When I started crossdressing, the first question I had was how to get minimally realistic breasts. Like probably most of you crossdressers, just putting on a (borrowed) bra was not enough. The first thing that comes to mind is to use some rolled-up socks, but, of course, while the padding might be visually gratifying, socks are not really up to the challenge…
Turning to the ‘net, even as far back in 1995, showed me that there were a lot of choices for crossdressers: I was fascinated by the already existing range of choices! Of course, back then, everything was insanely expensive and only available in the US. But buying things over the Internet was fine for me, so, in order not to ruin my bank account, I just got a cheap pair of “fantasy” latex breasts.
Needless to say, they weren’t very appealing. While the overall shape was somewhat correct, I never liked the smell or touch of latex (I know a lot of people actually have a latex fetish, but I never had it). They also didn’t bounce realistically and didn’t have the right weight (or even shape!) and were little better than, say, using some rubber balls of the appropriate shape and using some padding with socks to achieve pretty much the same result. But, alas, for the “beginner” crossdresser — one that had no idea where this would lead… — it was better than nothing, and, as said, they were cheap…
I got rid of them during my first “purge”, which coincided with getting a new girlfriend, which I thought would “relieve” the anxiety and the need to crossdress — also, at that time I kept my crossdressing accessories stored in a black bag in the trunk of my car (I still lived with my parents!) and didn’t want her to find out… Well, as we all know, crossdressing simply doesn’t go away because you throw all your stuff out. So, little time afterwards I went back to the ‘net and started looking for alternatives to realistic breasts.
There seemed to be no other choice but to go for silicone breast forms. They had been originally developed for women who went the painful psychological experience of mastectomy, and tried to be an aid to boost their self-esteem back again, by providing the best possible experience that technology could afford at that time. But I did order a C cup pair from a specialised shop (Suddenly Fem), where I originally got the latex forms, because I trusted them to pick, among the many choices, the ones that would work best on crossdressers.
These days, there were only two alternatives to fit your breast forms to your chest: either glue them on with a special adhesive, or get a special bra that sort of fixed them in place (“pocket bras” hadn’t been invented yet, or, if they were, I couldn’t shop for them online…). I got a pair of the latter, but also bought a set of adhesive and adhesive remover.
The silicone breasts definitely had a huge advantage over the latex. They had the right shape and weight and they bounce realistically, since the silicone used has the same density of human flesh. They also get warm to the touch and will get the same body temperature as the rest of your body, which is a fantastic experience and makes them feel “part of you”. Well… to a degree. When they’re slipped inside a bra, they wouldn’t really stay in place, fully in touch with your chest. Adhesive was the only way to get them behave naturally, and even go bra-less if you wished.
My experience with adhesives was a nightmare. For some stupid reason, the first time I tried it out was on a two-day business trip. I got early back to the hotel to have plenty of time to glue them on, have some fun (these days I didn’t take pictures of myself; I looked ugly anyway!), sleep wearing them, and un-glue them in the morning before checking out.Gluing them on was not so easy as I thought, but I eventually managed to do so. I correctly assumed that I would have some difficulty in the removal, so I didn’t sprinkle too much adhesive — enough to get them to stay on, but not too much. Let’s say that the experience was not very fulfilling. The glue smells horribly — nothing that you would relate to a “feminine image” — and you start really to appreciate the weight of those silicone breasts when they start to pull at your exposed (and previously closely shaved!) skin. Going bra-less was not really an option, it did hurt too much, but at least I could get them inside a bra and get some relief.
