Pectus Excavatum: Can bodybuilding help?

I was born with this dent in my chest. Now its not necessarily extreme like some cases, but it is still noticable. Ive been thinking that exercising and weight lifting can help remedy this. Especially by focusing on pectoral muscle building exercises.

But im not sure whether this will work or just make it worse. I hate this condition of mine, it has played a role in my lack of self confidence. I am weary about doing surgery, and, if body building does not help, are there any other natural ways to help this?

For pics of my chest, here is a thread i posted a while back.
http://www.hipforums.com/newforums/showthread.php?t=316073&f=169

thank you.

 

I have that too, but mines not that bad, and I'm a girl so it's less obvious. I would think building your pecs should help, since having boobs tends to hide it for women. It's a deformity of the cartilage, not your muscles, so it shouldn't make it worse, as long as the two sides of your rib cage are about even in size. The right side of my rib cage is smaller than my left, and thus my right boob is smaller too.

I'd be weary of surgery too, because I've heard it hurts like hell for months. they essentially break all your ribs. But I did hear of this experimental treatment for it that involved putting a magnet below the breastbone and then having the patient wear another magnet on his chest all the time, in order to gradually bring it out. I think it might depend on how old you are though, since it's easier to realign younger people's chests.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2007/11/13/BAONT5JAI.DTL&type=printable

-Kate