ITV Emmerdale’s Laura Norton fights back tears as she opens up about children’s rare condition
Emmerdale star Laura Norton fought back tears as she opened up about her two children's rare condition after they were diagnosed with Usher syndrome during the emotional first episode of ITVBe's Drama Queens
Emmerdale star Laura Norton fought back tears as she opened up about her two children’s rare condition after they were diagnosed with Usher syndrome.
The actress, 40, opened up during the emotional first episode of ITVBe’s Drama Queens. The new series, which launched on Wednesday and will air for eight episodes, gives viewers a real-life glimpse into the lives of some of the nation’s favourite soap stars as they give an inside look at their lives away from their characters.
During Wednesday’s episode, Laura who plays Kerry Wyatt on Emmerdale, gave viewers a glimpse into her life before returning to the ITV soap after her maternity leave. Laura has two children Jesse, three, and Ronnie, almost 18 months, with fiancé Mark Jordon, who played Daz Spencer on Emmerdale.
Both of their children were diagnosed with Usher syndrome, a rare genetic disease that affects both hearing and vision, and she opened up about this on Wednesday’s episode. In an emotional moment, Laura said: “When Jesse was born, he was very quickly diagnosed with hearing loss, which was a bit of a shock and then I had what I thought was a routine appointment with the paediatrician and she explained to me that this thing had shown up in him called Usher syndrome, which I had never heard of before.
Emmerdale star Laura Norton fought back tears as she opened up about her two children’s rare condition after they were diagnosed with Usher syndrome (
ITV)
“I’ve been told not only has he got hearing difficulties, and he will have for the rest of his life, but he’s going to lose his vision. So obviously, yeah…” Laura then fought back tears as she composed herself, adding: “So yeah, that was a bit of a blow to say the least!
“I was six months pregnant at the time, with the pregnancy, obviously, I wanted to know if the same thing was going to happen to Ronnie and they said: ‘The odds are all on her side, she’s got a 25% chance of having it and a 75% chance of not.’ Then, two weeks later, we found out she has it as well.”
Laura added: “The pull going back to work was extra difficult in that respect. I think it’s important to go to work, we’ve got to live as normal a life as possible because we know that we’re going to face hurdles as we go along!” Earlier in the episode, Laura broke down in tears as she prepared to return to Emmerdale after 18 months of maternity leave, having a FaceTime call with co-star Roxy Shahidi, who plays Leyla Harding, where she admitted she felt “up and down”.
It comes as Laura said ahead of Drama Queens airing: “I’d never heard of it until Jesse was diagnosed with it at one and a half I think. It’s a rare genetic condition that both of my children have, both have hearing loss, both will lose their vision.
“We made the decision to throw ourselves in at the deep end. We would regret it if we missed a huge chunk of time to help them and other people. It was that thing of: ‘We’re in the public eye, we can use this for good.’ The fact that people hadn’t heard of it – already within a year I feel like there’s been a bit of a change.
“We made a promise as patrons and trustees. It’s like having another full-time job. Hopefully within my children’s lifetime we should see a change and children being born with it can have a better life – provided we can spread awareness and get funding.
“That’s the dream – that there’s a treatment which slows down vision loss. I just won’t stop now. I’ve never had this sense of purpose. I thought: ‘This is why I’m an actor…’ Not just because I enjoy it – because it can be used for such good.”
Drama Queens continues on Wednesdays at 9pm on ITVBe and ITV X.
