The Kylie Jenner Effect: Why Is Everyone Suddenly Sharing Their Surgery Details (Including Our Dear Media Hosts)?

Well, you saw the news: Kylie Jenner got very specific about her boob job this week. The Kylie Cosmetics founder and youngest of the Kardashian-Jenner clan, has finally raised the bar. Or lowered it, depending on how you look at it. 

Still, how’s that for vulnerability! It’s worth considering how this new wave of celebrity transparency affects fans and followers—both for the good and the bad.

Surgery Details: Kylie Jenner Shares Breast Implant Specifics

Celebrities opening up about plastic surgery 

Jenner recently responded to a TikTok user who was asking for breast augmentation advice, calling out Jenner herself for the “most perfect natural looking boob job ever” and wanting specifics around exactly what to ask her plastic surgeon for. Jenner, apparently feeling generous, delivered: “445 cc, moderate profile, half under the muscle!!!!! Silicone!!!”

The transparency feels very 2024—part of a growing trend of celebs treating cosmetic procedures less like state secrets and more like skincare routines.

Kristin Cavallari, for example, also recently shared the specifics of her breast surgery on Let’s Be Honest, explaining that she went from 300 cc to 340 cc in her recent revision. She says, “They look substantially bigger because they are lying better. They are where they are supposed to be. I love them.”

Caroline Stanbury, host of Uncut and Uncensored and the Real Housewives of Dubai star has also been extremely open about her facelift. So much so, that she even documented the journey and shared it on Instagram. After years of filler and Botox starting at 26, she decided it was time for the real deal.

Her motivation for sharing? “I don’t want women to see me and think at 48, I look like this and they look like shit,” she told People. “It’s an unnatural thing.” Fair!

Boob job: Is it best before or after pregnancy? 

But wait, so when is the best time to get a boob job? Cavallari, who initially got her boobs done eight years ago after having her three children, suggests waiting until after kids. On Let’s Be Honest she shared her candid thoughts: “Kids will ruin your boobs. You’ll have to redo them.”

She speaks from experience, having recently gotten them redone two weeks before Stagecoach—only to discover she had a ruptured implant. But since her surgery, Cavallari is feeling great. “I’m 38. I’m still young, and I’m single. Right now, in my life, is when I need the best boobs imaginable. Some people won’t understand that, which is okay. It’s my body,” she says.

Jenner, who got her surgery at 19 and had daughter Stormi a year later, also agrees (hence her new set). “I would recommend anyone who is thinking about it to wait until after children,” she said on a 2023 episode of The Kardashians.

Embracing natural beauty is trending 

Over on Better Half, Kylie’s BFF Stassie Karanikolaou also shared the honest details around the work she’s had done on the debut episode of the show. “I did not realize at all what I was signing myself up for,” she says, adding how she’s had multiple corrective surgeries and regrets following trends. 

Arielle Lorre, who hosts Well With Arielle Lorre, embodies this push-and-pull perfectly. She loves her breast augmentation—”It honestly gave me so much more confidence and I would 100 percent do it again”—but lately regrets her nose job. “Unique noses give so much character to someone’s face, and if I could go back, I would have done less to it.” Again, embracing your more natural beauty is another beauty trend we’re seeing right now. 

Alexis Fisher, Stassie’s manager and cohost, puts it perfectly on Better Half: “Everybody needs to do what makes them happy and what makes them feel good, but I think you need to do it when you’re at an age and a maturity level where you’re in the right frame of mind to actually be able to make informed decisions that will affect your life.” 

What message does plastic surgery send to children

So, thanks to Kylie and other women sharing their experiences, we’re now in this new era of surgical transparency, which raises some interesting questions. Almost eight years since having her breasts done, Jenner’s opinion about plastic surgery has evolved—largely because of motherhood, but also perhaps because of age and perspective. 

In a previous episode of The Kardashians, Jenner publicly opened up for the first time about her regrets: “I had beautiful breasts. Natural tits. Just gorgeous. Perfect size, perfect everything. And I just wish, obviously, I never got them done to begin with.”

Her biggest concern is what message she is sending her daughter, Stormi. “I would be heartbroken if she wanted to get her body done at 19. She’s the most beautiful thing ever. I wish I could be her and do it all differently. Cause I wouldn’t touch anything.”

On one hand, there’s something valuable about celebrities finally admitting that their “natural” beauty often isn’t. But when we have someone’s exact surgical recipe, is this helpful information or a new kind of pressure disguised as authenticity?