‘My life was all about me – now my son is everything’
Hequestrian Lee Pearson, an 11-time Paralympic champion, reveals how becoming a foster father has transformed him
Lee Pearson is used to making the best of a bad situation. From being “hidden away as a baby in a stinking broom cupboard” by nurses at the North Staffordshire Infirmary, to wriggling out of a possible police charge in Beijing by showing officers his Paralympic dressage gold medals, this is a man who does not let circumstances dictate his fate.
So it is hardly surprising that, when the first Covid lockdown was announced in March 2020, Pearson saw it as an opportunity: with the Tokyo Paralympics delayed by a year, he had the perfect chance to fulfil his ambition to become a foster parent.
“People might be surprised at me doing this, but I don’t see myself as any different to anyone else,” he says, taking some time out of his preparations for the rescheduled Games, which begin on Tuesday.
“If you’ve got the home and the facilities to give someone a home, and the right skills to help people become the best adult that they can become, then why not be a foster parent? I don’t understand why more people don’t do it.
“Most people who are severely disabled or gay, bi or pansexual – basically all the things I am – would not have the b------- to go into fostering. I think I have b------- in life, to be honest. I have got this attitude that no one is better than me and, also, that I’m no better than anybody else. I like to grab opportunities by the horns and I try to instill that in my son.”
Pearson freely admits that becoming a parent, to a son of 15, has changed his life in a way sport never has. His medals – he has 11 Paralympic Games golds in total, making him the fifth most successful British Paralympian of all time – may have earned him a knighthood and sparked his competitive instincts, but now the school run is motivation enough to get out of bed.
“When I had the full assessment done, of my life, house and financial situation, the local authorities were not concerned about my disability but more that my life was very full already,” he says.
Pearson, 47, appeased those concerns easily enough, revealing that he had long lie-ins and rode one or two horses in the middle of the day, and is now well settled into the routines of domestic life.
“The school run gives me more structure and my grooms love that I am up and ready to ride by 9.20,” he says. “Then I have five hours to teach before the next school run. We probably have more takeaways than we should, but I do cook for him as well.”
One thing Pearson was not prepared for was the emotional roller coaster of parenthood. “Not just the days when things are going bad and he tells me I’m a terrible dad, but when things are going good and I just want to cry.
“I had never realised that you would have this feeling where you actually want more for someone else than you want for yourself,” he added. “For my whole life, my daily, weekly, yearly aims have been about myself and how I’m going to be better today. “Now it’s not all about Lee Pearson.
“I’m lucky that he is passionate about football. I have enjoyed being part of that, supporting him, taking him to training and matches. I even bought an Xbox to be part of his world but he refuses to play with me because I’m so s--- at it. “But I love him to bits, he loves me to bits, although he would barely say that. He is a brilliant person and I do everything I can to help him be the best human he can be. “I have been truly blessed in my life with my family. Mum was a psychiatric nurse and I grew up knowing that not all children have the best of upbringings.” Pearson’s own upbringing was far from easy. He was born with arthrogryposis multiplex congenita, which means he cannot
‘I never realised you would feel you wanted more for someone else than yourself’
move his ankles or knees. So extreme was his condition when he was born in 1974 – as he recalls in his autobiography, I Am Who I Am, that the “horrified” nurses hid him away for the first three days of his life while they decided how best to proceed. By the time he was six, he had undergone 14 major operations. Pearson is classified as a grade one para-rider – the highest level of disability. This never stopped him living life to the full and he still does not compute the word “no”.
“I was brought up feeling like I could do anything an able-bodied child could do, and that hasn’t changed,” he says. “When I am in the saddle, I feel my disability is less obvious. My seat is very good and I ride with feel and instinct. I’m not someone who can learn stuff from books.”
That applies to his training as well as his riding. He has schooled several horses to grand prix, the highest level of able-bodied dressage, and he is taking Breezer, a horse he bred himself, to Japan for his sixth Paralympic Games. There have been other major challenges, most notably wrestling with his sexuality, which he freely admits caused him far deeper anguish than his disabilities.
But now Pearson feels he is living his best life. He is loud and proud about who he is: an athlete with 14 Paralympic medals in total and 14 World Championship gold medals; a knight who once winked at the Queen at the Birthday Honours reception; Team GB’S flag bearer at Rio; a man who decided to take his class one articulated lorry driving test as he was fed up with being unable to tow his own horsebox; and now, most significantly, a father. “This is my dream job, my dream life,” he says. “It’s not easy, but it’s all I’ve ever wanted and I am so grateful for it. If it ends tomorrow, I won’t regret a thing.
“My son means everything,” he added. “He gives me love, he gives me a family and he makes me laugh and cry. In fact I think he gives me far more than I give him.”