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Privacy NoticeStrictly Come Dancing star Chris McCausland has candidly spoken out about the struggles he faced in school due to his worsening eyesight. As the talented comic continues to charm Strictly audiences with his stunning moves on the dance floor despite his visual challenges, he notably moved the audience to tears last Saturday with an incredible salsa performance that earned him an impressive 30 points from the judges, safely securing his spot in the competition. Opening up to James O’Brien on the Full Disclosure podcast, the 47-year-old entertainer delved into his journey with retinitis pigmentosa, a degenerative eye condition that worsens over time. He reminisced about his early childhood where his vision loss didn’t seem to impact his friendships, yet as they all matured, attitudes shifted. Chris touched upon the lasting effects of childhood adversity and brought up one particularly poignant episode from his school days that has never left him. In one unforgettable experience, he recounted how a teacher had encouraged him to talk about something new in his life to the rest of his class, reports Birmingham Live. Chris recalled: “I still remember in one school assembly where we had to stand up and say something that we’d got that year and my teacher said, ‘Well you should say about your new glasses’, and she said, ‘But I think you should say spectacles’.”
Strictly Come Dancing’s Chris McCausland and Dianne Buswell
(Image: PA)
Remembering the harsh reaction from his classmates, Chris shared: “And I remember doing this thing and standing up in the class and saying, ‘This year I got some new spectacles’ and all the other kids laughed.” Reflecting on a painful memory from the past, he shared, “But they didn’t laugh with me, they laughed at me with what I’d said, and I remember being so upset about that. I was so distraught that all these kids had laughed at me about this thing, and it’s mad.” Opening up about his personal challenges, Chris also delved into the topic of his declining vision, explaining how the process was not abrupt but insidious. “From my point of view, losing your eyesight very, very gradually – it’s like the frog in the water – you don’t notice the changes, and when you join school when you’re four and your eyesight…there’s less you need to cope with when you’re four years old, you know what I mean? ” he revealed. Chris remembered feeling different at a young age because of his vision problems. “And so the kids around me probably don’t notice the slight differences happening that I don’t notice happening in terms of struggling to see the blackboard, but I do remember that being a thing,” he admitted. In a twist of fate, he pointed out the irony of his current profession compared to his childhood experiences: “The irony is, obviously, scarred as a child from a room full of people laughing at me, to now desiring a room full of people to laugh at me.”Story SavedYou can find this story in  My Bookmarks.Or by navigating to the user icon in the top right.Follow OK! MagazineFacebookTwitterMore OnStrictly Come Dancing
