MrBeast has opened up about a health condition that affects his day-to-day life on a new episode of Steven Bartlett’s Diary of a CEO podcast show. Since being diagnosed with the disease when he was a teenager, he has learnt how to manage it – including avoiding certain foods that can cause him to experience a flare-up.
However, the condition hasn’t stopped him from becoming a household name. He is currently YouTube’s biggest star and the platform’s most subscribed channel, with 364 million subscribers as of February 2025.
MrBeast, whose real name is Jimmy Donaldson, has gained fame on YouTube for his massive challenges, eye-catching stunts, and generous donations. He frequently organises intricate competitions – such as the reality TV competition show Beast Games – and gives away substantial sums of money.
Besides having the most subscribers on any YouTube channel, he is also the third-most-followed creator on TikTok. As it stands, he has more than 114.5 million followers.
At the start of the interview with Steven, the 26-year-old recalled his life growing up as an ‘unhealthy’ kid. He said: “It was a lot because [my mum] was a single mum raising us, she’s working all the time.”
Speaking about his diagnosis, he added: “I have Crohn’s disease, so I was very sick growing up. My brother also had issues as well and so, you know, we’re not the healthiest kids in our teenage years. She was just trying to get by and take care of us.”
Crohn’s disease is a chronic condition that causes inflammation in various parts of the digestive tract. It falls under the category of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). This condition can impact individuals of any age, with symptoms often beginning in childhood or early adulthood.
When Jimmy turned 15 he dropped from 190 pounds to 139 pounds and “lost all muscle”. Because of the drastic change, triggered by Crohn’s disease, he ditched playing baseball in college and focused on YouTube.
Mentioning the impact Crohn’s disease can have on somebody’s life, Steven said: “A lot of people don’t know what Crohn’s disease is and the impact it has. I had a team member that had it so in order to help support them, at certain times they had to leave and I got a little bit more aware of what it means and how it impacts you.”
He then asked Jimmy: “Could you give me your perspective on that?” The YouTuber replied: “Yeah, so Crohn’s disease is when your immune system attacks itself. When I was 15 I just started going to the bathroom eight, nine, ten times a day, not digesting any food because my GI track is like literally just attacking itself.
“It’s very weird. Your immune system in your gut thinks your gut is a foreign Invader, so it just starts attacking itself, which, if you’re just using the bathroom 10 times a day, not digesting food, it’s why you drop weight rapidly. And it hurts like crazy because it gets very inflamed and it feels like someone’s stabbing you in the gut constantly when it’s really bad which is what I had.
“So I lost 50 pounds, which is crazy because I was already relatively lanky.” Opening up about the treatment he received, Jimmy added: “We were just trying different medicines and then eventually I’m on a pretty extreme medicine called Remicade where basically you nuke your immune system which is why my voice sounds a little off right now because I just got the flu.”
He continued: “I got covid six times, I got shingles – I get sick all the time because to have my GI track stop attacking itself we basically have to shut down my immune system, so I have a really weak immune system… It can randomly flare up sometimes and just makes you very sick very tired.
“I just just live life on hard mode to be honest… You still wake up some days where you don’t have energy, which is really hard to believe for someone who’s so productive.”
He went on to reveal he had recently spent four days in a hospital in South Africa because he got the flu and “it just takes me a lot longer to recover from certain things”. He went on to admit that if he didn’t work so much, he would spend more time researching Crohn’s “because surely there’s a better way to stop it than just destroying my immune system”.
MrBeast’s strict diet
Jimmy discovered which foods triggered his flare-ups by following an elimination diet over the years. This process involves beginning with a restricted diet and slowly reintroducing various foods to identify the ones that lead to flare-ups.
In 2022, Jimmy said: “There’s a lot of things that aggravate it. Like, chips, cookies, or things that have corn. I know what to eat now, where, like, my diet isn’t causing it, but sometimes, it just flares up. It’s weird.”
In 2015, Jimmy uploaded a video titled: “What Is Crohns Disease?????”, where he explains what his diet looks like. He said: “Whenever I eat certain foods, it agitates it and if it gets agitated, I have like enormous stomach pain that’s really unbearable.
“There are a lot of little problems Crohn’s causes. You’re fatigued and really low on energy a lot of times. But the biggest thing obviously is the diet. You have to eat certain foods every single week of every single year. It gets really repetitive, but you have to eat those certain foods, so your stomach doesn’t get all messed up and you’re not in constant pain 24/7.
“It’s a really small strict diet or at least mine is it’s different for everyone and that makes it a little bit difficult to socialise and stuff like… I can’t eat cereal anymore… If I could, I would just eat a different type of cereal every morning. “That’d be so awesome instead of freakin eating chicken and rice or chicken and sweet potatoes.”
What is Crohn’s disease?
The NHS says: “Crohn’s disease is a lifelong condition where parts of the digestive system become inflamed. It’s one type of a condition called inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). Crohn’s disease affects people of all ages. The symptoms usually start in childhood or early adulthood.”
The main symptoms are:
- diarrhoea
- stomach aches and cramps
- blood in your poo
- tiredness (fatigue)
- weight loss
The symptoms may be constant or come and go every few weeks or months. When they come back, it’s called a flare-up. See a GP if you or your child have blood in your poo, diarrhoea for more than seven days, frequent stomach aches or cramps, lost weight for no reason, or your child’s not growing as fast as you’d expect.
A general practitioner will work to determine the source of your symptoms and might suggest tests to investigate the possibility of Crohn’s disease. While there isn’t a cure for Crohn’s disease, there are treatments available that can help manage or lessen your symptoms.
The main treatments are:
- medicines to reduce inflammation in the digestive system – usually steroid tablets
- medicines to stop the inflammation coming back – either tablets or injections
- surgery to remove a small part of the digestive system – sometimes this may be a better treatment option than medicines
You will typically have a team of healthcare professionals by your side, including a general practitioner, a specialist nurse, and various doctors. Managing Crohn’s disease can be challenging at times, as unexpected flare-ups and frequent appointments with your care team can interfere with your school, work, and social activities.
However, when your symptoms are effectively managed, you can lead a normal life despite the condition. If you need assistance, your care team and organisations such as Crohn’s and Colitis UK are there to support you.
According to the NHS, the exact cause of Crohn’s disease is unknown. There’s no evidence to suggest a particular diet causes Crohn’s disease. It’s thought several things could play a role, including: your genes – you’re more likely to get it if a close family member has it, a problem with the immune system (the body’s defence against infection) that causes it to attack the digestive system, smoking, a previous stomach bug and an abnormal balance of gut bacteria.