Breasts; Improving their Size, Shape and Health! by: Dr. William Wong ND, PhD

What are the options when a gal is looking to increase the curves in her figure?  Whether she was not naturally well endowed in the breast department or has lost the fullness of the breasts after childbirth and breastfeeding, there are some very natural alternatives to restore fullness and uplift without the painful and dangerous surgical implants.  First though, lets have a word about those breast implants.

Implants do fill out and reshape the breast.  Implants do improve a woman's figure.  But; putting them in is very painful.  Postoperative recovery is not pleasant.  The younger you are when you get them the more often you'll have to replace them.  Yep, replace them.  Those things break, they leak and after a while they become surrounded by scar tissue that restricts motion and makes the breast painful to the touch.  If the whole idea is to improve sexuality by improving curve-atiousness, then having breasts that can't stand to be touched is a real downer.   This encasement of what the body sees as foreign material must be surgically stripped and removed.  Ouch, ouch and ooouch!  Aside from that, the encasement is made of the same material that forms fibrocystic breast disease.  No sense in purposely giving yourself a case of that!   

If you don't want to go the implant route or are thinking through the options prior to having them put in give a listen and see about this natural way of filling and reshaping breast tissue. The techniques described herein were developed by my wife Michele after the birth of our son William Andrew.   Michele found that her breasts went from a firm and fabulous 46 DD to a flat and unattractive thirty plus some odd inches around.  What happened?

When looking at the breast what are we seeing?  What gives the breast their shape, lift and support?  When we look at a full shapely breasts we are noticing the fatty part of the breasts only.  The fullness and size of the breast comes from body fat.  Yes, that stuff you think of as nasty on the hips is glory on the breasts.  With out the fat the breasts would look like flat empty bladders, much as they do just after you stop breast-feeding when all of the fat stores are gone and only skin and mammary tissue remain. (The fat went into building baby brains and nerves).  When breasts such as these are touched one would only feel the skin and strands and strands of milk ducts and milk pathways underneath.  (Not very erotic to feel or nice to look at).

Take a look at women endurance athletes, distance runners, tri-athletes and women bodybuilders - no boobs!  If they have much of anything showing, as with the muscle gals, it's fake.  If you're training to dramatically reduce your body fat overall then you'll also be reducing your breasts in the attempt.  So rule number one in building breasts - cut back on the aerobics, no more than 3 half hour sessions a week.  That will be more than enough to keep your heart strong with out forcing you to burn up what you're trying to put on.  Keep weight training intensity down as well; use medium to low reps (5 to 8) with moderate to heavy weight.  High reps with light weight burns up fat and not necessarily just from the place you're working.  Increasing resistance will make you strong and shapely with out making you look like a beanpole or a refugee from a concentration camp.  If your goal is to lose fat you'll lose it from everywhere including your breasts!  (Those of you who want to be built like pre-teenage boys with implants stuck on top can stop reading now and instead make appointments with your psychiatrist and family doctor to discuss your sexual self image problems and eating disorders. Those of you who want bigger well-shaped breasts read on).  

For the secret of breast development let's go to the beginning of a woman's becoming a woman - puberty.  Just before the onset of menstruation a gals hormones begin to churn.  Of that hormonal mix, the most important stimulator of breast size is progesterone.  Estrogen has little if anything to do with increasing breast fat stores.  If estrogen had anything to do with bigger breasts then women on birth control pills would all have large full breasts.  (Estrogen though is responsible for fat gain from the belly button down).  The body builds up fat in the breasts in response to preparing for pregnancy in order to provide fat for the baby's diet where fat is so important it makes up 32% of breast milk!  Increasing the fat stores in the breast is governed by progesterone.  When progesterone levels plummet down after childbirth, so does the pregnancy acquired breast size.  (The drop in Progesterone is also the MAIN reason for Post Partum Depression).  Most gals these days are estrogen dominant, as long term followers of Sherrill know.  For the newer readers let me explain why we all (gals and guys) have so much estrogen in our bodies: Chemicals that mimic estrogen are plentiful in our environment, agricultural chemicals, pesticides and fertilizers as well as additives used to fatten up livestock.  Soy in its various forms is chock full of estrogen like substances called isoflavones.  These days some folks are saying that isoflavones are good for women but they are turning out to have the same cancer sparking effect as the regular estrogen as well as decreasing fertility (1,2).

