Kari Wuhrer :Why I Took Out My Breast Implants

Read this article, about an actress who had the courage to took out her implant..

A Hollywood Actress's Intimate Diary – Why I Took Out My Breast Implants
In the movie business, your body is your business card. Which is why at age 22, aspiring actress Kari Wuhrer underwent breast implant surgery. Thirteen years later, she's had enough. In a Glamour Magazine exclusive, she shares her diary of rediscovering her real body – and real self.

Saturday, March 2, 2002

So far, this has been one of the most humiliating days of my life. This morning, I was standing in the dressing room of a movie set in a house in the Hollywood Hills, preparing for a nude scene for the film Spider's Web, and I was panicking. Not because it was a nude scene; I've done plenty of those. (I was naked in a room with Sean Penn and Jack Nicholson in The Crossing Guard in 1995 and didn't mind a bit.) No I was panicking because something was wrong with one of my breasts.

My right breast – filled with one of my silicone breast implants – had encapsulated, meaning that the scar tissue underneath the implant has turned rock hard and, in my case, is now pushing my right breast twice as high as my left. My doctor said it's the most common complication of breast implants, although it affects only about 5 percent of recipients. Unfortunately, I'm on the wrong side of the statistic. I'm half Pamela Anderson, half me. My right breast looks puffy and swollen, and the nipple is pointing downward. I look deformed.

Three weeks ago, when I began shooting this film, my breasts were fine. The encapsulation happened literally overnight. And because I was supposed to film a scene today that involved climbing out of a shower in a wet white shirt, I had to tell my director, Paul Levine, and my costar, Stephen Baldwin, about the encapsulation this morning. I may be the world's greatest avoider, but I couldn't get out of this one. I was so worried about their reactions: Would they fire me if I couldn't do the scene? Would they think I was just being a diva? Would they laugh? I mean, this wasn't a broken arm – it was something really embarrassing.

Telling them was humbling. When they asked, "How bad is it?" I lifted my shirt to show them and then started to cry. How ironic: thousands of dollars of implants and I couldn't bear to have anyone look at them. But Paul and Stephen werre so compassionate. Paul said, "We'll work through the love scenes together," and Stephen agreed to help hide parts I couldn't expose. When I walked back to my dressing room, I cried even more with relief. I'd been thinking about getting my breast implants taken out for some time, but this was the last straw. All I could think was, I want them out – now.

These implants have been with me for almost my whole entertainment career, After a yearlong stint in 1988 as the host of MTV's game show Remote Control, I moved from New York to Los Angeles to become a singer. An eminent record producer signed me to a record deal but added very matter-of-factly that I would need to get new breasts put in. He said, "I really like it when you can see a woman's breasts from the back." I can't believe that didn't halt me right there – the idea that I'd have such huge breasts that they'd peek out from my sides! But I was young and more concerned with my looks than with what was on the inside, in my soul.

Eight months later, I had my A-cups augmented to C-cups. After six months of working with the producer on my "image", rather than my music, I decided not to do the deal after all. But with the implants, I was offered a lot of "sexy" roles in low-budget films. It was limiting, but I couldn't complain – those jobs were putting a roof over my head. I took big roles in small movies and small roles in big movies. In 1997, I was cast in the science fiction TV series Sliders, which started my career in sci-fi thrillers and eventually led to my starring role this summer opposite David Arquette in the film Eight Legged Freaks, a parody of 1950s monster movies.

I vividly remember the day I first thought about taking out the implants. It was 1999, and I was starring in a short film. Before I began the love scene, I stood in the bathroom looking in the mirror and suddenly, for the first time in my career, I was afraid to expose myself. Where once I'd felt proud and empowered to walk into a room naked, I now realized that my breasts were defining me before I had a chance to define myself, in both work and my personal relationships. Even though I was intelligent and a trained actress, many of the people I met, including casting directors, weren't taking me seriously. I was sick of my breasts walking into a room five minutes before I did.

Finally, a year later, I asked a doctor to take out my implants. But he cautioned me about getting rid of them entirely, saying my breasts might be empty and saggy: "You'll be really unhappy," he said. I let him convince me that a set of slightly smaller silcone breasts would satisfy me, and I had the downsizing surgery that month. I felt pretty good about myself for a few months, but the feeling was fleeting. I hadn't gotten to the root of the issue, which is that I didn't want to be more natural – I wanted to be all natural. But before I decided to remove my implants, my body would show its own signs that they should be taken out. It's like fate stepped in with the encapsulation.

So today, back on the set of Spider's Web, I took a deep breath, walked onto the set in my see-through shirt and filmed my scenes. Paul, the director, said I didn't look bad, but I feel ashamed of my body. I want to be more than what I've given myself credit for. I am talented and loving and beautiful. I want to be me again. It's time to say goodbye to the silicone.
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