Star Monroe tells PEOPLE why going under the knife was about more than just her looks
Credit: Dr. Berat Cigdem
NEED TO KNOW
- Star Monroe is rebranding herself ahead of her 55th birthday in April
- The content creator and self-identity expert has been on a journey of reflection, “cleaning” up her act and recovering from a life of “self-loathing and self-destruction”
- She tells PEOPLE that she got a face and neck lift in December to give her appearance “longevity” and to reflect all the positive inner work she’d done in her 40s
Star Monroe is in a stage of her life where she's trusting that what's meant to be, will be. Although, more recently, she made a major change that she's been working up to for decades.
In December, the content creator announced to her 153,000 Instagram followers that she'd scheduled a facelift as a part of her "rebrand at 55," an age at which she planned to undergo the cosmetic surgery.
In that same clip Monroe, a psychotherapist, self-identity expert and author of My Wild Love Affair, said she's overhauled her life many times before, but this time she was starting from a clean slate. For probably what was the first time, Monroe embarked on a journey of reinventing herself without feeling like she was shedding a version of who she was.
Credit: Dr. Berat Cigdem
Monroe has a turbulent and troubled past. "From an early age, like say 10, 11, up until my mid-40s, I lived a life of self-loathing and self-destruction," she tells PEOPLE. Eating disorders, addiction, alcoholism, toxic relationships and financial ruin, she says, are all things she lived through and struggled with. By her 40s, she noticed the patterns and went on a personal mission to clean up "her act."
Monroe put herself back in school to become a psychotherapist, moved to Turkey and started a business built on empowering women to take back the reins of their own lives. During that time, she became sober, repaired her relationship with her son and worked to decenter men in her life (she got married again in her 40s but has been divorced twice). So, really, her facelift was a "celebration of all this work I've done inside," she explains, not a vanity project.
"I loved [what I saw] in the mirror. I've always been an attractive woman, and I really enjoyed how my face was aging. But I knew that I needed to give my appearance some longevity here because I'm going to be working for the next 10, 20 years," she says. "I really like who I am, and it's taken me so long to get here. This facelift is like this little stake in the ground."
Credit: Dr. Berat Cigdem
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On Dec. 23, 2025 — four months out from her 55th birthday in April — Monroe went in for a deep plane facelift and neck lift performed by plastic surgeon Dr. Berat Cigdem in Turkey. Her procedure also involved an upper brow and temporal lift, a revision to her previous upper blepharoplasty and a lower blepharoplasty to address her under-eye area.
It's not like Monroe was new to making a drastic change to her appearance. In her 30s, she had a "spate of plastic surgery," including two boob jobs. "I call my 30s my rock-and-roll years. I was high on drugs. I was drinking all the time. I didn't even bat an eyelid at the surgery," she says. However, no matter how much experience she's had and all the research she's done, going into the operating room this time around felt like a "bigger deal" and more "intense." She explains, "My face is the brand, and I have a big online presence, so it was a big deal."
The "numbness" and the "tightness" are what shocked her the most about coming out of the six-hour surgery. "The assault it has on your body, it's a huge trauma," she says of the recovery. The emotions have been a "rollercoaster."
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"When I was looking in the mirror, I was like, I don't look any better, I look disfigured…I think it f—s with your head," she explains. Catching her new reflection is still taking some getting used to two months out from her surgery, but she's trusting the process.
Earlier this month, she updated Instagram on the progress of her healing, 10 weeks post-op. "It gets better every single day, very slow progress," she said, adding that she's "pleased" with her results.
When asked how she'll feel when she looks back on this journey in 12 months, Monroe answers by saying she's focused on the present, working towards the best version of herself each day. She's learned to "just carry on with life" no matter the circumstance.
Even though this procedure tested her resilience, she still has plans to undergo another cosmetic procedure — removing her implants. "We're going to have that done, and it'll happen in good time."
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