Billie Eilish is happier than ever to answer questions about her often misunderstood experience with Tourette.
The Grammy and Oscar winner, 20, opened up to David Letterman during the Season 4 premiere of his Netflix show, ‘My Next Guest Needs No Introduction’, about the state of the system nervous, which often sees people exhibit sudden twitches or jerks, movements, or sounds.
“If you film me long enough, you’re going to see a lot of tics,” the “Happier Than Ever” singer said, noting that she doesn’t care that people know about that part of her life.
“It’s really weird. I didn’t talk about it at all. The most common way people react is to laugh, because they think I’m trying to be funny. Right?” Eilish said. “And I’m still incredibly offended by that. Or they say (turns around), ‘What?’ And then I say: ‘I have the Tourette’.
Eilish, who was diagnosed aged 11 following a childhood of ‘little’ tics, said she was ‘really happy’ to discuss Tourette ‘because it’s very, very interesting And I’m incredibly troubled by that.
While some of Eilish’s mannerisms left her for a while, she said that except for acting — or times when she’s “moving and thinking, concentrating,” like singing or horse riding — “I never twitch at all.”
In fact, she revealed that she has a host of tics that many would struggle to notice, although she engages in them “constantly all day”, including wiggling her ear or flexing certain muscles.
“These are things you would never notice if you were just having a conversation with me. But for me they are very exhausting,” Eilish said. “It’s not like I like it, but I feel like it’s… part of me. … I befriended him. And so now I’m pretty confident in that.
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