'Drag Race' Star Adore Delano Comes Out as Transgender in 'Euphoric' Video
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Adore Delano has come out as transgender and to that I give a heart-felt "party." The RuPaul's Drag Race, American Idol and Ex on the Beach alum announced that she had begun the transitioning process and would be using she/her pronouns in an emotional Instagram video she posted on Wednesday, July 26.
"I am transgender," Delano stated definitively at the end of the 10-minute-long message. "My pronouns are moving from me not wanting to like offend anybody and be like 'You know what, you can call me whatever you want.' No. I'm taking the g-----n chariot right now, and I'm going by she/her."
The noted Libra told fans that she'd been transitioning for several months, but had wanted to start the journey privately before sharing it with the world. And while her official transition started earlier this year, Delano noted that her gender dysphoria had started as a child.
"I didn't know what this body was that god gave me," she said, "I thought that I would just make the best of it. I thought that I would just work with what God gave me and be okay with it for a decade, but it was just not enough for my mental stability."
One impetus for her transitioning now is her recent sobriety. "The feelings of just being an absolute other gender that I did not see physically in the mirror becomes more prominent when you're sober," she said. Previously she "would just drink it away," but she's been sober for over two years, avoiding drugs and alcohol, including weed. "I'm dealing with my feelings, and I'm allowing them to be," she said.
Fans know Delano from her appearance first on Season 7 of American Idol where she made it to the Top 16 and then Season 6 of RuPaul's Drag Race where she finished as the runner-up to Bianca del Rio. Delano later returned for RuPaul's Drag Race All Stars Season 2, but pulled herself from the competition after realizing competing was not good for her mental health. In 2019, she returned to TV screens on MTV's Ex on the Beach Season 4.
Delano addressed her reality TV stardom in the coming out video, sharing that she'd come out as a version of transgender as a child although she didn't know the words for it. Then when it came to American Idol, "I suppressed everything. I threw it away. I burned it.
"I reinvented myself into something that was so uncomfortable," she said. "It was almost like a sacrifice in order to get what I wanted career-wise, and it made sense to me at the time as a 16-year-old. I tried to live it, but it just did not code well with my spirit."
Delano is now in therapy and has been taking estrogen for three months. "I love life again," she said. She's preparing for surgery in November, and is "going to be moving into the euphoric parts of the book."
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Delano is the latest in a series of Drag Race alum who have come out as transgender including her Season 6 sister Laganja Estranja, Eureka O'Hara, Gigi Goode, Willow Pill, Jasmine Kennedie and Bosco, among others. In recent years, Drag Race has consistently showcased transgender talent, including the most recent winner Sasha Colby, highlighting the importance of being able to live as your authentic self.
Getting emotional in her video, Delano says, "We only have body...but on this earth and this life time that I'm given right now, I'm going to make the best of it, and I'm going to squeeze the most juice out of this as I can and become the most beautiful butterfly."
Delano's coming out video is yet another powerful message to the world that transgender people exist at all ages and should be celebrated. "I'm giving my teenage self the permission to be my true self now," she says referencing the decades she suffered through gender dysphoria before coming out.
Now Adore Delano is on the "stairway to heaven," and we can't wait to see what comes next. Party!
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