In the morning, however, I got a surprise. In spite of using the adhesive remover liberally, they simply wouldn’t un-stick so easily as advertised! I guess it depends a lot on your skin type and so forth, but for a moment, I got into a panic. I did wake up relatively early, but I had to leave the room by noon, and after an hour or so, it was clear that the glue was not going to be removed so easily. Not without tearing the skin apart, which was quickly getting red from harsh treatment and the anxiety to get the glue off. Working in the shower, using more adhesive remover and bathing thoroughly, I managed to at least un-stick the breast forms. Then it was the hard task of getting the glue residue off my skin! I barely managed to finish in time, applied moisturiser liberally to ease the rashes, and left the hotel at the last possible moment, leaving the stink of the adhesive remover all over the room…
Although I used the adhesive later under more controlled situations (and aware of the time needed to un-glue the breastforms!), it was clear that this was not really a choice for me. Also, I learned — the hard way! — that simply applying the minimum amount of glue just to get the breasts in place is not enough: the amount of skin supporting all that weight is not enough. So there is really just one way, which is to put glue all over the breast form. And that means hours of getting rid of the glue afterwards…
Well, I don’t remember exactly how many months elapsed — by that time, I was limited to a few crossdressing sessions per year, on odd weeks of vacation on my own, and a few business trips — but at some point I saw that a new technology was introduced for breastforms: velcro! The way this worked sounded more promising: you’d use a “sticker” adhesive (similar to a big Band-Aid) which would be applied directly over the skin, and that remains in place for a week or so. The breastforms themselves have velcro straps in the back and would stick to the “Band-Aid”. So you could theoretically attach and detach them at will: great for a few days of vacations, where I’d need to go out to shop for food (and at least a few hours to give the hotel staff a chance to clean the room) and return to the room for my crossdressing sessions. This actually worked: the “Band-Aid” is not visible under regular clothes, and, unless I wanted to go to the beach or swimming pool, I could use them all the time with no discomfort. Just like advertised, it stayed in place even under the shower, for several days. While the adhesive didn’t cover the whole area of the breast, but just the border around the nipples, the adhesive strength of velcro was more than enough to keep them in place. I also did buy some larger cups — I learned the lesson that a C cup might be astonishing on a genetic girl, but it looks way too small for my big figure and wide chest — and was generally happy with the solution. And, of course, the breastforms came with a protective cover so that you could use them in regular bras without the need of using the velcro.
There were some disadvantages to this method. First, the velcro adds some “thickness”: the breastform is not firmly attached to the chest, there is a quite visible gap. My attempts to camouflage it with makeup failed completely; I understand that there is a special putty, used by Hollywood makeup artists, that might be able to fill the gaps, but I never used that. So while the velcro would indeed allow me to go bra-less, the result would be anything but natural. The biggest advantage is that the breasts would be in place and not “move around”; not really the ability to go bra-less and show the “girls” off.
After a few years, “pocketbras” became popular on the specialised crossdressing clothes sites. These assume that the breastforms are not attached to the chest: you just place them inside a specially designed pocket in the bra, and wear the whole ensemble. The breastforms will remain in place that way, and give you a comfortable, natural look. You can even use the usual tricks to provide extra cleavage very easily (easier than with glued-on breasts): just do all your cleavage-producing tricks on your real breasts, and let the breasts inside the bra pocket rest on top of everything. The results, as I hope you can appreciate on some of my pictures, are quite realistic and convincing! “Pocketbras” have also been evolving in terms of design and materials: the first one I bought was of the “rigid” type, where the breastforms are firmly held into place. The last I bought is designed with elastic straps providing super-bouncing 🙂 which looks and feels very good!
As time went by, I started using my newer pocketbras more and more, and eventually gave up using the velcro attachments — recently I’ve even removed the velcro strips from the breastforms completely, once I exhausted my stock of “adhesive” Band-Aid-like things (the online shop doesn’t carry it any longer). But the “old” bras were still useful. With some clever taping tricks (I’ve finally found the delightful world of surgical tape and its many uses!) I could partially attach the breastforms to the bra, thus making sure that they would stay in place, but also prevent them to be seen at the bra’s lacey edges (since the colour, texture, and “glossy” finish doesn’t make them look very realistic, and, as said, makeup doesn’t stick too well to them), which I hate. It simply breaks all the illusion 🙁 Some of the old bras trade-off “bouncing” by “extra projection” (using cleverly designed underwiring and whalebone support), and I likes that for some of my outfits, so I was happy not to get rid of the old bras. I was just sorry that I couldn’t use any of my real bras (ones bought from women lingerie shops!) because even underwired ones would not cover the breastform completely, and, as said, the “glossy” finish on the silicone forms just looks too unnatural for my taste…
After 12 years of regular use of my breastforms, they’re still in good shape — pun intended. But it’s clear they’re getting “dated”. An attempt to glue them on with fake nail glue (which is also organic, has good bonding properties, and is very easy to remove) failed completely — nail glue is simply not strong enough to support the entire weight. And, well, these days most high-quality breastforms use a radical new technology: they’re self-adhesive.
