Did Ashley Graham Undergo Plastic Surgery? The Chilling Reason She Spends Hours Under Daily Needles

Ashley Graham said on US television on Tuesday 17 March that she has never had plastic surgery but is 'totally not opposed' to getting a facelift in her 50s, telling TODAY With Jenna & Sheinelle that she prefers daily needles from acupuncture to more drastic work for now.

The 38-year-old Ashley Graham has built a career and a global following - out of speaking openly about bodies that don't fit the fashion industry's old blueprint. A plus-size supermodel, TV host and former America's Next Top Model judge, she has long positioned herself as a body-positivity advocate, talking candidly about weight, pregnancy and ageing. That is precisely why any suggestion of 'work' on her face or body tends to land more heavily than it might for another celebrity; her image trades on being unvarnished, even when the reality is more complicated.

Ashley Graham Talks Facelifts, Botox And 'Taking The Shame Out'

Guest co-hosting NBC's TODAY With Jenna & Sheinelle, Ashley Graham was drawn into a discussion about cosmetic surgery after the hosts raised actor Wendi McLendon-Covey's decision to skip the Bridesmaids reunion at the Oscars because she had just undergone a neck lift.

'I feel like there's more conversation around plastic surgery, and people are talking about what they've had and what they want to get,' Graham said, adding that McLendon-Covey would likely be greeted with, 'Dang, she looks so good,' when she returned.

Pressed on her own stance, Graham replied: 'I'm totally not opposed to getting a facelift in my 50s... There's options.' The comment was brief, almost throwaway, but it ran counter to the purist expectations some fans project onto her.

Her fellow presenter Sheinelle Jones, 47, offered a slightly different angle. She said she is 'good' without a facial procedure for now, but defended anyone choosing to alter their appearance. 'I haven't had anything yet, but one day, if I feel like I want to do something... let's take the shame out of it,' she said. 'Let's be nice, and we're going to take the shame out of all the things. Live your best life.'

Hours Under The Needle: Inside Ashley Graham's Acupuncture Obsession

Where Ashley Graham draws a firmer line, at least for now, is around surgery itself. On TODAY, she stressed that she has 'never received plastic surgery,' though she admitted to trying Botox in the past.

'I did not like what it did to my face,' she said. Instead, she leans heavily on a different kind of intervention; intensive facial acupuncture. 'I get a lot of acupuncture in my face... What it does is when the needle goes into a place of tension in your face, it'll relax the muscle around it,' she explained.

Graham name-checked her acupuncturist, Dr Sandra Chu, whom she described as 'fabulous,' and invited viewers to check her Instagram for images of her face covered in needles. 'Oh, the whole face is covered... it's great. Sometimes, I'm there for 30 minutes. Sometimes, I'm there for an hour. That's the kind of needle I'm dealing with.'

That commitment has gone further than an occasional wellness session. In a TikTok video posted in 2023, Ashley Graham revealed that Chu stayed with her for a full week to carry out a series of acupuncture treatments. 'She knows how much I love acupuncture... so we decided to needle me every day for like two to three hours a day, basically to experiment on what it does to my traps, my face, butt, quads, shins, my feet,' Graham told followers.

She outlined a routine that combined 'gua sha, cupping, moxa, old traditional acupuncture with needles.' Summing up her preference, she said she would 'rather do that than put some chemicals in my body, just saying! But not opposed to a little Botox.'

There is an element of selectiveness here that critics of celebrity transparency will recognise. Botox is a chemical, acupuncture is not; both are interventions aimed at tweaking what nature, and time, provide. Graham's position, though, is hardly unusual. Many famous faces draw a distinction between what they see as 'natural' or 'holistic' procedures and surgical alteration, even when the practical effect is similar.

What is harder to dismiss is her insistence on talking about it. Where an older generation of models simply denied everything, Ashley Graham seems intent on narrating each needle in real time, even as she leaves the door open to future surgery.