Ajay Rochester’s reveals the heartbreaking reality of raising a child with Asperger’s

Television presenter Ajay Rochester has spoken candidly about raising a child with Asperger syndrome. 

The former host of The Biggest Loser, 52, told New Idea this week she and her son Kai, 21, have certainly faced some difficulties together over the years.

Ajay said she’d always ‘expected’ to provide for her son well into adulthood because of his condition, but was beyond ‘proud’ of him after he landed a well-paid job.

‘I’ve been paying his bills for years and keeping him in a house and frankly, I expected to be doing that for some time,’ Ajay said. 

She explained that Kai had moved to Australia from LA – where he’d spent much of his childhood – in 2019, but struggled to find work after applying for over 100 jobs. 

But he has now landed a position as a video-editing assistant for a television network and is thriving and ‘living an independent life’.

‘Raising a child with Asperger’s, you learn to have different benchmarks to other kids – you really can’t compare milestones,’ she said. 

But she added: ‘I’ve never let our issues or worries get in the way of our life.’ 

In December last year, Ajay followed her son to Australia after almost a decade of living in California.

She told The Daily Telegraph she’d returned Down Under because she was sick of the lockdown in Los Angeles.

‘I spent 10 months in my apartment locked up, like a self-imposed prisoner terrified of this virus while millions of others go about doing what they want and it just spiraled out of control,’ she said.

‘I just knew I had to go. I had this gut feeling. People here don’t realise how lucky they have it.’  

Ajay, who hosted weight loss show The Biggest Loser from 2006 to 2009, had relocated to the U.S. in 2010. 

Her most recent TV appearance was on I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here! in 2019, but she now mostly works behind the scenes as a casting agent.