Many of Yaniv’s health dramas are as false as his claims about having exotic genitalia (see Release 1). But sifting the lies reveals the occasional truth: He does have medical problems and things he does every day makes them worse. That irresponsible conduct may keep him from getting the “cute teen pussy” he hopes surgeons can install in his crotch (Release 2).
As before, in this release I’m relying on material published by the Meow Mix and the indexes to Yaniv’s comments available on the Kiwi Farms as PDFs at the bottom of this post. An important reminder: I have no medical background and what follows is merely my opinion.
This one’s long, but there is some interesting shit ahead.
Does Yaniv have genuine health problems?
TL;DR Yaniv has obesity-fueled Type 2 diabetes, congenital neurological problems, and possibly a back injury. But he’s let the curtain fall on his dramas about cancer, a seizure disorder that can’t be controlled, and bouts of paralysis requiring him to use a mobility scooter.
In my opinion, Yaniv translates emotional distress into medical emergencies. Whenever he’s upset by the consequences of his actions, he flees to doctors, something his mother seems to encourage.
During the July hearings on complaints Yaniv filed with the British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal, for instance, he claimed to have had two mini strokes in one morning. His mother stormed in and out of the hearing room raving about the need to pay $500 for an ambulance. Yaniv ended up sending the EMTs away and went to a hospital later in the day, eventually posting that the strokes were “something else,” and later says they were seizures and he has epilepsy (KF 7535, 7560, 8224).
Yaniv likes soliciting sympathy online, posting dire messages about his imminent demise but almost never clarifying what the emergencies were about.
This man who calls more ambulances than many people call Ubers has even called 911 when he was already in the hospital (KF 7805).
Nevertheless, he’s usually released from the hospital within hours of his arrival. If he can stay even overnight, he counts it as a win worthy of making a self-pitying video (KF 8457, Archive).
So what does he or doesn’t he have? Let’s shovel the bullshit out of the way first.
Cancer. Even when he’s been told he does not have a particular disease, he still uses it for online theater. There was, for instance, the great cancer scare of 2019.
In barrages of tweets and Facebook posts in spring and early summer, Yaniv made it seem like he was about to learn or had indeed learned that he had breast cancer, lung cancer, skin cancer, or brain cancer (see the “By Category” index on the Kiwi Farms for the play by play). Even after sounding the all clear on July 12 (KF 6246), he circled back, posting a picture of a hospital sign with a hint that he had breast cancer after all.
Months after his cancer drama petered out, he was still going for breast exams every two weeks, according to a one-time acquaintance called Katie (KF thread). Yaniv told Katie that his father died of lung cancer in 2013 because a doctor ignored early warning signs (Katie Speaks Out, Meow Mix). That may legitimately fuel Yaniv’s fear of cancer as might knowing that taking estrogen as he plans to do for the rest of his life will raise his chances of breast cancer. It’s also possible that he enjoys the breast exams as much as he does a good ball waxing. One thing is clear though, after all the testing, they’ve found no cancer to treat or Yaniv would be emoting long and loud all over social media about it.
Uncontrolled Seizures. Less easy to rule out, however, are his claims to having some kind of neurological disorder that causes him to fall and at times lose consciousness without warning, a disorder that in fact paralyzes his lower body. The “By Category” index on the Kiwi Farms will take you to many, many examples. Don’t miss the video he posted of himself collapsing on the floor of his condo: KF thread.
Much of this drama erupted as the cancer drama was fading away and accompanied the tribunal hearings he had not wanted to be held. He has repeatedly said that doctors have been unable to determine why he collapses, blacks out, or becomes temporarily paralyzed. Here it gets tricky: He may very well have a congenital (that is, since birth) neurological problem that could cause some of those symptoms. More about that below.
But in my layman’s opinion, he does not have the uncontrollable ailment he has claimed to have. Here’s why: For several months in 2019 after the seizure drama began, he never drove his mother’s car. She drove him or he used public transportation and cruised around on a mobility scooter. Then, in autumn, he was back behind the wheel, even posting videos of himself driving dealers’ demo cars as part of his “mystery shopper” gigs (the first of the “test drives,” KF 2417).
