Watch: Trixie Mattel Strips Off the Drag, Announces Hiatus & Offers Insights into Health

Trixie Mattel opened up "intimately and honestly" on her youTube channel about her health, her unprecedented three-month vacation, and why she needs a hiatus from drag.

Appearing out of drag on her YouTube channel – probably for the first time ever, she said – Mattel prefaced her comments with promises that new content would continue to go up with an array of guest hosts, as well as some pre-taped shows in which she would appear.

Then Mattel got down to the nitty gritty.

"I can tell you without being too specific last year was the most difficult time of my entire life," the "Drag Race" icon disclosed, sitting in front of a collection of photos culled from different appearances. The montage served as an illustration for Mattel's admission of having worked too hard for too long, with the result that she "work[ed her]self into an autoimmune disorder" and reached a place of exhaustion where she "literally started to feel like a Trixie impersonator."

The drag superstar took note of her success and explained how it was a double-edged sword.

"All my wildest dreams came true when I was in my mid-20s, doing 'Drag Race,' travelling the world and making music and all that," the drag star said. "It was the paychecks I always wanted, doing my dream job, and I just, over time, squeezed out my real life so fiercely, where all I was doing, was this."

That meant her off-stage self was left to starve for rest and fulfillment.

"You know when straight guys are all muscular at the top and have twig little legs at the gym? That was my work-life balance," Mattel disclosed, going on to say that her "social life, family life, personal life" had atrophied into "twigs. Frail twigs. And the bigger the work things got, the smaller my real life things got."

Then came a watershed moment. While not explaining exactly what happened, Mattel noted that she went through "things" in the last year "that just beat it out of me.

"It really put me in my place as a person, and taught me new lows of the human experience," Mattel said, before going on to add: "Being a hard worker is fierce. Being a hard worker at the expense of your real life and health, is not fierce."

The heart-to-heart with her YouTube viewers came after Mattel announced last month that she would be stepping back from drag for a time.

"I can't really do it anymore," Mattel told Elle in an interview, after giving a rundown of her career, which, she noted, she had built "brick by brick."

The drag star's presence is seemingly ubiquitous, and she addressed this, telling Elle, "The Trixie we know, the Trixie that is on every YouTube video, on every show, and every TV show, I just can't sustain that anymore."

Mattel had a picture for what might take the place of her years-long full-tilt career. "I want a family, and I want a life, and I haven't really had that," she explained. "I'll probably grow a beard."

"Besides, the other drag queens have been waiting for me to take my high heel off their throats for years," Mattel quipped. "They love it when I get a sick day."

But, she told Elle, after a planned pause of several months to refresh herself, she intended to get back to working as hard as ever.

Watch Mattel's YouTube address below.