Kim Zolciak Biermann Admits to ‘Paying for a Stomach’ While Comforting Self-Conscious Daughter Ariana

Kim Zolciak Biermann is opening up about her own plastic surgery journey while trying to help her teenage daughter with self-acceptance.

On Sunday’s season premiere of Don’t Be Tardy, the Real Housewives of Atlanta alum got real when daughter Ariana, then 16, was struggling with her body image while selecting a prom dress.

The teen admitted to trying to up her style game more recently, explaining to sister Brielle, “I went through puberty. I think I realize that I just feel prettier with makeup on than when I dress up. Rather than just wearing basketball shorts. … I don’t know why I ever wore those. I just like the lashes and my hair done. I’m just a girl. I just want to be me — the prettiest girl that has ever been me.”

Coming into her own brought with it all sorts of new insecurities about her body that bubbled to the surface when Ariana was searching for a prom dress.

“My ideal prom dress is to just have something that shows off more of my waist, because that’s about the only tiny thing I have on me,” Ariana told the cameras. “It’s horrifying.”

Trying on dresses brought things to a head for the teen, who broke down over her body’s shape as she modeled the gowns.

“I look like a teapot,” she cried, telling her cajoling mother, “This is [a size 8 dress]! Your stomach is like, a size 4.”

Kim responded in attempt to comfort her daughter, “Yeah, because I paid for a stomach!”

“You’re beautiful,” she continued. “I love you, you’re beautiful the way you are. You have to accept yourself.”

“I definitely think that Ariana’s gotten a little more self-conscious about her appearance. She’s 16. Nothing looks right, nothing fits right,” Kim explained to the cameras. “Oh my god, it breaks my heart. But this is my time to encourage her. You know, believe in yourself. You’re beautiful. Embrace it.”

Ariana insisted that she didn’t look “skinny” in the dress her family said they liked best, prompting Kim to try the dress on herself, revealing that she couldn’t fit in the gown her daughter was rocking.

“My tits are five times your size,” she told her. “I cannot zip it. So you think you’re so fat? Wrong.”

The little pep talk appeared to have helped Ariana, who told the camera, “I feel better about myself now that my mom can’t fit into it because I feel like she’s so tiny and if she can’t fit into it, then maybe we’re not so different in size.”

Going with a rose-patterned high-low ballgown, she explained of her decision, “Knowing that I can eat anything that I want and my food baby won’t be showing is what really helped me make my decision.”

Watching her daughter head to prom was emotional for Kim, who confessed to the camera, “She’s always been the light of my life, even through the hardest times. I love that she’s really happy and I’m extremely proud of her.”

Don’t Be Tardy airs Sundays at 9 p.m. ET on Bravo.

Photo credit: Instagram/Kim Zolciak Biermann