A few of my CD friends have showed me the advantages of the latest technologies. You don’t need to use any kind of glue. There is usually a simple preparation: remove excess skin oil from the chest area, and just attach the forms. The adhesive usually lasts for several applications and is supposed to be strong enough to keep the forms in place for many hours, and they’re easily “peeled off” at the end. Just moisturise the area, wash the breastforms afterwards, and you’re ready. It was time to start looking at this new generation of breastform attachment, and so I browsed the Web, looking for comments about brands and the experience with them.
It was obvious that the choices have exponentially grown since my last purchase! Everything, from very cheap Chinese “falsies”, to the highest end of medical-grade silicone breastforms for mastectomy post-operation, uses some sort of self-adhesive. The cheapest the forms, the less likely the adhesive will remain for long, or will actually keep the forms attached firmly so that you can go bra-less. The Chinese “falsies” are usually for small cup sizes and use a lighter silicone — they might not have the proper weight and inertia of real, human flesh breasts, but trade that off for better sticking. Some brands can guarantee that the adhesive will work on the smaller forms of their model range, but not on the larger ones. And it was clear to me that, being endowed with a big frame and a huge chest, I’d very likely have a hard time to find something that would stick. But at least there would be the advantage of having the breastforms firmly in place, and that might be enough for my purposes…
The silicone itself has also undergone several technology upgrades. Silicone is now way cheaper than it was a dozen years ago. “Fantasy” breastforms for the CD population, from casual to intensive use, are now very popular and have an endless number of suppliers. It corresponds to the kind of silicone used in what used to be “medical-grade” silicone forms of a decade ago — same density as the human flesh, getting warm with your body temperature, providing the right inertial feel, and in general, looking pretty realistic, even when you touched them — at least, when you pinched them inside the bra. The finish is still glossy and looks unnatural. Some sites show tricks on how to apply makeup over them to get rid of the glossy look; some brands offer a matte finish instead, which is a bit better on pictures (less light reflection), but will still feel like, well, something manufactured, and not like a “real” breast.
So in my long searches I finally found the ultimate in breastform technology, developed for genetic women that underwent mastectomy who required nothing less than perfection: Amoena. This is a multinational headquartered in Germany (probably the world’s largest supplier of breastforms, as well as all kinds of “kinky” accessories…) with distributors and shops all over the world. They are notmanufacturers for the crossdresser/transgendered community: for the past 25 years, they have been providing mastectomy patients with a way to regain their self-confidence by providing them the best possible breastforms that technology can develop. Their customers include hospitals, clinics, orthopaedic centres, doctors, and so forth — not online shops for crossdressers. Nevertheless, due to the insanely high quality of their products, many online shops targeting the crossdresser community sometimes carry their products, on both sides of the Atlantic.
Some reviews were promising, and their site is reasonably thorough in explaining the technology behind their breastforms. They use medical-grade silicone of the latest generation – good enough for breast implants in Europe, where silicone implants are allowed — but don’t simply wrap it up into a container. They found out that their patients are much more demanding: they require all sorts of different shapes and forms to perfectly match the non-mastectomised breast. But Amoena has also found out that women after a complex surgery might suffer from hormonal imbalance and sweat more than usual (specially if they’re in their menopause). Mainstream breastforms just adapt to the body temperature and may become too uncomfortable during that period; sweating will also interfere with the adhesive properties. Mastectomised women will also want to return to a normal life, and that means that the breastforms will need to feel to the touch like a real breast. They will have to survive immersion in sea water or on a swimming pool. And some will want to sleep wearing the breastforms, too.
