The Rise of Breast EXplants and What You Need to Know
Breast augmentation has been the most popular cosmetic surgery every years for decades, but women are starting to remove their breast implants at an exponential rate and the longitudinal research is now explaining why
According to Google Trends in 2020, the most researched topic concerning breast augmentation was breast explantation.
Next was “breast implant illness,” and “breast implant removal.” Demonstrating a large decrease in public interest concerning breast augmentation.
Analysis of breast implant removal case volumes from 2006 through 2019 on a year-by-year basis demonstrated a total increase of 30.7%.
In the United States, breast explant surgeries are on the rise. In 2020, plastic surgeons removed more than 36,000 breast implant augmentations, an almost 8% increase from the previous year, according to the American Society of Plastic Surgeons .
This begs the obvious question, why the new upward trend? What is driving all these women around the world to remove their breast implants and undergo another surgery?
Research has gained traction in mainstream media, and women are finally taking notice to their once unexplainable symptoms.
I remember when my dad explained to me why he was taking immunosuppressant drugs daily. It is because our bodies, as genius and miraculous as they are, are primitively designed to search and destroy foreign substances, anything that doesn’t’ belong. For my dad, that would be his sister’s kidney, gifted to him during his kidney transplant.
Our thankfully reactive immune systems are designed to protect us against pathogens, toxins, and disease, however, they are not intelligent enough to understand that they shouldn’t destroy a vital organ.
This understanding lead me to think about the various objects we as humans do put in our bodies, sometimes willingly, like saline and silicone, and the reactions our immune systems are more than likely having to those foreigners as well.
My thoughts seemed affirmed when I first discovered Breast Implant Illness from watching a YouTube video by Sophia Esperanza about her explant story.
I took a deep dive into the research from there, and honestly, it normally has stopped surprising me the information that gets suppressed from the consumer, but the studies on this particular topic were hard to overlook and not react from.
A collection of research stemming all the way back to the 90’s on the dangers of breast implants on the body and the way it impacts our health by disrupting our immune and endocrine systems, reproductive health, causing certain rare cancers, and harming mental health, is all over the internet.
As a union, us women are so ready to throw our hands up and fight the system when it comes to ownership of our bodies. But is there a difference between control and manipulation?
Maybe it’s time we too, condemn the government agents responsible for not appropriately disclosing the effects breast implants of any kind, can have on our health.
We cannot forget the role capitalism plays in this country and the way they prey and manipulate us for personal gain. The blatant disregard for human physiology and true medicine has been overtaken by desire, greed, and fraudulence.
Plastic surgery is one of the most lucrative careers in America, but surgeons are not doctors, because if they were, they would put more value in their sworn in oath, first, do no harm.
I want to disclose that I do not judge, nor condemn any decision you make for your happiness in this life. I merely find it my duty to provide adequate information that can help inform you on the decisions you make for your body and your life. Providing a full circle of information and supportive studies to help you understand the implications. I support and love any choice you make in this life, and I don’t want anyone to feel anxious or attacked, however you choose to love yourself is your choice, your decision, and that is sacred. 🤍
What is Breast Implant Illness?
Breast implant illness (BII) is a term coined to describe systemic symptoms that patients relate to their breast implants.
These symptoms are related to our immune system’s reaction to the implants, and can appear right after implantation or several years down the line.
Awareness of BII is increasingly fueled by the power of social media, with one recent study reporting an online group that reached nearly 110,000 members.
BII symptoms are typically nonspecific, vary in severity, and can affect nearly all organ systems.
Because of their complex nature, women will often go to the doctors for one or two symptoms, get prescribed a range of pharmaceuticals which then come with their own host of side effects, rather than treating the root cause.
These symptoms can include fatigue, chronic pain, rash, body odour, irregular heart rate, anxiety, neurologic abnormalities, hair loss and endocrine dysfunction.
Here is a full list of all BII symptoms;
Source : https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34513545/
Their is a relationship growing between bacteria and fungi growth in the breast implant and BII because of it’s prevalence, as more patients present with BII and Autoimmune Syndrome Induced by Adjuvants after Silicone Breast Augmentation Surgery (ASIA-SBAS).
