Nikkietutorials details insecurity she felt after coming out as transgender

Transgender YouTube star Nikkietutorials has opened up about the insecurities and self-confidence issues she battled in the months after she publicly came out. 

The 25-year-old Dutch social media star, whose real name is Nikkie de Jager, detailed her feelings of self doubt in a new video shared to celebrate the launch of her latest makeup product launch – a collaboration with British brand Beauty Bay. 

‘In those days and weeks, even months after coming out, everything I said made me insecure, it made me question myself, because everything I said became news,’ she explained, before joking: ‘Even if I farted, people would write about it.’

Nikkie came out to the world as transgender in a moving video posted in January. However the decision to share that news was not entirely her own; the YouTuber only chose to speak out after she was targeted by blackmailers who threatened to expose her unless she paid them off. 

At the time, Nikkie was close to launching her new product, but says she made the decision to delay its release over fears that people would accuse her of taking advantage of the publicity around her coming out, and perceive the whole thing as a ‘PR stunt’.  

‘This has been a long time coming because I have been working on this project ever since last year, and we made some really really big moves around my coming out,’ she explained in a video posted to her YouTube channel. 

‘When I came out, I got really panicked because I was like, “OK well we can’t launch now because people are going to think I’m using this as a PR stunt. People are going to misunderstand and see this as publicity.” And that is the last thing that I want for you guys to think of me.’

Speaking to DailyMail.com, Nikkie admitted that delaying the palette launch was ‘absolutely’ a difficult decision, but she said that the most important thing to her was that her fans – whom she calls her Glow Babies – knew that she was being entirely genuine. 

‘What I find most important is that my Glow Babies know that everything comes from a genuine place,’ she said. ‘Launching this product after my coming out didn’t feel like the right moment.’

However, Nikkie faced another devastating obstacle earlier this month when, having prepared to launch her new palette this week, she and her fiance Dylan Drossaers were robbed at gunpoint in their home in the Netherlands.  

While overcoming the trauma – which she has described as ‘one her biggest nightmares’ – the beauty guru faced the same fears about launching her palette in the wake of the widely-publicized incident. 

‘Two and a half weeks ago, Dylan and I got robbed, and I was filled with emotions,’ she said in her video.  

‘Again, I felt like life came at me and not only took away my confidence and my faith in life itself, but again it felt like this opportunity was taken away from me, because again, my biggest fear was that people would see this as a publicity stunt.’ 

Beauty Bay offered to delay the palette launch once again – however Nikkie said that ‘after about a week of thinking’, she decided to take control and proceed with the release, which she hopes will serve as a bright sign of positive things to come in the future. 

‘After about a week of thinking, I was like, you know what? No, I am not letting them take this away from me as well,’ she said in her video. ‘This is the one thing in my life that I have control over right now.’ 

She added to DailyMail.com: ‘I am a firm believer that everything happens for a reason, but I thank the universe that there is light at the end of the tunnel for now.’ 

As well as giving the influencer something positive to focus on in the light of the robbery, and the global pandemic, Nikkie also sees the palette as a form of ‘redemption’ – an opportunity to prove herself to critics after a previous eyeshadow collaboration with beauty brand Too Faced became shrouded in bitter controversy. 

The palette – which was the last eyeshadow collaboration that Nikkie had done – was launched in 2016, and it quickly came under fire from consumers, who slammed its poor quality, with the YouTube star revealing that the criticism ‘almost’ ruined her career. 

To add insult to injury, her fellow beauty entrepreneur and influencer Jeffree Star then revealed that the brand paid Nikkie just $50,000 for the collaboration, despite it raking in more than $8 million from the lucrative partnership. 

Speaking about the disastrous partnership in her video, Nikkie admitted that it left an incredibly bitter taste in her mouth, and saw her turn down multiple opportunities to work on another palette over fear of potential backlash.  

‘After quite some years, I have found trust in a brand again to create an eyeshadow palette,’ she said. 

‘Throughout the years a lot of brands have contacted my team and said, “We really want to create something eyeshadow-wise with Nikkie,” and the answer always was, “No thank you, read what’s online.”‘

She continued: ‘Let’s be honest, when this palette ordeal happened with the last brand, it almost cost me my career.’  

However, she explained to DailyMail.com, when Beauty Bay reached out to her last year, she felt reassured by the team, noting that she immediately felt it was a brand she could ‘trust’.

‘After a tumultuous past experience with my other eyeshadow palette I was initially afraid to step back into the eyeshadow world, but really quickly I felt like the Beauty Bay team was one that I could trust and build a strong relationship with,’ she said.

‘In the beauty industry it’s important to find people around you that you can trust, so that was the biggest first step. Communications were straight up and honest from the beginning.’

When it came to creating the palette, Nikkie drew on inspiration from her own life to put together a product that she felt would be the perfect representation of her and how far she has come. 

Even the names for each of the shades in the 20-hue palette were personally picked by the influencer, who chose words and monikers that held special meaning for her, including naming the central color – a bold red – after her late brother.         

‘I named Mikai after my little brother who passed away a few years ago,’ she explained. ‘Red was his favorite color and is placed in the heart of the palette.

‘More than ever I’m focusing on my friends and family to make sure I’m always there for them. After all, that’s what’s most important to me.’  

The exterior packaging also represents something significant in Nikkie’s life – her love of makeup and the sanctuary that YouTube and her tutorial videos have given her over the years.  

‘I always like to call my home Temple Tutorials – hence why there is an actual temple on the front of the palette,’ she said. ‘This is where I feel safe and where I can truly be me. I wanted to share this safe place so that everybody can feel safe and enjoy makeup like I do.’ 

Nikkie’s palette release comes almost two years after she came out to the world in an emotional video she posted on YouTube in which she not only revealed that she was transgender, but also shared that she was being blackmailed by someone threatening to expose her past to the world.  

‘I’ve always wanted to share with you but under my own circumstances,’ Nikkie said at the beginning of the 17-minute video, adding: ‘and it looks like that chance has been taken away from me. So today, I am taking back my own and I have to tell you something.’  

Nikkie went on to state when she was younger she was ‘born in the wrong body’. 

‘I am transgender,’ she said to the camera. ‘Filming this video is scary, but its so liberating and freeing…I’m NikkieTutorials, and I am Nikkie. I am me. We don’t need labels.’    

‘I have been blackmailed by people who wanted to leak my story the press,’ she said, ‘and at first it was frightening…that there are people so evil that they can’t respect someone’s true identity. It is vile, it is gross.’ 

These people, who have since been identified by police, claimed they wanted to leak her story because they thought she was ‘lying’ to her followers. But the influencer was not going to let them threaten her life. 

‘Today is the day I am free, finally,’ she said, addressing her ‘glow babies’. 

During her appearance on The Ellen Show she elaborated, telling the TV host: ‘People were like, “We love you, we accept you,” and I was so happy that it is 2020 and the acceptance is real.’