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Lena Dunham Opens Up About the Shocking Plastic Surgery Advice She Received

The ‘Girls’ creator recounts a surprising encounter with a plastic surgeon during a recent consultation.

Muskaan ArshadBreaking News Intern

PublishedApr 13, 2026, 8:52 PM EDT

UpdatedApr 13, 2026, 8:52 PM EDT

Updated Apr 13, 2026, 8:52 PM EDTPublished Apr 13, 2026, 8:52 PM EDT

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Actor, writer, and director Lena Dunham, 39, opened up about a jarring cosmetic consultation she had with a plastic surgeon ahead of her May 13th birthday.

“So, I am going to be 40 in about a month. I know it shocks you, blows your mind,” she quipped to her TikTok audience last Thursday. “I went to go see a doctor, a dermatologist. She also is a plastic surgeon. Let’s call it what it is. She’s a plastic surgeon.”

“I said to her, ‘If I were to fully let you loose on my face, money were no object, healing were no object, just tell me what would you do?’” The doctor’s answer surprised her.

As they say, never ask a question you don’t want to know the answer to.

Dunham thought the dermatologist would say “you’re out of your mind,” but instead, she looked at her and said, “I wouldn’t go crazy,” but that she likes to highlight a “client’s natural beauty.”

According to her surgeon, the actress’ “natural beauty” lay mostly between her brow and just below her nose.

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“Okay, so I was like okay, so what you can see through a criminal ski mask? And the rest you would obliterate in a meat grinder basically?” Dunham complained.

It’s unclear whether the Girls creator took up the surgeon’s suggestion.

Dunham has previously been open about her struggles with body image, as her form became a topic of discussion when she catapulted to fame as the star of Girls in her mid-20s.

She revealed in an Instagram post for the generational show’s 13th anniversary last spring how that era of her life was, to some extent, a “nightmare” that “affirmed all the 7th grade ghosts living in my head.”

“There is almost nothing that scares us more than the truth of what our bodies are, and that—even with all these modern tools—their fate is so often out of our control,” she reflected, adding that “I no longer believed that being thinner, taller, or tanner would save me.”

Dunham is set to release her memoir Famesick later this week, where she’s set to dish on lore from her days on Girls, her chronic illness, and how she has dealt with decades of fame and controversy.

Muskaan ArshadBreaking News Intern

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