After a double mastectomy, Louise Butcher found her confidence again by running marathons topless
Before she was diagnosed with cancer, Louise Butcher ‘didn’t care’ about how she looked – now, after her double mastectomy, she feels more feminine and powerful than ever.
Topless marathon runner Louise Butcher feels more feminine after her double mastectomy than she ever did with breasts.
She knows that sounds strange, but the empowerment and sense of purpose she has found on her daily bare-chested runs around England’s southwest coast have transformed her.
“Before I got cancer, I didn’t care about how I looked, I had kind of let myself go,” said Butcher, who opted for a flat closure procedure over reconstructive surgery following her mastectomy in 2022.
“To be honest, I feel more feminine now without (breasts) than I ever did. It’s really weird, and I think it is because femininity comes from confidence and how you feel about yourself.”
Six weeks after her lifesaving mastectomy, Butcher ran her first marathon. It made her feel strong and powerful, so she decided to run the next one topless, proudly showing her scars in a bid to tackle the stigma that shadows women who opt for flat closure surgery.
“When I got diagnosed, everything changed, the people around me changed because they all looked at me differently, with pity,” she said.
“I felt like I’d lost my identity, but the running and the marathon gave me focus – I was so driven to not be pitied.”
Butcher was diagnosed with lobular breast cancer in April 2022, only a month after she had paid for a private mammogram and was given the “all-clear”.
“A few weeks later in the shower, I had a really good self-check because I thought, having had the mammogram, it would be a good baseline and I would know if anything changed,” she said.
“That is when I found a really small thickening – it wasn’t even like a round lump – but it just felt a bit weird.”
Her GP sent her to a breast clinic for an ultrasound scan, which found abnormalities the mammogram had missed. Biopsies confirmed she had cancer and required a mastectomy. She was 48.
Butcher’s surgeon advised her to have breast reconstruction, warning her mental health would likely suffer if she declined. But the mother of two knew straight away that she didn’t want implants.
“To other women in that position, I would say, even though the surgeon has done all these operations and they’re going off research, you really need to advocate for what you feel, not what you think society feels,” she said.
And while she was confident in her decision, Butcher said losing her breasts was still painful.
“It felt like losing a part of myself and then having to evolve into something, someone else, without them,” she said.
“I had to become something better than I was when I had boobs, because when I had them, I’d never run marathons.
“So when I started running marathons without them, it was like I could never look back at the person with the boobs, because I’ve become something stronger and fitter and better.”
Since her surgery, Butcher has run five marathons and last year became the first woman to run the London Marathon topless.
So what does it feel like running bare-chested without breasts?
“Oh, it’s amazing,” Butcher said.
“I feel less vulnerable because when I had boobs, especially when I was younger, they were always talked about, they were always stared at, bouncing around when I was running,” she said.
“Running now, I feel really powerful and free – the breeze on your chest is brilliant and when it rains, oh, it is just so nice.”
Going Topless, by Louise Butcher (Pegasus Elliot Mackenzie Publishers), is out now.
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