyne, but nothing big unless they had even bigger stomachs, but all very visible.  And then there I was with D-DD cups sticking out prominently well past my stomach.  There was a clear bimodal response curve.  Two guys popped their eyes and dropped their jaws.  Nobody else showed any sign of noticing. 

I ignored the eye-poppers and gave them a chance to plop those eyes back in.

However, there were no tweakers or grabbers, no comments, just some eye popping and jaw dropping.  It's not junior high any more, thinking of the root of so many fears for a lot of us.  And besides, half the formerly pretty boys also have breasts and double chins and wattles and have no comments at all any more.  I approached one of the bullies from back then at a class reunion.  He hadn't aged so well.  He apologized for his behaviors way back then and said that life had taught him differently now.  Some of the others are dead.  Time wounds all heels.

So now I have to deal with some of the colors these shirts came in.  My partner insisted they were all fine, both for fit and color.  This is a whole new set of color variations.

[Paa_Paw]

Actually the eyeball popping could have been because of a particularly hot babe a few yards behind you. 

[Alchemist]

Actually the eyeball popping could have been because of a particularly hot babe a few yards behind you. 

Hi Paa Paw,

Where is that HD where a "particularly hot babe" is a few yards away in any direction in the morning? I've never seen one of those. I know a double take to the chest from 10 feet, very specific.  No babe that day.  Later on that day I ran into some more noticeable gawkers, again nobody behind me.  Maybe they were noticing my new shoes?  And so it goes.  They will get over it without any serious side effects.  Maybe that guy was tuning out all the fat guys as not relevant. There were a bunch of fat guys with gyne all around that morning in t-shirts.  I did notice that just before I saw him. He was tall and skinny and flat as a board and also wearing a t-shirt but no gyne.

My curiosity has gotten poked.  Now I'm looking at all sorts of things I hadn't been noticing. 

[igotum]

I sat in the car dog sitting while my wife shopped at Walmart a couple of weeks ago. She was there about an hour.
During that time there were 3 guys walked in front of the car at different times that were
 wearing snug fitting tee shirts and were also wearing a bra. The thing that made me
remember was that they appeared to be between 25 and 40 years old. I felt they looked just fine
and for sure looked better than without the bra. None were overweight. Maybe public acceptance is
not as far away as we think.

[hammer]

You would think it would be! You got all kinds of things that go on now that are accepted, such as boys and young men as well wearing their pants under their butt cheeks and their butts hang out showing their under wear, girls run around in men's  Boxer shorts, as regular clothes, now I won't even get into hair or what they do to their ear lobes!

We also got same sex merrage, and  politicians that do illegal things and it's over looked, and I could go on and on, and those of you that know me could probably guess where I stand on a lot of the issuses going on today, but why not accept a guy who has breast wearing a bra to support them to be ok! After all is that what a bra is for?

Bob, always  politically incorrect and always will be!

[Paa_Paw]

I do so much business with the local HD that the people at the contractors checkout all know me by my first name.  Some of the chicks at the contractors check out are not hard on my eyes at all.

[hammer]

I personally don't like HD and have found that their prices are higher on almost everything around here in my area. We have Menards, but my favorite is LOWES who also give a 10% discount on everything, everyday to veterans! You need to show your old ID card or something that you really are a vet, I use my VA hospital ID card, but all the check out girls have gotten to remember me with my Navy hat.

When they built the newer and better Menards store they put the in door at one end and the out door at the other end of the building with handie cap parking on either end. They only provide 1 in store shopping scooter, so the store is far from disability shopper friendly! Whereas LOWES in and out doors are about 100 feet from each other, handie cap parking in front on the store in between the doors and the provide 3 scooters a couple wheelchairs. I have never shopped there when a scooter wasn't  available!

I still do or supervise the repairs on my home givin my back ground, but I guess some stores don't think disabled people can do that!

BTW, HD only has one scooter too.

[TomJones]

Getting back to the subject, since I have gynecomastia, it makes me more aware of other gentleman's chests. I have noticed several men with larger breasts than I have in the last year.  Nobody says anything to them although they are quite prominent.   I think we sometimes make a bigger deal out of it than it really is.
Tom

[Jay55]

I guess I got to the point where I pay less attention to people's reactions than they pay to my breasts. But I'm sure this summer I'll get more "looks" because my breasts (and nipples) have gotten bigger and literally stick out like a sore thumb. But I'll still wear the same tee shirts and as long as I don't have any discomfort, I won't wear a bra. Not because I'm embarrassed to wear one, but I'm much more comfortable, and cooler, without one.
So let the eye poppers pop . Chances are I won't notice. Like you said, we're not in Jr. High any more.

