In her recently published book, Bertinelli openly discusses the cosmetic surgeries she has undergone, admitting to having a “complicated relationship” with her breasts due to relentless mockery.
“They were referred to as ‘little quarters,’ ‘itty-bitty t——,’ and ‘tiny b——,'” she recounts. “I internalized all of it. Instead of valuing the transformations my body was experiencing, I feared them. I had no clue what I was supposed to look like; I only understood it was perceived as wrong.”
Eventually, she opted for breast implants, which later became infected in a manner she describes as a “horror movie” scenario after one ruptured during a frightening fall.
“I dashed down the stairs, stumbled, and landed on my right breast. I heard a pop. I immediately understood what had transpired,” she writes.
Upon discovering the rupture, Bertinelli’s doctor showed her the old implants, which she described as resembling “ostrich eggs, hard and crusted over.”
“I was astonished they had been inside me. I returned home, bandaged and in pain, with drains under my arms, uncomfortable yet optimistic,” she continues.
The Valerie’s Home Cooking star initially found everything to be “great” for the first two weeks, but soon noticed her right breast developing “shades of green, yellow, and blue.”
“The following day it began to swell and turned a dark purple,” she explains. “I felt myself growing dizzy. By evening, I had a fever.”
“Upon waking, the pain was severe. My breast was throbbing, and it progressively worsened. I knew I had to see the doctor, but it was Saturday morning. I opted to wait until Monday,” she writes. “By then, I was extremely ill. My breast was discolored, painful, and swollen. I was feverish. Fluid was seeping from the sutures around my nipple.”
Three weeks later, she underwent surgery to remove the infected implant.
Bertinelli explains, “The second surgery involved extracting the implant and the infection from the surrounding muscle tissue. Recovery took longer… The doctors termed it cratering. It was an apt description. Another fitting word was gross. Truly gross. It resembled a horror movie — and it was. I had an open wound the size of a distorted quarter and a hole over an inch deep where my nipple once was. My nipple, or what remained of it, was hanging on by a literal half-inch.”
She later received a small implant to restore “what was left of [her] nipple” during a third procedure nearly seven months after the initial corrective surgery.
During her recovery, Bertinelli anticipates a fourth surgery to “even things out once and for all.”
“Currently, they are two entirely different sizes. The implant on the left is over the muscle, while my right side appears sad and misshapen,” Bertinelli remarks about her breasts in the book. “In all seriousness, I’m fortunate to have survived. That weekend terrified me. After a lifetime of believing I needed to correct something about myself, this last experience has been quite overwhelming.”
