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‘Real Housewives’ Star Hospitalized After Illegal Cosmetic Injections

“That was really the worst thing I ever did to myself.”

Roosa RahkonenReporter, The Looker

PublishedApr 15, 2026, 2:05 PM EDT

UpdatedApr 15, 2026, 2:06 PM EDT

Updated Apr 15, 2026, 2:06 PM EDTPublished Apr 15, 2026, 2:05 PM EDT

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The Real Housewives of Atlanta star K. Michelle recently revealed that she underwent surgery after suffering complications from her illegal butt injections.

The singer-songwriter, who first became known through the TV show Love & Hip Hop: Atlanta, was preparing to perform at the 2025 Academy of Country Music Honors on Aug. 20 when she realized something was wrong.

“I’m sitting there, minding my business, and I stand up—the whole couch is soaking wet,” she said in a TikTok preview clip of Sunday’s RHOA episode, posted by Bravo TV.

Prior to noticing the wet couch, the 44-year-old had experienced no discomfort. “I was completely numb,” she explained, adding that her team helped her clean up so she could perform.

“I was standing there in a bathrobe. Everyone was blow-drying me down. It was very frantic just to get me on stage to sing.”

After her performance, Michelle visited a doctor, who told her she had an “opening” and an infection in her buttocks.

Years prior, in hopes of furthering her career, Michelle underwent a breast augmentation and a Brazilian Butt Lift, where fat was transferred to her buttocks from her stomach.

Ultimately, she felt the results were not dramatic enough, and later received illegal silicone injections from an unlicensed provider in Atlanta.

“I got my body done, trying to get a butt that I already had,” she said in the clip. “I got illegal silicone injections, trying to overdo it and overextend it or expand it.”

In the clip, the doctor told Michelle that she would have to undergo a “reconstructive” surgery.

“The best thing to do would be to just go in, clean it out, remove any of the dead tissue,” he explained.

“I hate that I did this to myself,” Michelle said, breaking down in tears. “That was really the worst thing I ever did to myself, and I have paid for it for years.”

In 2018, she told People she had already undergone four surgeries and two blood infusions due to side effects from the silicone injections.

In another preview clip posted on YouTube, Michelle was recovering from her two-hour surgery and reflected on the journey.

“The hardest thing for me was learning that no matter what I do and how many surgeries, I will never get that silicone out of my body,” she said. “It will be forever in me. I will never be fully healed.”

Another Love & Hip Hop star, Grammy-winning rapper Cardi B, has also been open about her journey with illegal injections, sharing that she visited a basement in Queens to receive biopolymer injections in her buttocks at 21.

Despite severe pain and leaking for days after the procedure, Cardi planned to go in for more. Before her follow-up appointment, her injector was jailed after the jabs allegedly caused another client’s death.

While silicone gel implants are FDA-approved (after being temporarily banned from 1992 to 2006), the injection of liquid silicone for large-volume body contouring procedures is illegal and carries severe, permanent, and sometimes fatal risks.

Roosa RahkonenReporter, The Looker

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