WHILE many people may have an opinion on the size of breasts, most would agree on the number.
But for 43-year-old Matt, his “third boob” was starting to impact his quality of life.
The former marine, from Ligonier, Pennsylvania, first noticed the lump growing from his armpit around 18 years ago.
In 2009, he had it surgically removed, but after the operation noticed that there was still something in there.
He said: “I said to the surgeon that there was still a piece in there and he said, ‘no, it’s fine’, and less than four months later it was back.”
Describing the growth, he said: “It’s very squishy and freely moves around. The best way to describe it is like a third breast.
“I do believe I’m about a B cup now – hopefully it’s not going to get to a C cup.”
Having put up with it for another decade, Matt said the bump is starting to impact on his way of life.
“The problem is that it’s in my armpit and that’s a softball sized object that you have in a vital area that you need to move and it’s really wearing on me more and more,” he said.
“You can probably put two and two together on how it’s affected work, personal, social and all aspects of my life.
“It’s become a quality of life issue now.”
Matt decided it was time to do something about the growth and booked in to see Dr Sandra Lee at her clinic in California.
In tonight’s brand new episode of her TLC show Dr Pimple Popper, he’s seen arriving for his appointment having driven 3,200 miles from Pennsylvania.
“I’ve been waiting so long to get this procedure done and now I’m outside Dr Lee’s office I feel like I’m at the Superbowl,” he tells producers.
“It’s been so long since I’ve had any confidence in myself, I don’t know what that’s like anymore, so this is going to be a whole new world.”
In her outdoors Covid-safe clinic, Dr Lee pops on a pair of gloves and begins examining Matt’s lump.
She tells him that she believes it is a lipoma – a slow growing benign growth of fat cells.
“I think it’s conceivable that a lipoma could come back because you have that there that are these finger like projections and sometimes part of it winds round and hides from you,” she explains.
Pressing down on the lump, she says: “It feels firmer right here.”
“It also makes growths grow in a different sort of path because there’s a wall there so it tries to go in a different direction so you almost have two lipomas that have been split up.
“This area here, there’s a lot of important nerves in this armpit area – certainly I’m very careful, especially in that area.”
Explaining to producers where the growth is, she says: “Anytime I’m working in this armpit area, it’s called the brachial plexus, it really is ascending all the nerves and all the blood vessels from your heart to your hand, so you don’t want to disturb it.”
But the expert decides to press ahead with the surgery under local anaesthetic, and will carefully snip out the lipoma piece by piece.
In the operating room, she can be seen numbing the area before carefully slicing the lump open.
Dr Lee then begins the painstaking process of snipping out the fatty, yellow lipoma in small clumps.
Part way through, she turns to Matt and tells him: “I would say we have three fourths of it out.
“It’s the kind I have to be patient with because if I try to go too fast you won’t like it and it’s just going to tear.”
Speaking off camera, she explains: “I was able to remove a majority of the lipoma but there is something still there left, and I can see it, it’s just evading me. It’s down deep.”
Back in surgery, she continues to snip away slowly and it reveals her suspicions – there is a second part to the lipoma.
“We have a double one here, I actually have a lot of it but I can’t say for sure I got it all. If I did, it’s a tiny little bit,” she tells Matt.
Eventually, having got the majority of the lump out, Dr Lee decides to call it a day and stitch Matt back up.
“I always give 100 per cent when I’m removing a lipoma, but there is a limit for me. I have to balance the risks versus the benefits,” she says after the op.
“But if it’s going in areas that I don’t think are safe for me to go into, I have to call it.”
Speaking after the life-changing operation, Matt says: “I feel like the last 10 years washed away.
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