Progesterone is a wonderful hormone responsible for fertility, bone density, good mood and mental outlook, better muscle to fat ratios, libido (sexual desire), protection against cancer, and a host of other beneficial effects (3).   Given today's predominance of estrogen most all women need to balance their lives with natural progesterone.  Avoid prescription progesterone, as these are patented synthetics.  Since you can't put a patent on something natural the prescription progesterone's are not exactly like a real progesterone molecule in structure.  This creates side effects that are not good.  Natural progesterone from the Mexican Yam plant is fully progesterone and as such is completely safe and effective.  Research has found that breast growth in young women is greatest in the time between her periods when progesterone levels are their highest. 

These days a few supplements can be found which indeed increase breast size using herbs.  They are attempting to bring back the hormone levels women had as teenage girls and while this is not in itself a bad thing, there can be side effects from those herbal supplements.  Most of the herbs used in these mixes contain a high level of, you guessed it, phyto estrogen.  Estrogen is estrogen and whether it comes from a test tube, horse urine, black cohosh or licorice it's all still estrogen.  Decreased fertility and libido, increased body fat from the hips down, and increase in various different kinds of fibrosis are all things that can be looked forward to from extra estrogen. 

So, what supplements do you use?

1. Natural progesterone cream.   Apply one measured spoon (1⁄4 teaspoon) of the cream to the breasts twice a day 12 hours apart.  Follow the directions on the label as to when in the month to use the cream.  If you are post menopausal then you can use the cream through out the month with out a break.  Though I recommend that these women use the cream for 25 days in the month and give      themselves 5 days off.  
2. Maca Root Extract .  This vegetable found only high in the Andes mountains and tastes like butterscotch.  Maca controls Estrogen dominance and balances the hormones.  It is known as the sex herb because of its ability to enhance libido in both men and women. (4,5). When you improve your progesterone / estrogen balance then, the breasts enlarge and fill out.  A working physiologic dose for maca powder whether the raw powder or the gelitanized is 3 to 6 tablespoons      eaten daily. Andianessence Maxx contains a 20 to 1 maca root extract equal to 1      tablespoon of maca powder per capsule, and is much easier to take than the      powder. Usual dose is 2 to 3 capsules 2x daily.   

What about exercise? Fat fills in the breasts but the muscles of the chest wall give the breasts their support, shape and uplift.  The pectoral muscles of the chest have three different segments and though they work together to perform the movements of pulling our arms into the bodies midline, they pull from different angles and need different angles of work to effect a change in their strength and shape.  The upper fibers of the pectoral muscle along with the pectoralis minor muscle beneath it pulls the breast up and helps to fill the hollow that women get between the clavicle and the beginning of the breast. This sagging is known as Coopers Droop after the British doctor Sir Astly Cooper who first described the condition. 

The mid and lower pectoral fibers add fullness and support the breast from underneath.   These muscles also keep the beast from flopping into the armpits.  Meanwhile the margins of the pectoral muscle as a whole delineate the breast from the chest wall improving cleavage, making the breasts more distinctive and stand out ish.  Pectorals keep the breast margins from simply blending and disappearing into the sides of the chest wall.   While nothing can be done to completely restore the breasts height and firmness after the connective tissue has been stretched out and torn though childbearing, running or age; working the muscles beneath the breast substantially contribute to the positive reshaping of the breasts.

The Exercises: All of the exercises here should be learned under proper supervision of an exercise physiologist or certified exercise professional.  Use moderate to heavy weights for the repetitions involved.  Do no more than 3 sets of 5 to 8 repetitions per set and do this workout no more than twice per week.  Unlike money and sex, in exercise more is not necessarily better and can actually work against your goals!   

