Flat and Happy.

Flat and Happy By Rikki We were standing in line for long-jump practice during gym class, tracing half-circles in the dirt with our sneakers, when Sylvia pulled me away from the other girls. "Do you have any boobs?" she asked. We were wearing leotards. I looked at her. "What?" "Boobs!" she said anxiously. "Girls start getting them at our age. Do you have any?" She flattened her palms against her chest. "I don't." "Well, I don't either," I said. We examined our chests in silence. Then the teacher yelled at us to get back in line. We were eight years old. By the time I was 11, gym class became painful. Getting hit in the chest playing dodge ball would leave me sore for days, and I feared every wayward elbow on the bus. But while girls all around began to sprout bouncing breasts, all I seemed to manage were puffy nipples. Of course it was only a matter of time before my "booblessness" was noted. In sixth-grade biology we studied procreation and sexual development. During puberty, we were informed, boys go through a change in voice and girls, well, they grow breasts. "What does that make Rikki then?" Ingo shouted from the back row. At 14, I resigned myself to a life without breasts. My chest had actually developed faint "boob-esque" features, but I had long been branded "flat as a board," and was hardly about to argue. In fact, my barely developed body contributed to a comfortable identity as everyone's little sister -- a sort of class pet. While other girls received hormone-inspired attention (the amount usually in direct proportion to breast size) I was still able to do "normal" things with boys, like play ping-pong. I didn't think of myself as a young woman, much less a sexual being. I nearly got sick the night my mom gave me two bras and told me to wear one. It could have been the clinical tone in her voice, or just the realization that I couldn't cheat time forever and pretend I was still a child. But the first day I wore one of those bras to school I barely made it to recess before tearing it off in a bathroom stall and stuffing it into the trash. Growing up I thought women fell into two categories: sexy, desirable women with big boobs, and the rest of us who were lacking. That first bra sealed my fate as one of the forever less-endowed. Over the next several years, I viewed my breasts as personal enemies. Men and women were attracted to me despite my small boobs, I thought; I was sure they secretly wished I had bigger ones. I don't think so anymore. My boobs are part of my identity as much as my freckles and my voice and I love the whole person I am. Sometimes I think it might be fun to have bigger boobs, but I'm also happy with the ones I have. They're cute, they feel good, and they're mine. Copyright ? 1999 - 2002 Planned Parenthood ? Federation of America. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission from www.teenwire.com