This created several engineering challenges, but Amoena has found some clever tricks, or so they claim on their website. Well, I was curious, but the high cost listed on some of the online shops were a bit too high for me — after all, unlike a mastectomy patient, I just wear the breastforms once or twice per week, and the cost didn’t justify the quality, at least for me. Also, there was a further problem. Most crossdresser online shops have relatively easy sizing tables: you just pick the bra size you wear, and they’ll ship the correct breastform size for you. As I’ve found out in the past, a breastform for a 34D bra is way smaller than one for a 38D bra — the cup size is the same, but the breastform will be much larger to accommodate the wider chest. To make things more confusing, Amoena’s models are for a wide variety of mastectomy patients. Some require a full replacement; others just need a partial replacement. In some cases, their clients just need some “extra padding” on one of the breasts. Some breasts are full, some sag a bit; and depending on the exact configuration of the remaining breast, the breastform might need to be asymmetric, symmetric, or have a round shape. Too many choices!
So what does Amoena do? They provide “fitting” sessions to make sure their clients get exactly the breastform they need. This is done by professionals with a lot of experience. A few crossdressers and transgendered individuals offer that service as well; some believe that they can work from pictures and tape measurements to give you an accurate fitting. But here I found another problem: the online shops carrying Amoena’s products don’t offer the full range of models and sizes, but just focus on a few. Their reasoning is that this is a rather specialised and expensive product and few crossdressers will buy them, so they stick to the most popular choices. Unfortunately, after trying to figure out my size from their charts and tables, the model and number I wished was not among the popular choices (as I’ve found out later, and as you’ll see, I did get the size wrong).
A bit frustrated, and close to abandoning Amoena and picking one of the more easily obtainable “fantasy” breastform suppliers, I found out, almost by chance, that Amoena had a local representative in my country. I blinked. This was astonishing — or was it? After all, remember that Amoena’s clients are, first and foremost, mastectomy patients. Breast cancer in Portugal is as common as anywhere else in the world, and of course someone would have to supply hospitals and clinics with good, medical-grade products.
On the other hand, as mentioned, we’re talking about a very sensitive area, where absolute discretion is needed. Mastectomy patients have lost a lot of their self-confidence and require gentleness and patience to get back to their normal lives. Fitting a breastform which might ease the pain of transition back to a regular life — one where a women doesn’t need any longer to worry about “hiding” the missing part of her body, but can pretty much do anything again: wearing low-cut dresses, swimming in pools and on the beach while wearing a bikini again, being able to pick up clothes and try them out on the fitting rooms without caring – requires professionals who are familiar with a very sensitive condition and are there only to help, while keeping the “secret” of the breastform very closely. So I started to wonder if they wouldn’t be discreet with crossdressers as well…
Most resellers on the list for my country are obviously hospitals and clinics, and I was weary to go there. I might be felt as “intruding” – wasting time with my fancies, while real women in a sensitive condition after breast removal surgery would be waiting on a queue, feeling apprehensive and anxious for their own appointments. On the other hand, the main distributor might feel differently. For them I would be just another client. And one that would be buying a pair of breasts and not just one.
So last week I filled myself with courage and went to the non-descript office of the main distributor for my country. I was prepared to ask them if they did fitting appointments for crossdressers; and if they answered “no” I’d be out, never to return, never to be identified. Even if by a bad stroke of luck I would meet someone who knew me (hardly likely in the reasonable anonymity of a large city like Lisbon), I would just pretend that I was looking for a shop in the neighbourhood, got lost, and was asking for directions. But I didn’t need to worry. In a cosy environment, where discretion and putting people to ease were the norm, the receptionist at the desk said that they definitely would do fitting appointments for crossdressers, and it was quite obvious from the reply that they had done this in the past. So, well, we set up a date to my convenience and I left, happy in spite of the initial misgivings and the anxiety.