Like every other jurisdiction, British Columbia does not allow people with uncontrolled seizure disorders to drive. Doctors seeing such a patient have to report the condition to the authorities. To regain driving privileges, patients must provide a doctor’s statement saying their disorder is under control and they will not have seizures when they are driving. Since dealerships require customers to show valid driver’s licenses before letting them take cars off the lot, Yaniv has definitely regained his privileges. He’s no longer seen using his scooter or his walker, either, and spends many hours handing out samples in stores where seizures would become an issue. Perhaps he’s being given effective treatment – or perhaps it was all drama to begin with.
That said, I do believe Yaniv has a number of medical problems and some of them play into his phony ones.
Acanthosis Nigricans. His skin cancer scare, for example, probably began with what has since been diagnosed as acanthosis nigricans, which causes dark, velvety patches of skin to appear on the skin of people who are obese or diabetic (KF 1585, 2953). It can be a sign of a cancerous tumor in an internal organ, such as the stomach or liver, as well.
Diabetes. He clearly has Type 2 diabetes. He wears a diabetes alert bracelet, has had a Freestyle Libre glucose monitoring system disc implanted on his upper arm and has referred to using – even abusing – diabetes medication (KF 2245, 6843, 6848, 4840, 5063). In my opinion, it is Type 2 because no Type 1 could survive Yaniv’s obesity, his sugar gluttony, or his drinking.
Poorly controlled diabetes could contribute significantly to his dramas. Both hypo- and hyperglycemia destabilize mood (Healthline). They can cause fainting (hypo) or a compelling need to sleep (hyper) (Medical News Today 1), both of which he described to MandaPanda as frequent occurrences (Meow Mix, pp. 66, 96, 119, 121, 140, 175, 178). Diabetes is also likely to interfere with Yaniv’s trans plans: It makes sufferers’ surgical wounds heal more slowly and makes them more susceptible to urinary and yeast infections (Medical News Today 2). That he eats a lot of what diabetics should not eat, boozes to assuage his anxiety, and gets little to no exercise means his diabetes will only get worse.
Spinal Injury. Yaniv may have a genuine back injury, although his lawsuit ambitions make his claims seem shady. He made not quite intelligible comments to MandaPanda about his spine being injured at the L5/S1 lumbosacral joint, which is the point where the lower spine begins curving outward to transfer weight to the pelvis and legs (MandaPanda log, Meow Mix, pp. 47-48). That’s an unusually precise statement from Yaniv and is a condition that could be verified with xrays and MRIs. Lower body pain would be severe, and he might have foot drop.
How he got the injury isn’t clear. He told MandaPanda that it occurred when a physiotherapist’s massage table partially collapsed in June 2019 and was made worse “when Rebel media hit me with their car” in August. But he also said he was seeing the physiotherapist for the pain he was already having from an L5/S1 injury (KF thread). Such injuries do occur spontaneously, however, particularly in obese, out-of-shape people whose core muscles can’t support the spine properly (Caring Medical).
In any event, he’s suing the physiotherapist (KF thread). No word on whether he’s suing Rebel Media (KF 001, 007) Meanwhile, he says he is taking “heavy” pain medication while nevertheless regularly consuming alcohol (MandaPanda log, Meow Mix, pp. 173, 177).
Ataxia. Yaniv has said he has ataxia that intermittently paralyzes him from the waist down (but that still somehow allows him to drive). Ataxia is a condition, meaning it’s a collection of symptoms that could have various causes rather than being a disease in and of itself. The term describes a lack of muscle control or coordination of voluntary movements, such as walking or picking up objects (Mayo Clinic). “Persistent ataxia usually results from damage to the part of your brain that controls muscle coordination (cerebellum). Many conditions can cause ataxia, including alcohol abuse, certain medications, stroke, tumor, cerebral palsy, brain degeneration and multiple sclerosis. Inherited defective genes also can cause the condition.” Remember the bolded stuff here when we get down to the MRI image Yaniv shared of his brain.
