August 14th 2023.
I had a dirty little secret. One which I’d managed to ignore and hide for over 50 years. When I was 10 minutes into trying to decipher the jumbled letters and symbols in a simple English language children’s book, frustration took over. I thought about giving up.
At primary school, I was written off as stupid and had been diagnosed with dyslexia 10 years ago. As a result, I was left alone to my own devices and decided to leave school when I was 13, barely able to read or write.
My late father was more interested in getting me out to work as soon as possible, so I did a paper round, delivered vegetables and worked in a butcher’s shop. Aged 20, I eventually became a slaughterman and at 28, entered the world of hairdressing.
I was fortunate enough to become a multi-millionaire hair stylist for celebrities like David Beckham, Liza Minelli, Piers Morgan, Marco Pierre White and Liam Gallagher. My creativity in hair set me aside, but I was unable to do even the most basic tasks that required reading, such as booking a flight or taking my driving test. I relied on others to do it for me, and got away with it for years.
Being creative was a way that I could finally prove myself, and I was flown all over the world from Dubai, to LA, Miami, and Chicago. I had a chain of successful salons, and a range of hair products on shelves across the UK and Europe.
However, a combination of Brexit and Covid caused me to lose a lot - my salons, property, products, and staff. My whole world as I knew it stopped. But it gave me the opportunity to reassess and regroup, and I started raising millions for charity and set up pop-up salons nationwide, providing haircuts for frontline workers.
It was then that I realised I’d never been able to do even the most basic tasks without help. I knew that it was time to stop hiding, and at 46, I started to learn how to read - a 40-something-year-old man learning the same way as a child of four or five would. I was taught in the traditional way by a former partner who is a primary school teacher, and I also enrolled in online reading courses.
Can I read a novel yet? No. But I certainly hope to be in a position of being able to read a famous autobiography one day.
It’s been tough to start learning any new skill at my age, but it is possible, letter by letter, word by word, sentence by sentence, that I will get there. I know that there is far more help in schools now, and I’m proof that it’s never too late to learn. And I’m determined to get there.
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