Bhad Bhabie says she has cancer after being body-shamed online

Bhad Bhabie, real name Danielle Bregoli, became famous for a 2016 appearance with her mother on Dr Phil at 13. Photo / Getty Images
Danielle Bregoli, also known as Bhad Bhabie, 21, says she has cancer after being body-shamed about her apparent weight loss.
Bhad Bhabie, a 21-year-old internet personality who found fame telling Dr Phil’s audience to “catch me outside”, revealed on Instagram this week that she has cancer, after commenters speculated about her appearance.
The rapper, whose legal name is Danielle Bregoli, sounded off on her Instagram Story on Thursday in response to online criticism she received last month about her apparent weight loss, with commenters body-shaming her and critiquing her “empty” facial expression.
“I’m sorry my cancer medicine made me loose weight. I’m slowly gaining it back,” she wrote. “So stop running [with] the worst narratives.”
The rumour mill continued churning despite her statement, as the gossip blogger Perez Hilton suggested a conspiracy at work.
“I’m going to say it – there is also a possibility that she might have pulled a Lil Tay,” Hilton said on Instagram, referring to last year’s death hoax surrounding another young, brash internet persona. ” … I wouldn’t put it past her to do something like this for attention.”
That prompted Bregoli’s mother, Barbara, to respond.
“How dare you?” she said in a video posted to Instagram. “And I pray to God one of your children never get cancer. I’ve had it twice. How dare you say my daughter’s faking this?”
Bregoli didn’t provide any further details about her condition, and her representative didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. Citing her family, TMZ reported that she was being treated by a doctor for cancer.
Bregoli became famous for a 2016 appearance with her mother on Dr Phil at 13, when the defiant teen told audience members laughing at her to “Catch me outside, how about that?” in an accent some claimed was an appropriation of stereotypical black speech. (Bregoli claimed to get her accent from “the streets”.)
She later launched a rap career, becoming one of the youngest female rap artists to debut on the Billboard Hot 100 with These Heaux and charting with the songs Gucci Flip Flops and Hi Bich.
The rapper also made headlines for her public squabbles with other artists, including with former Disney star Skai Jackson in 2020 and with rapper Iggy Azalea, whose 2019 song Sally Walker was rumoured to be a Bregoli diss. Bregoli also started an OnlyFans account with her in bathing suits and lingerie shortly after turning 18, earning her millions of dollars, according to screenshots she’s posted.
In 2021, Bregoli made a video speaking out about the abuse she says she faced at Turn-About Ranch, the troubled-teen facility in Escalante, Utah, where Dr Phil sent her and other misbehaving youths featured on his talk show. Another woman later sued the talk show host and ViacomCBS, alleging she was sexually assaulted after they sent her to the ranch. The suit was later dismissed.
Earlier this year, Bregoli gave birth to her first child with her boyfriend Le Vaughn.
A post shared by Bhabie (@bhadbhabie)
Other celebrities have also experienced body-shaming while battling an appearance-altering health condition.
Ariana Grande addressed comments about her change in appearance on TikTok last year, advising viewers to “be gentler and less comfortable commenting on people’s bodies, no matter what”, and saying “the body that you’ve been comparing my current body to was the unhealthiest version of my body”.
Selena Gomez, who has lupus, said last year that her medication to treat the autoimmune disease was responsible for her fluctuating weight. In 2015, she captioned one of her social media posts “I love being happy with me yall” and “#theresmoretolove” after tabloids took note of her weight gain.
Chadwick Boseman died in 2020 after a private, four-year battle with colon cancer – and public comments online about his thinner frame.