Congenital Neurological Condition. Little clues about this have been piling up for more than a year on the Kiwi Farms, but Yaniv himself has recently declared this to be one of his problems (KF 2900):
He also recently shared an MRI image with MandaPanda that offers more clues (MandaPanda log, Meow Mix, pp. 176-178):
People with medical backgrounds warn that drawing conclusions from a single MRI image (which may even show a scan made at an odd angle) is poor practice, but they also note that the image appears to show a cerebellum that’s too small, ventricles that are too large, and what may be an arachnid cyst in the posterior fossa (see the “By Category” index on the Kiwi Farms, keyword fossa). That cyst may be the fabled brain tumor Yaniv talks about constantly and may be what he’s had to wait a year to consult with a neurosurgeon about (KF 7992).
An interesting bit of evidence that supports these observations came from one of Josh Moon’s tipsters over at the Kiwi Farms. The source, who seemed genuinely knowledgeable, told him that Yaniv has an issue with his filtering organs allowing excess fluid to collect in his skull (hydrocephalus) and requires a way to drain that fluid (7/3/19 stream around the 55-min. mark; KF 7225 refers to the tipster’s report but contains slight wording error). That would account for what appear in the MRI as unusually large ventricles. Seeming to confirm this is a comment Yaniv made in June about walking out of an emergency room in panic after seeing the words “brain,” “leaking,” and “stint” somewhere (KF 6405). One technique used to treat hydrocephalus is surgically implanting a shunt to allow the excess fluid to drain out of the skull and into the abdomen, relieving the pressure on the brain that the excess fluid causes.
If he has hydrocephalus, what might the symptoms be? Some that are very familiar: seizures, poor coordination, irritability, excessive sleepiness, memory loss (which Yaniv attributes to concussions from his many falls), cognitive delays or regression (Yaniv was in special ed programs as a child), and large head size.
The size of Yaniv’s head is notable, in fact, especially when compared with others around him.
Discussion of the MRI image at the Kiwi Farms among people with medical backgrounds produced an interesting possibility: that Yaniv has Dandy-Walker syndrome, a rare group of congenital human brain malformations that could explain a lot about Yaniv’s many maladies. From Wikipedia:
“There are three subtypes which affect multiple organs to varying degrees, but the fundamental abnormalities involve the cerebellum which controls muscle coordination. The adjacent third and fourth ventricles are often affected, which can alter the flow of cerebrospinal fluid, increase intracranial pressure and lead to multiple other brain function problems.
“The degree of disability varies but is typically lifelong. In the majority of individuals with Dandy–Walker malformation, signs and symptoms are present at birth or develop within the first year of life. Some children have a buildup of fluid in the brain (hydrocephalus) that may cause increased head size (macrocephaly). Up to half of affected individuals have intellectual disability that ranges from mild to severe, and those with normal intelligence may have learning disabilities. Children with Dandy–Walker malformation often have delayed development, particularly a delay in fine and/or gross motor skills such as standing, walking, and holding or manipulating objects. People with Dandy–Walker malformation may experience muscle stiffness and partial paralysis of the lower limbs (spastic paraplegia), and they may also have seizures. While rare, hearing and vision problems can be features of this condition.”
Fits Yaniv’s complaints pretty well, doesn’t it? And hearing problems? On November 4, Yaniv messaged Katie that his neurologist’s office called to say that his loss of hearing had been attributed to the wrong diagnosis (KF slide, thread). To MandaPanda, he said, “Please talk to me I just got the worst news ever about my health” (Meow Mix, p. 153). That was the first public comment he appears to have made about hearing loss.
His mother, though, is hearing impaired and once attributed it to mitochondrial disease, a variety of hereditary genetic mutations in the mitochondrial DNA that can lead to seizures, hearing loss, heart problems, and respiratory failure (Saanich News, see her comment at the bottom of the article).
So while Yaniv’s constant lying leaves many people convinced that his only health problems stem from gluttony and laziness, Yaniv may actually have been genetically doomed from the womb to some of the problems he dramatizes. In particular, his comments about having a brain tumor and facing brain surgery seem to have some basis in reality, though he distorts that reality.
Do Yaniv’s ailments excuse his predatory and manipulative behavior? No, not at all. In the fourth and final release in this series, a’shrinking we will go into what is known about his psychological problems.
If you want to hear more about the insane world of Jessica Yaniv a.k.a Jessica Simpson look no further.