The fitting appointment day was scheduled for last Tuesday. I remembered, at the last moment, that it would be a good idea to bring a few of my bras with me. Of course I was in “male mode” — even though smoothly shaved – and the initial anxiety subsided while I waited in the room. After all, what could go wrong? They made clear that they had no issues with selling breastforms to crossdressers; I was just another client. They were discreet for sure; there was little opportunity to suddenly meet anyone that could know me (several of the women in my family were subjected to breast cancer, including my own mother, even though most didn’t need full mastectomies, so I had the excuse to be there shopping for something — Amoena doesn’t sell only breastforms, but also bras and matching panties, swimming suits, scarves, even dresses). The prices might be too high for my tastes, but I would be willing to discuss that with them afterwards. Nothing could really “go wrong”, except, well, being laughed at — but, as said, they did accept my appointment, so one might presume they would just want to sell their products to a potential customer, not laugh at them…
I was finally met by a dynamic sales rep, who had been working with Amoeba for the past 18 years, and who definitely was familiar with crossdressers and transvestites, even though she was not an “expert”. But she was fine with helping with the fitting. I knew the model I wished — Contact Comfort+ — and she quickly confirmed the measurements. At this point I found out that I had gotten the sizes wrong from the charts and tables: I suspected I would need at least a size 8 breastform, but she immediately suggested a size 10, because of my wide chest. And, of course, she was quite right – when wearing my own bras (both D cups), they were perfectly filled with the size 10, and the size 8 would have been too tiny. It would have been impossible for me to figure that out without a proper fitting!
The Amoena Contact Comfort+ breastforms are very… strange. It’s very hard to explain the feeling, since I had nothing to compare with, and I’m not sure if words are good enough to describe them. After wiping the skin surface with a special product to increase the adhesion properties, the sales rep removed the protective film over the adhesive part of the breastform, and applied it from the bottom upwards. The backside has these strange tiny little transparent pearls, which don’t look really “sticky” at first glance. However, they have quite strong adhesion properties (which increase over time; don’t ask me how that works, but the site also refers that)! The breastform is fit snugly and perfectly, and after it’s on, it really feels like it’s part of your own body. It’s quite different from the sensation of the glue I used before on my early breastforms. With those, all you feel is the weight of the form pulling the skin out and down. With the Amoena breastforms, you don’t experience anything like that. The weight is distributed uniformly among the hundreds of tiny pearls, and you don’t feel the skin being pulled at all. It just sticks and stays there. Very comfortably so.
Then the silicone used is really different from what I was used to. There is a difference between the current generation of medical-grade silicone and the one used on “fantasy” forms for crossdressers. The weight is the same — same density! — but the whole way it reacts to touching and pinching is… very strange. I always thought my other forms were realistic, but they don’t come even close to Amoena’s material. They’re almost uncannily realistic, and it takes some getting used to. Perhaps I can give an analogy. Do you remember when you sit uncomfortably for a long while and your legs get numb? If you pinch the muscle of your legs, you won’t feel a thing (until the blood circulation is restored, of course, then you’ll start feeling the “pins and needles”), but you still know it’s a leg made of flesh, muscles, and fat, because you’re used to the touch and the way the flesh reacts to the pinching and goes back to its place. So you still get this feeling that you’re pinching a leg, even though you’re not actually feeling anything on your leg (but your fingers are feeling the touch of the skin and the way the flesh beneath reacts to the pinching!).
I think that comes closest to the description of the Amoena breastforms. After a few minutes of wearing them, so close to your chest, and feeling so natural, it’s very hard to believe they’re not a part of you — a part of you that is numbed down, but that still reacts and feels to the touch as if it’s a part of you. The brain plays this trick rather neatly. Yes, you know it’s not your “real” breast; however, your sense of touch still thinks that you’re touching and pinching real flesh beneath real skin, you just don’t feel it, just like you don’t feel anything when your legs (or arms) are numbed down. Or perhaps you remember the moments after leaving your dentist after surgery, while you’re still anaesthetised: touch your lips, for example, and you know they’re there, you know they’re made of flesh and skin, but you simply don’t feel them because the anesthesia is still active. But you still know they’re your lips, part of you. This is pretty much what you feel with the Amoena breastforms, and I can tell you that no other breastform ever felt like this before!
