Amber Tamblyn Shares She Underwent Ear-Pinning Surgery at Age 12

Amber Tamblyn is sharing her truth.

The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants actress shared for the first time that she got her ears pinned back when she was 12 years old, and why it's a decision she still wrestles with to this day.

"As a little girl, I had ears that stuck out like butterfly wings," Tamblyn wrote in an opinion piece for The New York Times published Oct. 20. "Some kids at my school in Los Angeles would make fun of them, and I'd often stare at myself in the mirror wishing my ears would lay flat against my head."

The 41-year-old wrote that getting her big break in Hollywood—getting cast to play Emily Quartermaine on General Hospital in 1995 at the age of 12—prompted her to act on her insecurity.

"I opted to undergo ear-pinning surgery, a decision I've never made public until now," Tamblyn wrote. "For years, my parents watched my struggle with private shame, though they understood I was a tough kid who could handle it. But once I knew millions of people all over the world would be judging me on their television screens, not just on a playground, that knowledge changed everything for me."

The actress—whose parents are West Side Story star Russ Tamblyn and Bonnie Tamblyn—described herself as "a fiery young feminist who raged against the patriarchy" who also felt like "a hypocrite who gave into it" by deciding to undergo elective surgery.

"How could anyone not? Going under the knife felt like choosing a weapon I could wield in self-defense against my own disposability," she reflected. "It showed the world that I understood the assignment of assimilation—that I could do whatever it took to fit in, never stand out, the way my ears once did."

The Joan of Arcadia star nodded to the new film The Substance—in which Demi Moore's character, a 50-year-old actress, elects to take an experimental drug that allows her to live in a younger body and feel desirable by Hollywood again—as reflective of her own conflicted feelings having been part of the industry since she was a child.

"Over three decades, my responsibility not just to my craft of performing but to the performance of youthfulness was reinforced constantly," Tamblyn wrote. "Would I be less happy if I had fought against the desire to get my ears pinned back, if they still stuck out today?"

She continued, "I don't know—but I do think about it often, and about my willingness to align myself with the industry's expectations."

Tamblyn made sure to say that she's "not saying that plastic surgery is bad or that everyone who elects to change their bodies regrets their decision," but also noted that she thinks The Substance "is a warning to all of us about what we might be willing to destroy in the name of desirability."

Ultimately, the longtime Hollywood star said that she's "quite content" with the path her career has taken, but that doesn't completely erase her complicated journey with self-acceptance in an industry that has sent her mixed messages.

"I'm also not immune to wanting to feel beautiful and desired, and indulging in that need," Tamblyn wrote. "I don't apologize for what I've done, or for what I haven't."

She continued, "My relationship to my body has changed, healed even, as I've become more protective, compassionate and honest."

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