Gretchen’s Story

(Breast Implants--The gift that keeps on taking!)

Hi! My name is Gretchen, and I'm going to tell you about a "Christmas Present" I gave myself in 2006-a gift that has been taking from me ever since.

Until December 26, 2006, I was a manager at an advertising agency in Southern California. Another important part of my life was my love of fitness training and figure competitions. This training resulted in my losing quite a bit of body fat and, as expected, breast size. I suppose that's why the majority of women I've known in the figure/fitness arena have breast implants.

Between this loss of body fat and the pressure from my "bodybuilder" boyfriend (now my ex-boyfriend), I started to feel insecure about my physical appearance. My "ex" also believed that I would excel in the world of figure modeling if I had a sexier, more proportioned, look.

Since my mother had undergone some cosmetic procedures, and so many other women I knew had breast implants, I decided to use my "plastic" to pay $7,000 to a Plastic Surgeon to have him implant a couple "plastic bags" into my chest. At the urging of that Surgeon, I decided to get a pair of the "just approved by the FDA" silicone breast implants. After all, the FDA and my Doctor both said that they were safe-what could possibly go wrong?

It didn't take long to find out, because within a week, I was so sick, I couldn't even drive to work. My father had to delay the start of his new job to care for me after this surgery. My mother eventually had to resign her teaching position to provide me with the constant care I required. And those $7,000 implants cost almost $12,000 to have fully removed from my body and, so far, another $5,000 in additional medical care (tests, medications, co-payments, etc.)

I received disability insurance for almost a year, but rather than pay my growing medical bills, I had to pay the rent on the apartment I was unable to live in, with a lease I was unable to get out of. I lost my appetite. I lost more weight. I wasn't able to exercise. I lost interest in my appearance, and all my nice clothes (which did not fit anymore). All the things that had meant so much to me-now meant nothing. I have since found a man who loves me for me and who helped me get over this nightmare.

So this "gift" gave me about two or three days of men staring straight at my chest (talk about making me feel self-conscious about my figure). After that, the gift just "took" what it could from me. It took my health. It took my job. It took my money (and still does). It nearly took my life! The only thing this gift actually gave me was a better view of who really cared about me. It was too high a price to pay for that view, though.

Don't you think it is more than just a coincidence that hundreds of thousands of "otherwise healthy" women were afflicted by these same problems after receiving breast implants? Now I know that all those women who sued Dow-Corning-Wright really were sick! They can't "prove" we are all sick from implants because our illnesses mimic so many immune disorders and sicknesses-but we don't test positive for them.

I got better after I got my implants out-as did most of the other sick women I have met. I wish someone would have warned me that it was possible to get SICK from implants. If my doctor had told me of the real risk I was taking-I would not have taken it.

Visit my site at www.myimplantstory.com to learn more about me and my experiences.