A combination of even just some of these symptoms can cause imbalances in different areas of the body as well, creating a cascade of symptoms that can lead to hyper-hypo thyroidism, PCOS, endometriosis, rheumatoid arthritis, Sjogren Syndrome, and melanoma.
Studies revealed on a sample size of just under 300 women with symptoms of BII, 96% reported improved or complete resolution of their systemic symptoms after implant removal and total capsulectomy (removal of entire implant.)
Source: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8423394/
Chemicals in Implants:
The list of chemicals and heavy metals present in both saline and silicone implants is staggering.
When our body is fighting so many different pathogens at one time coming from within our body, it makes it difficult to fight outside environmental pathogens, therefore, hindering our immune systems and offsetting our endocrine system (hormone disruption.)
Chemicals degrade from the surface of the breast implant shell, and the interior gel can move through the silicone shell out into the body as well.
Some of the chemicals and heavy metals present in breast implants:
amine
Toluene-voc
Formaldehyde
Phenol
Ethylene oxide
Xylene
Talcum powder
Arsenic
Barium
Cobalt
Lead
Copper
Cadmium
Mercury
Silver
Tin
Titanium
Platinum
(Source from @breastimplantillnessdoctor on instagram)
Further Health Implications:
In one research study, the scientists dissected and analyzed the breast implants they had just explanted.
They found overgrowths of harmful bacteria and fungus that all contributed to a dysfunctional immune system.
Some patients with mycobacterial infections (black mold, in the body) had to go to infectious disease treatment centers, while others had to endure rounds of antibiotics.
It is important you test for these types of bacterial overgrowths and just general bloodwork when you explant because the surgeon won’t do it for you.
Of all the bacteria’s, the researchers found that Propionibacterium acnes was the most common organism in the reports on patients’ specimens.
It is currently being studied to be associated with “rheumatological disorders, thyroid disease, sarcoidosis, endophthalmitis, and prostate disease.”
Propionibacterium acnes has been found in the lymph nodes of patients suffering atherosclerosis, sarcoidosis, and discitis associated with sciatica.
In terms of immune system health, natural killer cell activity is significantly suppressed in patients with silicone breast implants.
These findings mirror the studies done in experimental animals which showed that when the body is exposed to silicone, it compromises the immune system and suppresses our greatest defender cell, the natural killer cells.
It was demonstrated that when the control (silicone) was removed, this effect quickly reversed and the immune system rebalanced.
Since NK cells are important in the control of tumor cell growth, researchers proposed that patients with reduced NK cell activity are at a higher risk of developing cancer.
Which brings us to our greatest risk
Breast Implants and ALCL Non Hodgkin’s Lymphoma
“The FDA has identified an association between breast implants and the development of breast implant-associated anaplastic large cell lymphoma (BIA-ALCL), a type of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma.”
In 2019, there was a great recall of breast implants made by BIOCELL because of an increase in this type of rare cancer which probed the FDA to release the above statement.
A simple way to understand cancer, is we all have the potential for it, we all have cancer cells in our body and our DNA. It is whether our actions, behaviors, habits, environment turns those cells ON or keeps them OFF.
Anaplastic large cell lymphoma is directly linked to immune system compromise and inflammation. It’s a rare form of lymphoma that occurs in some people who’ve had breast implants. It’s a type of immune system cancer. Although they have described the risk as low based on reported cases, many cases go unreported because it can be easily misdiagnosed as breast cancer, or a different type of immune system cancer.
People often argue with me that “we’re all going to die anyways.” Why care about every little thing, every little risk?
But if you stack the risks, stack the little things, you’ve built quite a huge thing.
The question you then have to ask yourself is, you know the cost, so what’s the reward?
Happiness? Love? Appearance? Status? Control?
If you put all those things on a scale, do they weigh evenly or higher than, life?
Not everything in this world needs to be such a calculated risk, because that leaves little room for enjoyment.
But, if we sit with our decisions a little longer, and create a life conscious of the divine connection between the mind, body, and spirit, we grow towards the understanding that those three pillars don’t exist at all, they merge in the same light.
Honor that light in a way true, to you.
Sources:
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30222598/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34513545/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9931386/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/7855864/