Supermodel Anok Yai has shared a deeply personal health update, revealing that she has been diagnosed with a congenital lung defect that has quietly taken a serious toll on her body. In a candid post shared on Instagram on Friday, the 28-year-old explained that the condition had been “overworking my heart and slowly destroying my lungs.”
“For the past year I’ve been dealing with this silent battle,” Yai wrote, alongside videos showing moments from her hospital recovery. She said the diagnosis came as a shock, especially because she had been “asymptomatic for the majority of my life.”
The warning signs only became clear after she developed what she initially believed was a minor issue. A “lingering cough,” she explained, turned into something far more alarming. “[The cough] turned to chest pains, bouts of coughing up blood, then at times struggling to breathe,” she wrote.
Despite the seriousness of her symptoms, Yai said she tried to push through while continuing her demanding career. “I chose to work through this while trying to find the right doctor and the right time. I quickly realized there was never going to be a ‘right time’, my health would continue to worsen.”
The realization forced her to confront the limits of sheer determination. While she once believed she could “outwork or outrun” the problem, she came to understand that “the universe has a way of slowing you down and waking you up.”
That wake-up call led to surgery. “So, yesterday I had a successful robotic lung surgery thanks to Dr. Robert Cerfolio and his gracious and talented team, who I am forever indebted to for giving me more time,” she shared. Robotic thoracic surgery, according to the American Lung Association, is a minimally invasive procedure sometimes used in lung cancer cases and can remove diseased lung tissue and nearby lymph nodes.
Yai also credited Dr. Harmik Soukiasian and the team at Beverly Hills Concierge Health for identifying her condition, saying she was “forever grateful” for their care. She offered heartfelt thanks to the nurses at NYU Langone Health, where she was treated, as well as to her friends and family, “for being the first thing I saw when I woke up.”
Closing her message with optimism, Yai reassured followers: “For now, I’m healing … but I’ll be back. See ya.”
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