Following recent accusations that she is lying about or exaggerating a myriad of health conditions, Jameela Jamil has published a thorough statement on Instagram, saying that she has never lied to the media. “I’ve been in this business 11 years and am a smart woman,” she wrote on Sunday. “I wouldn’t lie in print or on camera knowing how permanent the internet is. Especially knowing how much our media loves to portray women as liars and hysterics.”
She ended her post with a message for individuals struggling with similar health conditions. “Big love for the messages of support and similar stories of gaslighting you’ve all faced,” she said. “But we are in this shit together.”
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The internet was divided last week when a viral Instagram Story accused Jamil of having Munchausen syndrome, specifically based on purported inconsistencies in her stories of cancer diagnoses, car crashes, and Ehler-Danlos syndrome. While some people bought into the Insta Story, others lashed out at the theorists for buying into stereotypes that women living with chronic illnesses exaggerate or make up their pain. Jamil’s boyfriend, the musician James Blake, also defended her on Twitter.
“I always own up to any mistake I make. I never hide from it. I publicly learn from my mistakes with other people joining me, so we can grow as a community,” Jamil wrote on Instagram. “I’ll be damned if some lies and conspiracy theories are going to get in my way.”
Jamil herself wrote a series of Tweets about her conditions, before concluding that “this bullshit has raised a really important conversation about how we gaslight people whose illnesses aren’t visible.” In an earlier tweet, she called the poster “an unhinged idiot who didn’t even realize in all her 'research' that my car accident injury stories are 'different' because they were about TWO SEPARATE CAR ACCIDENTS 13 years apart?”
The drama began unfolding while Jamil was on a Twitter hiatus after another controversy. When she was hired to judge the upcoming HBO Max show Legendary, she was called out for taking a role that should have gone to an LGBTQ+ person of color — specifically, someone familiar with ballroom culture. Jamil took the opportunity to come out as queer for the first time before letting followers know she would be taking another break from the platform.
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Though she is now back on Twitter, Jamil’s account has been switched to private.
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