Kylie Jenner's Plastic Surgery Admissions and Regrets
The members of the Kardashian-Jenner family are almost constantly under examination and speculation regarding their changing looks. They're also well-known for strongly denying having undergone plastic surgery, except for the occasional mention of Botox (even then, only a "small amount"), and Khloé confessing to a rhinoplasty last year. Now, the youngest of the group, 25-year-old Kylie Jenner, is ultimately acknowledging that she had a breast augmentation when she was 19, just a few months before getting pregnant with her daughter.
"You know I got my breasts done before Stormi," Jenner told a friend in the latest episode of The Kardashians. This disclosure follows years of Jenner stating the contrary. In a 2015 video posted on her now defunct website, she attributed her larger chest to a Victoria's Secret push-up bra. "I don't share this with many people, but everyone assumes I've recently had breast augmentation, but I haven't. I just use the Bombshell by Victoria's Secret. It's life-altering. I've gotten all my sisters and friends to use it." In another post on the website, she claimed that weight gain was the cause of her larger breasts. "I haven't gotten breast implants! Everyone is fixated on that. The truth is, as I've grown older, I've gained 15 pounds and my body has changed. I swear there are ways to address problem areas without resorting to plastic surgery." The next year, she attributed her chest size to PMS. "Too much information, but it's that time of the month lol," she tweeted when asked why her boobs looked so good. "They will shrink soon. And it will be a sad day."
The pattern of denial after denial and then finally admitting is precisely what occurred when fans began discussing Jenner's fuller lips. After years of insisting that all she did was outline her lips, she eventually confessed to getting filler. She later clarified her decision to hide the truth in an interview with Complex: "I didn't want to be a negative influence. I didn't want people to think you had to get your lips enhanced to feel good about yourself. But they thought it was even crazier that I was lying about it because it was so obvious. I wish I had just been honest and upfront."
In the July 27 episode, Jenner further described how soon she got pregnant after the breast augmentation: "Within six months of having Stormi—not thinking I would have a child when I was 20—like, they were still recovering." It was a choice she now regrets. "I had beautiful breasts, like, natural ones. Just lovely, perfect size, perfect everything. And I just wish, obviously, I had never had it done in the first place. I would advise anyone considering it to wait until after having children."
However, according to Dr. Joseph Zakhary, a board-certified plastic surgeon in Phoenix, Arizona, "There is no set time frame to wait to get pregnant after an augmentation, given that most of the changes to the breast occur late in the pregnancy in preparation for lactation and the postpartum period." And while both pregnancy and breastfeeding can alter the overall appearance of the breast (whether there is an implant or not), he says that women who get pregnant in their 20s, like Jenner, are actually less likely to undergo significant changes. "There are numerous patients who have had a breast augmentation and get pregnant in their 20s, but maintain the same breast appearance after pregnancy because they have denser breasts," Dr. Zakhary explains. He also adds that, in his experience, regret over breast augmentation, in general, is very rare, even among patients aged 18 to 22.
Jenner also expressed that she wishes she had done things differently because of her daughter. "I would be devastated if she wanted to have body alterations at 19. And she's the most wonderful thing ever. I want to be the best mom and the best role model for her. And I just wish I could, like, be in her shoes and do everything differently because I wouldn't touch anything."
Ironically enough, in the previous episode of the reality show, the sisters talked about their body image concerns and the beauty standards they represent. Kylie was insistent that she has made no surgical changes to her face: "One of the biggest misunderstandings about me is that I was this insecure child and had a lot of surgery to change my entire face, which is not true. I've only had fillers." Given how events have unfolded, whether that's actually the case remains to be seen.
