Celebrities who have spoken out about their disabilities that you may not realise they had
Celebrities you may not have realised had disabilities have previously spoken about them and the impact they've had on their day-to-day lives.
With social media and all the information we could possibly need just a click or a scroll away, you'd think that you'd know everything there was to know about your favourite celebs. Whether it's Jesy Nelson announcing she's pregnant with twins or news of Tom Holland and Zendaya's yet-to-be-confirmed engagement, celebrity news is not something in short supply.
However, something that is less talked about among these celebs are their struggles with different disabilities you may or may not know they had, and how they have dealt with it over the years.
Leonardo DiCaprio
Wolf of Wall Street star Leonardo DiCaprio suffers from OCD and has previously spoken out about how it impacts him. OCD may not be commonly considered a disability but under the Equality Act of 2010, OCD and other mental health issues are in fact considered disabilities 'if they have a long-term and substantially adverse effect on a person’s day-to-day activity.'
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On his experience with it, DiCaprio said: "My thing was not stepping on cracks, or not stepping on certain things.
"Sometimes it took me 10 minutes to get to the set because I'd be pacing back and forth, stepping on gum stains."
He went on to add that he 'fights the urge to walk through a doorway several times,' and has expressed that he does not want the condition to take over his life.
Millie Bobby Brown
Fans of the Stranger Things star Millie Bobby Brown may know this already but she is part of the deaf community, having hearing loss in one ear. Not being able to fully hear herself when she's performing, Brown opened up to Variety about being born with partial hearing loss in one ear, eventually having her hearing in that ear fade away altogether. She expressed how she used her other senses when it came to playing Eleven in the famed Netflix show: “You can talk with your face.
“It’s very easy for someone to say, ‘I’m mad. I’m sad. I’m angry.’ I have to just do it with my face.”
On not letting it get her down during her early years, she said: "I just started to sing, and if I sound bad, I don’t care, because I’m just doing what I love.
"You don’t have to be good at singing. You don’t have to be good at dancing or acting. If you like to do it, if you genuinely enjoy doing it, then do it. No one should stop you."
Tom Cruise
The ultimate stunt man - known for giving his fans a heart attack - Tom Cruise, once opened up about his struggles with dyslexia and how it motivated him to be the best he could be.
“When I was about 7 years old, I had been labeled dyslexic.
“My childhood was extremely lonely. I was dyslexic and lots of kids make fun of me. That experience made me tough inside, because you learn to quietly accept ridicule.
“I had to train myself to focus my attention. I became very visual and learned how to create mental images in order to comprehend what I read.
"I love what I do. I take great pride in what I do. And I can't do something halfway, three-quarters, nine-tenths. If I'm going to do something, I go all the way."
Daniel Radcliffe
Turns out we don't know everything there is to know about the boy who lived, as Radcliffe once shared that he has dyspraxia. Dyspraxia - or developmental co-ordination disorder - is described by the NHS as 'a condition affecting physical co-ordination' and begins in childhood. Radcliffe previously said that his is 'mild' but sometimes affects him to the point where he can't do simple tasks.
"I was having a hard time at school, in terms of being crap at everything, with no discernible talent.
"Why, oh why, has Velcro not taken off?" Radcliffe said, poking fun at the fact that sometimes tasks like tying his shoes or writing a note would cause him difficulty.
Johnny Depp
“I’ve never had proper vision.
“Everything is just very, very blurry.” Depp once said in a Rolling Stones interview in 2013, after admitting publicly for the first time that he suffers from visual impairment.
Depp, who has gone on to star in some of the biggest blockbusters, is actually blind in one eye and near sighted in the other. Since birth, Depp admitted he was 'basically blind as a bat' and he relies heavily on prescription glasses. Who would have known?
Judi Dench
Judi Dench (Chris Jackson / Staff / Getty)
Speaking of visual impairment, academy award winning actress Dame Judi Dench announced in 2012 that she had been diagnosed with age-related macular degeneration, but had zero plans of letting it slow her down.
“I’m not going to make it something that’s going to stop me,” she revealed in an interview People at the time and simply asked for scripts with larger print. Macular degeneration is 'an eye disease that can blur your central vision' and there is no cure for it.
Topics: Health, Mental Health, Celebrity, Daniel Radcliffe, Millie Bobby Brown, Johnny Depp
Saskia Calliste