British TV presenter Kirstie Allsop is perhaps best known for hosting property and home development shows for the network Channel 4 such as Location, Location, Location and Relocation, Relocation.
And she has dyslexia.
Allsop’s official title is “The Honourable Kirstie Allsop”, as she is the daughter of a baron. She went to multiple schools as a child, where she struggled with reading and writing. Dyslexia runs in the family – Allsop’s famous designer cousin, Cath Kidstone, is dyslexic, as are Allsop’s son, her father and her three siblings.
“At school, I would cry and hurl myself on the floor. I was a poisonous little monster. I wasn’t cool or popular. I was a weirdo!” she says.
To cope with her difficulties, she had to move around to ten different schools before finding one that could teach her differently.
Allsop grew up in a family of property developers, and always had an eye for spaces, colours, and visuals – a trait many people say is a common strength of the dyslexic brain. So it was probably no surprise that she became a television personality presenting shows on flipping and decorating houses!
—
Sarah Forrest is a Reading Specialist for the Easyread System, an online course that specialises in helping struggling readers with dyslexia, highly visual learning styles, weak auditory processing and more. www.easyreadsystem.com
