90s supermodel Linda Evangelista opened up about her double mastectomy at Shiseido’s Potential Has No Age Summit on Feb. 19, 2025, participating in a panel about the pressure on women to look young.
She sat alongside fashion designer Jenna Lyons and Shiseido’s chief marketing officer Agnes Landau and was asked when she had felt the most beautiful, as reported by People. In response, the 59-year-old remembered a Feb. 2024 photo shoot — coincidentally shot by Lyons’ fiancée Cass Bird.
She appeared shirtless in the photos, with just a jean jacket on her top half. The surgical scars from the double mastectomy procedure she had previously undergone were visible. “Jenna was there,” Evangelista recalled. “When I was changing, they asked me, ‘Can we see your…’ I don’t know what you said, if it was my chest or my whatever. I have had a double mastectomy and I had never shown anyone besides my family.”
While she could not recall the exact details, Evangelista remembers being told that her body, scars and all, was “so beautiful.” She struggled to believe it that day, mentioning that the validation from her friends and colleagues reassured her, “I should have known myself, looking in the mirror. Something I don’t love to do, but I should have known that it is beautiful. And they made me feel beautiful.”
As a result, she agreed to appear shirtless in the photos, saying “I’m beautiful, but I needed to hear it from someone else.” She added. “So I just really think it’s important that as women, we support each other and uplift each other. I think we’re all in this together.”
Evangelista shared her breast cancer diagnosis in Sep. 2023 with WSJ. Magazine. She found out privately in 2018, after a routine mammogram. “The margins were not good,” she said, resulting in her decision to opt for a bilateral mastectomy — the removal of all tissue from both breasts.
Unfortunately, the cancer returned in July 2022. This is generally uncommon but does happen on rare occasions, as per Ellis Levine, MD, chief of breast medicine at Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center. For example, cancer can develop in the chest wall adjacent to where it was originally found.
She told her oncologist after her second diagnosis, “Dig a hole in my chest. I don’t want it to look pretty. I want you to excavate. I want to see a hole in my chest when you’re done. Do you understand me? I’m not dying from this.”
On the Drew Barrymore Show in Oct. 2024, she shared that she self-diagnosed her second cancer, and had to insist when asking doctors for imaging because they were almost certain that the cancer would not have returned following her double mastectomy. “It came back in my [pectoral] muscle,” she explained, “what we need to remember is, if you find something, the earlier you find it, the better. I think that everyone should test because it can save your life.”
If you’re too young to be invited for yearly mammograms, you can also do a self-exam to check for abnormalities at home. “With the pads/flats of your 3 middle fingers, check the entire breast and armpit area, pressing down with light, medium, and firm pressure,” explains National Breast Cancer. You should look for changes such as new lumps and changes in the skin.
It’s advised to perform the self-exam around the same time every month. For people still menstruating, the ideal time is a few days after their period ends. For those who are post-menopausal, it should be done on the same day of each month. Regular self-exams will help you identify any changes. As Lisa said, early diagnosis increases the chances of recovery and its speed monumentally.
Published: Feb 22, 2025 10:58 am