[Alchemist]

Hi Jay,

This has been a period of discovery for me.  I found out just how much I wasn't watching.  I'm always thinking about one thing or another.  I'm a good model for "the absent minded professor" when I go shopping.  Any of the guys here could have walked or wheeled right in front of me and I likely wouldn't have noticed. I really started tuning out when crotches hit the knees and his ass is sticking half out, or his boxers.  I watch faces, not fashion. 

A mention to Bob, my daughter was in art school and what she did with her hair was scary.  She was a natural platinum blonde that went to a darker platinum as she aged.  Electric blue is a little extreme.  Also, the weirdest fashion statement I saw in the 80s were teenaged girls doing spring skiing wearing boys boxers over waffle-weave long underwear.  I just about dropped my teeth on that, and they were all OEM then.

So reading here, especially the tales of anguish from some of our younger members, I started noticing.  And then the collision of timing, needing new clothing.  Not only have I worn out the clothing bough 9 years ago, I have worn out my "old man" clothes bought 20+ years before that.   So now I have to buy and wear contemporary styles and colors so I started watching.

That was when I noticed that fat liberation had happened. I had suffered terrible fat shamming much of my life and my mother was anorexic and didn't let up if there was still meat on the bones.  Guys who would have been hiding under 4 layers of XXXXL shirts and so on.  Now the only guys wearing that kind of style that I have seen are guys with a serious reaction to their own gyne.  Fat guys, which I also suffered from "fat guy syndrome not my fault" and hated the people doing calorie counts on my shopping cart and looking at my stomach.  In recovering from many of my metabolic problems, suddenly my breasts were the only things sticking out.  That was when I bought the first non-underwear t-shirts I had ever bought, 9 years ago. 

So now comes reality.  This year sizes have all changed.  I had noticed that happening to shoes as the sizes became internationalized.  I have old size 12 I can still wear but have to buy 14 now.  XL shirts are not what they were.  I've wear a 52 inch suit jacket now but have a 38 waist. When my waist was 34, my jacket size was 46. An XL shirt now for me is very form fitting.  That was a shock.  It was like something my wife bought for me 30-40 years ago and I could not wear it and couldn't even explain coherently  So I watched. There is a group that is hyper sensitive, hyper aware of their own gyne and hyper reactive with fear.   I've been there.

When I wore the t-shirts the last 9 years I just ignored my awareness of others.  In some spiritual work circles it is said "It's none of your business what others think about you."  It probably hurts the most to find out they don't care about you at all.   First timers at a nudist club making their big entrance to the pool on a sunny day expect to be the center of attention, "Oh look, a new guy".  Many seem disappointed when the only person who notices them at all says "No glass into the pool area please".

There are guys in advertising on TV that have plenty of gyne wearing t-shirts.  There are guys with gyne with bare chests on some shows.  I think society, especially advertisers, are trying to "normalize" anything they can that creates a market.  I remember the fuss about putting deodorant ads on TV.  The erection drug ads and vaginal cream ads during national news are totally inconceivable from a 1950-2000 period.  I believe ads for bras designed for men will be on TV before too long.  You know, a man and his girlfriend having one of those serious conversations and she says "I have a bra fitter you just have to meet.  She will do wonders for your comfort" as she caresses his chest.

I agree with TomJones.  Most of us notice it far more than most of the public.  I see a smile of relief on other men who are sizable but smaller than me.  The shirts I've just bought leave not even a fig leaf of hiding, no folds and bulges of cloth disguising what is there.  They are very comfortable and feel entirely different from my other shirts which "hung" without touching my stomach, drawing my attention at least until they feel "normal".

And Paa Paw, the local HD isn't devoid of good looking ladies, they just were nowhere in the vicinity.  There is one I joke with regularly that "we just have to stop meeting this way" and she flirts a little. 

I had outright experiences of hateful discrimination in the 60's while wearing a beard and badly treated for fat at all sorts of ages.  I've never had that happen for breasts once out of school.