During the 2024 Paris Olympics, gymnast Stephen Nedoroscik became nearly as famous for his spellbinding pommel horse routine—which scored him an individual bronze and also carried the US men’s team to a bronze—as he did for his Clark Kent–esque glasses. The 25-year-old could almost always be spotted chillin’ in his chunky black specs, but when it was his time to shine, he’d whip them off and deliver a heroic athletic performance. Now, all eyes are on the bespectacled champ once more as he’s set to compete in the 33rd season of ABC’s Dancing with the Stars, premiering on Tuesday, September 17, at 8 p.m. ET.
It turns out, Nedoroscik’s trusty glasses aren’t just part of his signature look; as he’s shared in the past, he has two eye conditions that affect his vision. And the only reason he took his glasses off pre-competition at the Olympics was because they were “gonna fly somewhere” if he left them on, he told Today. So he’s seemingly gotten used to competing without being able to see clearly.
In 2022, Nedoroscik posted a TikTok video in which he explained that he has strabismus. He describes the condition as being cross-sighted before demonstrating how he can “switch his dominant eye on command with both eyes open.” And during this year’s Olympics, he commented on the video, noting that he posted it to see if anyone had a similar experience of strabismus, and that he could shift his “world viewpoint from one eye to the other. Like one camera to another [two inches] away.”
Portland, Oregon–based ophthalmologist William Flanary, MD, who goes by Dr. Glaucomflecken, suggested in his own TikTok video this summer that Nedoroscik may have esotropia, a type of strabismus where one or both eyes turn inward toward your nose. The common condition is often referred to as being “cross-eyed” and basically involves a failure of muscle and nerve coordination—typically, eyes function in tandem, but with esotropia, they operate separately.
As Dr. Flanary also noted in his TikTok, esotropia often occurs with far-sightedness, which is when you can see faraway things clearly but struggle with close-up items; in this case, glasses can be an effective solution, as they appear to be for Nedoroscik. (Other treatments can include wearing a patch on one eye or surgery to realign the eye muscles.)
But Nedoroscik’s vision issues don’t end there—he also tagged his original TikTok video with #coloboma, which is a condition that occurs when you’re born without a portion of eye tissue in one or both eyes. It can cause your pupil(s) to take on an irregular shape or appear, like in Nedoroscik’s case, “permanently dilated,” as reported by The New York Times. Nedoroscik also posted a TikTok video in 2022 describing how the condition makes his eyes sensitive to light. In a heartwarming moment during the Olympics, he chatted and snapped a photo with a seven-year-old who also has coloboma, becoming the first other person the child had ever met with his same condition.
Coloboma, like strabismus, can also definitely mess with your vision, which may be why Nedoroscik was so fond of keeping his glasses nearby before and after his Olympic performances. He told Today that things are “not necessarily clear” when he takes them off, adding that when he pommels “it’s all about feeling the equipment. I don’t even really see when I’m doing my gymnastics. It’s all in the hands—I can feel everything.”
Dancing without seeing clearly seems like a whole other story, though, particularly when you factor in a partner (in Nedoroscik’s case, pro Rylee Arnold). He told Entertainment Weekly he wasn’t sure yet whether he’d sport his specs in the ballroom because any errant kick or turn could send ’em flying, but also told ABC News that he wanted to “have fun with it” and would maybe use a special gadget to keep them in place as he and Arnold get their moves on. Either way, we’ll have our own eyes peeled for Nedoroscik’s routine: Only time will tell whether he’ll be able to wow us on the dance floor like he did on the pommel.
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- Everything Katie Ledecky Has Shared About Living With the Health Condition POTS
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