Susan's Place Transgender Resources

I've been hearing that long-term binding, especially if you pull them down against your chest so the tissue morphs, is really bad for surgery results. I've heard that the elasticity of the skin affects the result.

Well I personally have been binding for ages and well, it's certain the skin on my tumors has lost its elasticity. It kinda stretches if pulled.

Even uppercaseChase made a vid about this and warned against binding...! And that he feels bad for guys who've had bad results bcos of it blah blah. This has never been a real concern for me coz obviously I am (and was) gonna bind so...! And having a big chest the tissue is gonna stretch and mold no workaround for that. I've been concerned by many things regarding surgery (such as the procedure itself, not waking up, nipple grafts, the overall result etc. etc. etc.) but never been really concerned by this. Anyway the skin is what it is. And at least it's removed anyway so...!

Does anyone have some concrete info on this? Have you had this happen to you? Has your surgeon talked to you about this? Anything specific?

All I'm hearing is 'it's bad for surgery' - but how exactly is it bad I'm asking?

i had a big chest prior top surgery and i binded for like 5 years? give or take. my top surgery results were good. like i even had a breast reduction before i binded and came out as trans. so i even had those scars. i'm actually really happy with my results because i was worried about that but i only literally have scars from my top surgery. the surgeon said nothing to me about any of that. my skin is just like any other part of my body so nothing more stretchy etc. i don't know if it's different for how long you bind or whatever but i think 5 years is pretty long and had nothing wrong, but i guess some people could have different results.

I've seen some who've had such issues with top surgery after long term binding. Like the chest post-op can get uneven in shape and/or colour, and scars can stretch more if the skin around is less elastic as it pulls more at the scars when moving then. Most or a lot of the skin above the nipples will likely still be on the chest post-op, depending on the cup size and how far down nipples are. With the double incision method, that is. The only skin that was removed from my chest was that which was between my nipples and where it stop underneath those humps, if that makes sense.

I was binding for around 5 years before my top surgery. Before binding my tits were very round and firm, like they looked fake, but I can assure you they were not! ;) After those 5 years of binding, they sagged more but looked more like average tits of that size (B-C-cup) and their skin was still quite elastic and didn't look bad. The only thing about my binding that affected my top surgery result was a dent in my ribs that I had unknowingly caused. It's a quite small dent though, and I didn't notice it until after my op.

I used the same binder through that entire time of binding cause it was adjustable and never wore out, but I've later on heard that is not a good type of binder or company. It was a mid-length one with velcro on one side from T-Kingdom. Might be the reason I dented my ribs, or it was the frequency or the length of time, or who knows what.

One more thing about skin elasticity, is that it's also very related to age. Meaning for those who are older, the skin will be less elastic simply due to age, and adding on binding to that might be of some concern. For us younger guys, skin is generally more elastic. I was 24 when I had my top surgery, which is young in that sense. I don't know at what kind of age skin elasticity may generally start getting noticably worse, but maybe possibly somewhere around middle age.

Yeah, they say excessive (?) binding will cause changes to the elasticity and feel of the skin in the area, but depends on your age and the size of your chest. Either way though, surgeons deal with removing the demon lumps of all sorts of people of all ages for medical or cosmetic reasons and it's not going to stop them from doing it for you.

I was binding for AGES and it never appeared to affect the elasticity of the skin much. I mean I'm 39 and my skin is still really good. It's probably because I don't sunbathe or smoke, or eat crap... but I suppose it could also be genetic. Either way the surgeon did ask about binding but examined the area himself on a pre-op and said the skin was looking good so there would be minimal issues. Looking at it now it does look fine, it's not stretched or 'papery' at all and springs back to shape.

How 'bad' it is is probably not that bad... I mean I've never heard of someone binding being the cause of major flabby or lifeless skin... but I have heard that being overweight will do that. I think that's more likely to screw up chest results than binding really. Or both binding and being overweight at the same might be the worst-case for any effects on the quality of the results. But even with that I've seen pics with good results on people, so I don't think it's much to worry about

If you're looking to get periareolar keyhole technique binding can cause the breasts to droop more and make you less eligible for that type of operation. I think with Double incision it shouldn't be an issue as the surgeons are able to remove a lot of excess skin.

From the research I've done, the reason that elasticity is lost is because many men tend to push their chesticles down instead of flattening them.  Thus, elasticity is lost after years of binding. 

Instead, you're supposed to press them against your ribs, so that they're like a pancake, not a second stomach roll.  when I first started binding, I didn't know what to do with them, so inadvertently pushed my chesticles against my ribs and positioned the nipples to look natural.  And I'm a D cup, almost a DD.  It just looks like I have pecs when I bind, which is a perfectly normal thing to have, as no man has a completely flat chest.  There is some pecs there, so as long as they don't look like a A cup, I'm okay with how my chest looks.  Especially since I'm a bit muscular anyways.

A few months ago, I found a graphic that shows the proper way to bind.  if I can find it on my phone again, I'll post it here.

Good luck brothers!

Ryuichi