Unlike the older technologies, the Amoena breastforms are temperature-controlled (that means they won’t become too hot or too cold), the adhesive properties will deal with sweating effectively, and they don’t have a glossy, unnatural finish. In fact, the outer shell is made of a very soft, silky material, with a matte finish, that feels just like smooth skin. It’s not “smooth” in the sense that “fantasy” breastforms are smooth (all of them are!), but smooth like skin is smooth: you can feel the very soft and delicate texture, just like real skin. I can tell you that it’s powerfully arousing!!
And finally, the whole “package” just sits into a bra in a way that I cannot describe with any other word than “perfect”. I can’t exactly say why it fits so well. I can only say that with some bras, there are some areas that are never closely “fit” with my other breastforms. You won’t notice it on the pictures or videos, of course, but I know they’re not a perfect, flawless match — although obviously some bras fit better than others. That’s why in some cases I apply some surgical tape to make sure the forms don’t overextend the bra’s borders and show up on unexpected places (and also a reason why I like the pocketbras, although some required some clever sewing to make sure the breastforms remained inside where I wanted them).
The Amoena breastforms behave quite differently. They fill the space inside naturally, fitting smugly in every nook and crevice they’re supposed to fit in. I’ve also bought a new bra, specially designed by Amoena for best results: let me tell you, I could model lingerie in that! None of the genetic girls I’ve known in the past have ever had such perfectly fitted breasts inside their own bras. And the results are incredibly realistic; as a matter of fact, I thought they were too realistic: most genetic women will never have such perfect breasts, unless they go through surgery… and note that by “perfect” I don’t mean the size (which is what most guys would immediately think!), but the shape, which falls so naturally… to be honest, I don’t think I could get a better result with surgically implanted breasts (!), but perhaps I was just excited and overestimating the final result, and, in time, I’ll start noticing all the tiny flaws… on the other hand, remember that I was in “male mode”, and even so, they looked perfect to me. I can’t wait until I have an opportunity to really use them inside a dress 🙂
Removing the breastforms is also completely painless — what a difference compared to the glue or even the “Band-Aid” types! You just pinch them at the bottom, and peel them off, from the top downwards. It’s not painless at all — it feels like removing a thoroughly soaked Band-Aid, where you feel some resistance, but it doesn’t really hurt your skin at all. In fact, after having them removed, I was actually surprised that the adhesive properties would work so well at all, considering that the removal is so simple and so painless!
Well, I had to say that I was far, far more impressed than I thought I’d be… but I still got a pleasant surprise at the end. As said, I had seen the prices for the Amoena forms on US and UK sites, and they were among the most expensive I’ve ever seen. Apparently this is not the case! Even though I got a very good discount for buying a pair (and not just one!), medical-grade products are taxed in Portugal with just 6% VAT (as opposed to the usual 21%). But even so the base price is far, far lower than what is quoted on the websites: the pair I got, which — remember! — is the highest-expensive model that Amoena manufactures, came out way under €300 — and that including two cleaning kits, a pair of attachable nipples, and a bra. I was expecting to pay more than twice that, based on what I saw on the sites, and knowing that usually these “luxury items” in Portugal get a lot of expensive taxes on top of them. But no. As a matter of fact, for the kind of quality I wanted, these were the cheapest forms I ever saw… which was really surprising!!
And at the end I got a non-descript paper bag to bring the breastforms back home with me. They are in unmarked boxes. All very discreet: they don’t even need you to give your real name, the invoices are not exactly clear about what you’ve bought (but clear enough for tax purposes), and, at least in my country, they can just send them to your home if you don’t want to walk in the streets carrying the paper bag. Excellent and discreet service!
The sales rep told me that they’re preparing the launch of a breastform line specifically targeted for crossdressers. It will use a different site, it’ll have different packaging, and be differently targeted (e.g. the forms will include nipples, to compete with what is more usual with the “fantasy” brands). I’m curious to see what they will come up with.
In the mean time, I hope you don’t think this is just merely propaganda; that’s not my intention (nooo I don’t get commissions, lol). I had a great shopping experience and I’m just excited about sharing it with you!
