Chris Rock Diagnosed With Non-Verbal Learning Disorder, Reveals It Ended His 20-Year Marriage
While speaking with The Hollywood Reporter, legendary comedian/actor Chris Rock shares that he’s been diagnosed with non-verbal learning disorder (NVLD), and that it may have led to the end of his 20-year marriage.
Although the 55-year-old legend divorced his wife Malaak Compton in 2016, he explains that he’s only learned of the disorder — which makes it difficult for him to pick up on non-verbal signals (making up 80% of communication) — since the beginning of this year. However, he believes it contributed to the end of his lengthy partnership.
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He says, “By the way, all of those things are really great for writing jokes — they’re just not great for one-on-one relationships. And I’d always just chalked it up to being famous. Any time someone would respond to me in a negative way, I’d think, ‘Whatever, they’re responding to something that has to do with who they think I am.’ Now, I’m realizing it was me. A lot of it was me.” Since his diagnosis, Rock is in therapy seven hours a week with two therapists. Together, they deal with his disorder and painful childhood that consisted of him being brutally bullied as the only Black student in a all-white school.