Billie Eilish Opens Up About Tourette's Syndrome, Says She Gets "Very Offended" When People Laugh At her Tics
Billie Eilish has opened up about what it's like living with Tourette's syndrome.
The Oscar-, Grammy-winning singer, 20, was diagnosed with the neurological condition — which causes involuntary movements, twitches and sounds — when she was just 11 after experiencing "small" tics as a child and although she doesn't "like" it, she's grown to view her affliction as a "part of" her.
Speaking to David Letterman on his Netflix show My Next Guest Needs To Introduction, she shared: "It’s not like I like it, but I feel like it’s part of me. I have made friends with it. And so now, I’m pretty confident in it. When I’m moving around, I’m not ticcing at all. When I’m riding my horse, I’m not ticcing. When I’m moving and thinking and focusing, when I’m singing [I’m not ticcing]."
But the 'No Time to Die' hitmaker admitted she gets "incredibly offended" when people laugh at her tics or think she's making the movements on purpose.
She said: "It’s really weird. I haven’t talked about it like at all. The most common way that people react is they laugh because they think I’m trying to be funny. They think I’m going like [imitates one of her tics] as, like, a funny move.
"So they go like ‘Ha!’ and I am always left incredibly offended by that or they [turn their head behind them] and go ‘What?’ And then I go, ‘I have Tourette’s’."
Eilish also shared how she was fascinated to learn from other musicians with the condition.
She said: "What’s funny is so many people have it that you would never know. A couple of artists came forward and said, ‘I’ve actually always had Tourette’s,’ and I’m not going to out them because they don’t want to talk about it, but that was actually really interesting to me. I was like ‘You do?! What?’ "
Eilish finds her tics "very exhausting" but admitted people rarely notice them when they are in conversation with her.
She said: "I actually really love answering questions about it because it’s very, very interesting and I am incredibly confused by it and I don’t get it.
"I never don’t tic at all, because the main tics that I do constantly all day long are like, I wiggle my ear back and forth, and raise my eyebrow, and click my jaw and do that, and like flex my arm here, and flex this arm, and flex these muscles.
"These are things you would never notice if you’re just having a conversation with me. But for me, they’re very exhausting."
My Next Guest Needs No Introduction is now streaming on Netflix. — BANG SHOWBIZ
