Strictly star Chris McCausland's 'denial' over blindness as he candidly shares experience

Comedian Chris McCausland has impressed viewers with his dance moves on the new series of Strictly Come Dancing so far after the live shows launched last weekend.

The 47 year old, who's the show's first blind contestant, has been paired up with Dianne Buswell. Stand-up comedian Chris had previously admitted to never having watched Strictly before and had "no burning desire" to participate.

However, he was reportedly driven by his determination not to let his blindness hold him back, so joined the BBC show's 20th-anniversary series. According to Wales Online, Chris' resolve comes from his experience with losing his sight as a young adult.

Speaking about his experience in an interview with Channel 4 whilst promoting his appearance on Scared of the Dark last year, Chris shared: "It's difficult when you're losing your sight so subtly. There's never a moment you've got to deal with. So if somebody has an accident and the next day they're disabled, they've got a huge moment of trauma and they've got to come to terms with that. But when you're losing your sight noticeably slowly, it's just kind of a constant phase of frustration and denial really.

"And you don't realise that you can't do things until maybe something happens that you realise, 'Oh, maybe I shouldn't do that anymore.' The last time I played football, I put myself in hospital and I thought, 'Well, that's my football days done.' But each of these things happen separately, you know what I mean? And when you grew up with a very normal childhood, playing in the streets childhood with mates, and you're a teenager in Liverpool and in your early twenties, you want to be cool or trendy or whatever."

He added: "So there's a huge kind of refusal to get on board with the whole blind thing, I think. You know, like using a stick. I was never comfortable with it. I think as a result I'm still not comfortable with it. I'm still not good at it. I think I'm not comfortable with it now because I haven't got the confidence with all that kind of stuff. I haven't got the confidence with it because I was so resistant to it through my twenties that I've never really got massively on board with it all. But luckily we've got Uber now!"

Chris has appeared on panel shows like Have I Got News For You and 8 Out of 10 Cats, and has also captivated audiences on the Chris McCausland Show. It was last year that he took part in Channel 4 experiment Scared of the Dark, joining other celebs in experiencing life without light, navigating various challenges plunged in darkness.

The comedian has shared that he has retinitis pigmentosa (RP). The outlet notes that the condition causes the retina, a layer of light-sensitive tissue in the eye, to deteriorate, resulting in gradual vision loss. Chris, who had sight as a child, saw a deterioration over time, describing it as a "constant phase of frustration and denial".

He said: "People go, 'Well, when did you go blind?' And it's very hard to say because when your eyesight deteriorates steadily, you stop being able to do different things at different stages. So you stop being able to see in the dark, or seeing dusk, or see your computer screen, or read a printed book, all of these different things happen at different times. But I kind of say late teens to early twenties, that kind of five year period from maybe 16 to 21 is when the bulk of the useful stuff just went."

Chris has said his involvement in Strictly offers a platform to highlight the capabilities of visually impaired individuals. The comedian told the Telegraph that he's "serious" about the show, adding: "I want to show just how capable and resilient blind people are." He continued: "There's a misperception that we are helpless but in fact we are hugely adaptable and amazing problem-solvers. Yet there's a 73 per cent unemployment rate among blind people of working age in this country – because employers just don't have the necessary vision to give us a chance." Chris added that he wants to "change that," though teasing that it would be a "bit of an own goal" if he's "useless" on Strictly.

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