Manchester United legend Paul Scholes has revealed that he has stepped away from television punditry in order to care for his 20-year-old autistic son Aiden.
Scholes, who won 25 trophies during his 20-year playing career with United before retiring in 2013, had been a regular pundit for TNT Sports but has not featured for the broadcaster since the Europa League final in May.
The former England midfielder, who split with his wife Claire in 2020 after 27 years together, says he has stepped back from his television work in order to help provide around-the-clock care for Aiden, who was diagnosed as having non-verbal autism when he was a young child.
‘I just made the decision this year because of Aiden, obviously with his special needs and stuff, all the work I do now is just around his routines, because he has quite a strict routine every single day, so I just decided everything I’m going to do, it is around Aiden,’ Scholes said on The Overlap.
‘Well, me and Claire are obviously not together any more. We have him three nights each and Claire’s mum has him on a Friday night but we’ll always do the same things with him.
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‘He doesn’t know what day of the week it is or time. But he’ll know from what we’re doing what day it is.
‘I pick him up every Tuesday from his day-care place he goes to for four hours and we go swimming. Loves swimming, then we get his pizza on the way home. Thursday pick him up, we’ll go for something to eat, go home.
‘Sunday, I pick him up from Claire’s house and we go to Tesco where he buys a trolley full of chocolate. So, he doesn’t know what day or time the is, he knows from what we’re doing what day it is. He’ll be 21 in December.
‘He’s non-verbal, when I say he can’t speak, I think he understands a lot more than we think, if you says something to him he will understand.
‘He has sounds, but it’s only people that are close to him that will know what he’s saying.’
Scholes rarely shared details of his private life during his playing career at United but now regularly updates his 1.1 million followers on Instagram with his moments alongside Aiden.
‘I did it one or two times, I only show the good bits, obviously there are some bits that aren’t great, and it was just the response I had from people, parents who had the same, that’s why I carried on doing it,’ Scholes said.
‘I will reply to people on Instagram because it’s hard, especially when they’re young because there’s the harm, the attacking people, I only put the nice stuff on.
‘I do sometimes think about putting stuff on where he’s not too happy, when he might go for you, try to bite you, I do think about it but think that’s probably not the right thing to do.’
Scholes also revealed that he struggled to balance his playing career alongside caring for Aiden.
‘You never got a break from it,’ Scholes said.
‘It was very hard in those days, it feels like it was years ago, I don’t think they diagnosed it until they were two-and-a-half [years old]. But you knew early something was wrong but then you get the diagnosis of autism, and I’d never heard of it. Then all of a sudden you start seeing everything, I don’t know if it just consciously happens, I don’t know.
‘I remember the first time after we were playing Derby away and I just didn’t want to be there. I remember the manager [Sir Alex Ferguson] dropped me the week after actually, and I hadn’t told anyone, I ended up telling them a few weeks later, I think as it was quite hard.’
Scholes also recalled a moment last year when he struggled to understand that Aiden had been suffering from a toothache.
‘Don’t get me wrong, he can be so happy it’s untrue, and it gives you great pleasure and joy, it’s not all bad,’ Scholes said.
‘There was a time last year I took him away and he kept feeling his mouth and not sleeping and I had no idea what was wrong with him.
‘He kept doing it and doing it, so I put numbing gel on his lips cos he can’t tell you what’s wrong or got pain anywhere and he won’t go to a dentist. He won’t sit there and have someone open his mouth, he just can’t do it.
‘We got him to a special needs dentist and they had to put him to sleep with gas. He had to have a fillings and all sorts then had an operation because his mouth was a mess. But he can’t tell you what pain he’s in. That must have been going on eight-to-nine months, imagine having toothache for nine months?’
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