Lewis Capaldi has been diagnosed with Tourette’s syndrome and is learning how to live with the twitches and the condition.
The Scottish singer, 25, says his decision to make his diagnosis public knowledge was due to the fact he doesn't want his fans thinking he is "taking cocaine or something", as he opens up about discovering he has the condition that causes a person to make involuntary sounds and movements called tics.
Lewis - who releases a new single on Friday - explains how he was relieved to find out he had the condition because he originally feared he might be suffering a degenerative disease, and says he can see signs he had Tourettes when looking back at old interviews.
The Hold Me While You Wait singer is being treated with Botox injections to freeze muscles to try to control the tics characteristic of Tourette’s, and reassures fans his shoulder twitches are " not as bad as it looks".
"I have been diagnosed with Tourette’s," Lewis says in an interview with The Sun. "I wanted to speak about it because I didn’t want people to think I was taking cocaine or something.
"My shoulder twitches when I am excited, happy, nervous or stressed. It is something I am living with.
"It is not as bad as it looks."
Lewis' debut album Divinely Uninspired To A Hellish Extent was in the Top 10 for a record 77 consecutive weeks following its release in 2019, and his first ever single Someone You Loved propelled the Scottish star to international fame the year prior to the album's release.
Lewis recently told fans during an Instagram Live chat how the diagnosis now 'makes so much sense', after re-watching some video interviews from the early days of career in 2018 where he can "can see that I’m doing it [tics]" when revisiting the old footage.
The singer - who releases new music for the first time in three years at the end of the week - describes Tourette's as "a new thing" and explains how he is learning new ways to cope with the condition all the time.
He describes some days as "more painful than others, sometimes it's quite uncomfortable", but it "comes and goes" and he can sometimes go months without experiencing it.
"I thought I had some horrible degenerative disease so I’ll take Tourette’s," he adds when opening up about his health, amid his comeback to the spotlight after some time away working on his second album.
According to the NHS, Tourette's syndrome usually starts during childhood, but the tics and other symptoms usually improve after several years and sometimes go away completely.
There's no cure for Tourette's syndrome, but treatment can help manage symptoms.
Over recent years, a number of high-profile figures and celebrities have revealed they have Tourette's syndrome, including singer Billie Eilish who was diagnosed with the condition at the age of 11.
Speaking about her symptoms with David Letterman earlier this year, the Bad Guy singer said: "I 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 flex my arm here and flex this arm, 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."
Do you have a story to sell? Get in touch with us at webcelebs@mirror.co.uk or call us direct at 0207 29 33033
