'RuPaul's Drag Race' Star Willow Pill Opens Up About Trans Identity & Chronic Illness

justjared.com:

Willow Pill is opening up. The 27-year-old RuPaul’s Drag Race star, who is currently on Season 14 of the hit series, got candid in an Instagram post about their gender identity, as well as their continued battle with the chronic illness cystinosis, as they’ve discussed on the show. Click inside to read more… “I want to address some of the things I said in Untucked last week when I talked about my gender identity,” Willow said, referring to the Drag Race behind-the-scenes series. “It’s taken me a long time to come to terms with my transness because so much space has been taken up by my illness.

My condition has caused me so much physical and emotional pain that my body became something I always wanted out of. Eventually, hating my body for failing me and hating myself for not being a girl was so constant and intertwined that it felt totally normal.

I know it’s not my fault, just the way I’ve learned to survive,” they continued. “During quarantine I started to explore my feelings about my illness and unpacked a lot of medical PTSD and self-hatred.

But only in the last year have I really started to realize that I’m not happy with my gender identity either. Much of that is due to being on drag race and feeling euphoria being Willow for the first time since quarantine and being around a bunch of queer and trans friends on set.