‘Mormon Wives’: What Plastic Surgery Has Jessi Had? She Responds to Backlash Over ‘New’ Face
What To Know
- Secret Lives of Mormon Wives fans have been criticizing Jessi Ngatikaura for her seemingly “new” face since the end of 2025.
- She opened up about the procedure she had done and why she’s still swollen weeks later.
- Ngatikaura has had various other plastic surgery procedures over the years, as well.
At the end of 2025, Jessi Ngatikaura shocked fans with her holiday photos, as her face looked quite different in the pictures she shared to her Instagram Story. At the time, the Secret Lives of Mormon Wives star noted that her face was still “swollen” and “bruised” from a procedure she’d had a few days earlier.
In mid-January, when Ngatikaura was three weeks post-op, she made sure to remind fans that she was still “swollen” from the surgery and that her current face is not the final result of the work she had done. She also went into detail about the procedure in an Instagram video.
Scroll down for everything we know about Ngatikaura’s plastic surgery.
Did Jessi Ngatikaura have a face lift?
No, the Hulu star did not have a facelift. At the time of the surgery, Ngatikaura’s doctor documented the lead-up to the procedure on his own Instagram Story, showing the process of how he marked up her face before she went under the knife. At the time, he clarified that she was not having a facelift.
“I want to be very clear since there’s some confusion. This is not a facelift,” he wrote after his post was inundated with comments and questions. “Markings are used for many conservative and preventative treatments including eyelids, fat transfer, and laser procedures. Jessi did not need surgery. Her natural beauty is obvious.”
He continued, “My approach is preservation and subtle enhancement of what someone already has…not changing who they are! That is not what we do!”
What did Jessi Ngatikaura have done to her face?
In her January 15 Instagram video, Ngatikaura revealed exactly what she had done to her face. The less invasive procedure was an “upper and lower [lid] lift,” which she said was actually “pretty common.”
“My top lid, I was just having a little bit of creasing,” Ngatikaura explained. “When I would put my eyeshadow on it would kind of tug on my eyelids and get stuck a little bit. You guys know I got a skin pinch in my lower lid a little bit ago, and [this] was essentially a little bit more than the skin pinch. The skin pinch was a little more subtle than I was wanting, and since I had lost weight, I just had so much extra skin under my eyes. So that surgery was just kind of to make me look a little more bright and awake.”
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However, the reason her face swelled up so much is because she had “some fat grafting” done. “Facial fat grafting is basically kind of like a better option or replacement for filler,” Ngatikaura shared. “I dissolved all of my facial filler, like, a year and a half ago. I’m so happy I did.”
Ngatikaura pointed out that she also lost about 15 t0 20 pounds during the dissolving process, which “kind of sunk me and made me hollow in certain areas” of the face. “My doctor recommended the fat grafting to produce collagen in those areas and fill in a little better there,” she continued. “Especially in the under eye area, after doing the lower lift, they recommend doing the fat grafting so you don’t look so hollow there as well.”
The fat was taken from Ngatikaura’s outer thighs and then injected into her face. It will be “three to six months” before things fully settle in, she confirmed.
What other plastic surgery has Jessi Ngatikaura had?
In March 2025, Ngatikaura had a “little nose tuck,” which she said has made her “so much more confident” about her face. The exact procedure is called a Wier excision, which reduces the width of the nostrils.
She’s also undergone CO2 laser resurfacing to rejuvenate the skin on her face and got veneers to improve her teeth. In February 2024, Ngatikaura had a labiaplasty and breast implant revision, as well. Prior to the revision, she’d had four boob jobs, she confirmed to Marie Claire.
Ngatikaura opted to have the labiaplasty because she felt uncomfortable in tight pants and workout clothes after having her kids. “The first four to five days were the most intense with swelling, but after about a week I thought my vagina looked pretty normal,” she shared. “By two weeks, I thought it looked great. But I would say it took a good three to four months for me to feel like it was where it needed to be, which is totally normal.”
Ngatikaura said her most recent procedure is the “last surgery [she] has planned” until she “needs a facelift” when she’s in her 50s.
The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives, Season 4, TBA, 2026, Hulu
