Breast prostheses and clothing

Strapless and ‘strappy’ clothes

Some strapless tops and dresses or ‘strappy’ clothes offer full support in the bra area so that you can wear them with a silicone prosthesis without a bra. If you want to wear a top or dress that does not provide enough support, you could try the following:

• pinning a soft fabric prosthesis (‘softie’) directly inside
• placing a softie or very light prosthesis in a strapless bra or in the support structure of the top or dress
• wearing a bra with transparent or decorative straps
• using a stick-on prosthesis if the top or dress provides good support
• using a stick-on prosthesis with a strapless bra.

Low necklines

If you'd like to continue to wear your favourite clothes without changing them too much, you could try the following:

• a camisole or vest top underneath a V-necked top so that it is visible across the ‘V’
• a camisole-style bra, available from specialist catalogues, made with lace inserted between the cups that will cover the cleavage area
• a lightweight lacy or semi-transparent top worn over a low-necked item to disguise the cleavage area while still allowing the clothing beneath to show through
• a draped scarf, or flowers pinned on the side that needs extra coverage
• lace or fabric inserted to raise a neckline
• chunky or sparkly necklaces.

Low or revealing backs

You can buy special extension straps to extend your bra straps from mail order catalogues or online. Instead of fastening at the back, they continue round and fasten lower down at the front, to enable you to wear clothes with low backs.

If a dress or top is reasonably supportive in the chest area, you could try using a stick-on prosthesis, or pin in a softie, without wearing a bra.

You can also buy bras with straps that can be crossed at the back, which will enable you to wear tops with cut-away shoulders.

Sleepwear

You may feel you need some sort of prosthesis in place when you are in bed. You could consider:

• a ‘sleep’ bra or very soft, low support bra with a softie
• a camisole or nightdress with a softie pinned in place
• pocketed nightwear, available from some catalogues
• wearing your silicone prosthesis in bed. However, this might be rather uncomfortable and it would need greater support than a softie
• a stick-on prosthesis. This usually needs to be worn with some support, but you may find it stays in place sufficiently on its own.

Going without a bra

If you find bras uncomfortable and prefer not to wear one at all, you can adjust your clothes and wear them with a prosthesis if you want to. You could try:

• pinning a softie into underwear such as a vest top or camisole, or a tankini top
• wearing a very soft, low support bra – such as a ‘teen’ bra or a ‘sleep’ bra – with a softie. Teen bras come in different sizes, mostly with small cups and for quite small body frames. Sleep bras are very soft bras designed to be worn at night, which are available from some mail-order catalogues
• using a stick-on prosthesis with clothing that has good in-built support
• wearing pocketed clothing, available from some mail-order catalogues. These clothes are usually designed to be worn with a silicone prosthesis. You might wish to try them on first and see if they work well for you.

However, it is worth remembering that going without a bra for long periods can cause pain and discomfort in your neck, shoulders and back, especially if your breasts (or breast) are naturally large and require support.

Without a prosthesis

You may feel strongly that you do not want to wear a prosthesis at all. Many women will feel fine with how this looks, but others may wish to make some adjustments to their clothes. There are some ways of doing this below.

If you have had one of your breasts removed, you can make the two sides of your body seem more balanced by wearing dark, patterned fabrics, and loose fitting clothes. If you want to distract the eye further, you could wear overshirts, jackets, scarves or costume jewellery.

If you have had both of your breasts removed your chest area will be symmetrical. Many women feel happy with how this looks but you could also try some of the ideas above.

If you have a small difference between your breasts that you want to disguise without using a prosthesis, a padded bra gives a good shape.