Nikita Dragun HOOKED UP With Her School BULLY

YouTube has influenced Nikita Dragun's beingness successful much ways than one.

One of the platforms' biggest quality influences—with implicit 3.55 million subscribers—Nikita's emergence to fame coincided with her coming retired journey, arsenic she came retired to fans arsenic transgender successful an affectional 2015 YouTube video.

But agelong earlier her societal media success, the self-proclaimed "mother of draguns" was a makeup-loving kid increasing up successful Springfield, Virginia. Opening up astir her coming retired travel connected E! News' integer bid DRIVE!, she exclusively told big Austin J. Mills, "I ever knew I was a small spot different."

"I was a small spot smaller than everyone, a small spot much feminine," she continued. "And being successful a tiny town, I truly didn't person that galore friends, truthful I turned to online to effort to marque thing of myself."

Nikita said that YouTube gave her the abstraction to beryllium her true, authentic self. "I conscionable wanted to unrecorded an online life," she told Austin. "And being online, nary 1 knew I was either a lad oregon a girl. They conscionable saw maine for me."

"I decided, 'Okay, if I grounds a YouTube video and I travel retired connected YouTube and I station it, past I'm conscionable gonna person to woody with it,'" said Nikita. "And it ended up going viral."

That video, titled "I Am TRANSGENDER," has implicit 3.2 cardinal views and remains 1 of her most-viewed videos to date.

"It was conscionable truthful shocking," Nikita said of the reactions she got, adding that it served arsenic her coming retired to respective household members, arsenic well.

"They're like, 'Wait, you're huh?'" she joked. "That was my mode of coming retired online."

Oct. 11 is National Coming Out Day. Catch up connected past episodes of DRIVE! now connected E! Online and E! News' YouTube page.