Please ease my mind...

Hi,

let me start off by saying I'm a 21 year old male. About 1.5 months ago noticed a mass underneath both my nipples. Since then I've done quite a lot of research on the web about male breast cancer and I more or less came to the conclusion that it could not be breast cancer (especially seeing my age).

Still, I never found out what else it could be and I'm kinda afraid that it could very well be cancer. Let me give you some details. The mass is kinda shaped like a donut and is located underneath my nipple area. What I mean by donut is that the mass is round but in the middle there's a "hole". Note that my nipples aren't inverted. What's discomforting is that the mass underneath my left nipple is noticably larger than the one underneath my right nipple. The one on the right is only mm's in height, but I estimate the one on the left is more than 1cm in height. What's really discomforting though is that I very recently noticed tiny lumps (around 3) at the bottom of my left rib section and around the mass in my left breast. These lumps are very flat but vary in lenght. You can't see them, but I can feel them if I press hard enough on my ribs. That really scares me. I should point out that I'm a little obese (some of my friends taunted me about my "man-boobs") and I can move the masses in my breasts. So they aren't attached to neither my ribs nor skin. I'll also mention that the donut like masses are hard, but the small lumps are soft. I also never had any nipple discharge as far as I know.

Please don't think I'm joking because I'm not and I'm really worried.

[CCF-RN,MSN-JS]

Dear Karel, It is unlikely that this mass is due to breast cancer.  Male breast cancer is rare, but one out of every 150 cases of breast cancer involves a man, usually in men over 60 years old.  Although a painless breast lump is the most common sign, most breast lumps in men are benign (non-cancerous) and are related to some other cause.  The first step in determining what the cause might be in your situation would be to have it examined by a health care professional.