Kathy Bates Reveals the Reason She Chose Not to Have Reconstruction Surgery After Undergoing Double Mastectomy
Kathy Bates is giving her reasoning for not getting reconstruction surgery after her second cancer battle.
During a Tuesday, November 12, appearance on the "MeSsy" podcast with Christina Applegate and Jamie-Lynn Sigler, the Titanic actress, 76, opened up about why she felt she didn't need to go under the knife again after having a double mastectomy to combat her b---- cancer diagnosis in 2012.
"I decided not to have reconstruction because at the age I was, I thought, you know, I really don’t want to go through that. I just didn’t want to go through it," she explained. "You know, I wasn’t in a relationship, I was older and I didn’t think I would be in a relationship, and it’s always kind of like, why do I have to?"
Bates candidly shared with the Bad Moms actress, 52, who has also had cancer in the past, and the Sopranos star, 43, that she doesn't miss the body parts she lost. "This is really weird maybe, but I had really heavy b------," the Annie alum revealed.
"They were like 10 pounds when they removed them. Really big, big b------ and I kind of enjoy not having b------. It's strange," she added.
While making her latest project, Matlock, Bates emphasized her innovative costuming in making it look like she had an ample chest. "They put little falsie cups in it. They’re so comfortable and they give me a nice shape," the star added. "I feel so good when I go out like that."
Bates has not only dealt with b------ cancer but she also overcame ovarian cancer in 2003 which was discovered after a friend urged her to make a doctor's visit. "She saved my life,” she explained in an interview with Future Personal Health. “It would have been easy for me to write off all of those things if she hadn’t been there.”
However, it's taken Bates a long time to be open about her health journey. “My manager didn’t want me to be the poster child for ovarian cancer. Then I got b---- cancer, and that, combined with seeing Melissa Etheridge doing her thing, made me say, ‘Why not?’ I wanted to give women a face to this cancer," she explained.
The Hollywood icon has continued to keep a watchful eye on her health after recently losing 100 pounds. "There’s been a lot of talk that I just was able to do this because of Ozempic," she explained in an interview earlier this year. "But I have to impress upon people out there that this was hard work for me, especially during the pandemic. It’s very hard to say you’ve had enough."
People conducted the 2024 interview with Bates.