1. Incline bench press.  3x 5 to 8 reps.
2. Decline bench press.  3x 5 to 8 reps.
3. Standing crossover cable flys.  3x 5 to 8 reps. 

On the cable crossovers exercise, use only moderate weight.  Going too heavy can strain the Long Head of the Biceps tendon at the front of the shoulder and cause pain.  Avoid fly machines as most place the upper arm at bio-mechanically incorrect position and can cause the same injury.  Also a very important point: keep the weight up and the reps down, you want to build strength and tissue.  Higher reps and lighter weights wear tissue down, especially the fat in breast tissue.   If you want proof the high reps and light resistance wears down tissue and that low reps with heavy resistance builds it, compare the legs of a marathoner to those of a sprinter!  

If fully bringing the bar down to the chest in either of the bench pressing movements hurts the front of the shoulders, then only bring the bar down half way, to were your elbows are level with the sides of your ribs.  This will be enough movement and still provide the wanted exercise result.

Fun Work:  Lovemaking is a time of flying hormones (mainly progesterone, testosterone and oxytosin - the orgasm hormone).  These can be taken advantage of and put to good use in increasing breast size.  Have your partner lavish a ton of attention on your breasts and nipples thoughout your lovemaking sessions and immediately afterward.  Gentle massage during this attention will increase the blood circulation to the area getting the hormones into the tissue.  There have been couples who have made love, placing intense attention to the breast and then immediately went to work out with the weight training exercises.  This flushing of hormone-laden blood through breast tissue increased the cup size of one woman I know of from a saggy 34 B to a firm 36 C in three months!    

Breast tissue with it's complicated physiology and varying anatomical structures demands a multi-dimensional approach to its augmentation.  One thing alone will not do it all.  This combination of supplementation, exercise and sexual stimulation covers all of the bases and will produce the greatest results in size and shape.  

A Note on Breast Health; For gals with fibrotic encapsulation of implants, fibrocystic breast disease, breast cancer survivors, or those wishing to avoid all of the above, this bit of advice: 

1. Keep your progesterone levels high.
2. Take 800 IU's of Vitamin E and 50 mg. of Zinc daily and most important of all; 
3. Take 1 to 3 caplets of a good systemic enzyme daily.

These nutrients help insure the health of breast tissue reducing and keeping away Fibrocystic Breast Disease.  According to Germanys leading oncologist Dr. H. Wrba the enzymes are essential in fending off cancer and preventing its reoccurrence. (6).  Most importantly, the enzymes will eat away at the fibrosis and control its further deposition. (7).  

By the way, my wife Michele returned to a full and beautiful 42 D in just a few months on this routine!

References:

1. Stahl, S., et al.: Phytoestrogens act as estrogen agonists in an estrogen - responsive pituitary cell line.  Toxicol Appl Pharmacol 1998 Sep; 152(1): 41-8
2. Zand, R., S. Et al: Steroid hormone activity of flavinoids and related compounds.  Breast Cancer Research and Treatment 2000 Jul; 62(1): 35-49.
3. What Your Doctor May Not Tell You About  Pre Menopause, John Lee MD, OBGYN, Warner Books, Dec. 1998.
4. Canales, M., et at.: Nutritional Evaluation of Lepidium meyenii (MACA) in albino mice and their descendants. Arch Latinoam Nutr 200 Jun; 50(2): 126-133.
5. Canales, M., et al: Effect of Lepidium meyenii (maca) root on spermatogenesis of mice.  Asian J Androl 2001 Sep; 3(3): 231-233.
6. Wrba, H.: Krebstherapie mit proteolytischen Enzymen.  (Cancer therapy with proteolytic enzymes). In: Wrba H., (ed)., Kombinierte Tumortherapie,pp.134-145,      Hippokrates-Verlag, Stuttgart 1990.

Scheef, W.: Gutartige Veranderungen der weiblichen Brust.  (Benign changes in the female breast).  Therapiewoche, 1985, 5090.