A body-positivity influencer says she felt canceled after choosing to change her own body

15 October 2025

Clara Dao built her online presence around uplifting messages for women with small or flat chests she shared how she had struggled with body image, faced judgment, and learned to embrace herself in a world that favors certain ideals. Over several years she earned a devoted following whose loyalty seemed rooted in a promise that she would always speak to those left out by mainstream standards. Yet this year she made a decision that would test the limits of her platform: she chose to undergo breast augmentation, and when she revealed it publicly, the backlash was swift and painful.

Dao knew exactly what she was risking. She says she had reached a point where creatively she felt constrained, boxed into one kind of content. She wanted to grow beyond the “flat chest storyteller” label that her audience had come to associate with her. She anticipated that the change would rattle fans; she even admits she thought she might be “canceled.” Still, the decision felt deeply personal. She says it was a spontaneous act in part, a response to desire rather than external pressure.

When she announced her surgery, the numbers started to tumble. In weeks she estimates she lost about 200,000 YouTube subscribers and another 100,000 followers on TikTok. She saw some negative commentary accusing her of hypocrisy that she was turning her back on the very identity that had drawn so many people in. The criticism, she says, stung especially because much of it came from women who felt betrayed.

At the same time she was coping with private pain. She says that as the backlash mounted, she experienced a breakup. She had already made the surgery decision before sharing it with her partner. He stood by her, but when public reaction began to touch their joint creative projects and personal relationship, the pressure proved heavy. She pulled back some content they made together. Dao describes a time of turmoil: uncertainty, second-guessing, and emotional strain.

Yet she frames the process also as transformation. She calls the journey “chaotic and painful at times, but ultimately transformative.” She says she still loves her body as it was and she loves it now more. She rejects simplistic judgments that reducing the size of her audience means failure. She sees it as a necessary moment of self-definition, a pivot from identity as product to identity as evolving person.

Remarkably, despite so many unfollows, her business and brand didn’t collapse under the weight of controversy. She says most of her partnerships remained in place, only one deal fell apart, and new opportunities continued to arise. She acutely felt the tension between being a public figure whose success depends on audience favor and being someone who must live her truth, even if that truth breaks a pattern.

Dao also reflects on how the way she revealed her surgery may have intensified the reaction. She used phrasing like “for fun” to describe why she wanted it, and she suspects that description triggered stronger criticism than a more measured narrative would have.

Her story raises a question that few public creators face so openly: how much are we permitted to grow before our audience feels betrayed? When a content creator is invested in a message, does altering the story feel like abandoning an audience or carving space for honesty? Dao does not see her evolution as betrayal. She says she wants to push the boundaries of what it means to show up in this space, to allow complexity and change.

For now she is charting her own course. She says she wants to expand her message beyond just one body type or one story. She wants to challenge notions of authenticity on the internet, to explore how truth shifts over time. She acknowledges the cost. She also insists the cost is necessary.

Dao’s experience shows how deeply personal bodies are to both creators and audiences. The body is a site of identity, of belonging, of conflict. For someone whose platform was built on the courage to say we all deserve acceptance, choosing to change her own body felt like stepping onto new ground. She is discovering whether the foundation she built can sustain a more expansive version of herself.