'It's amazing being an overnight TikTok sensation'

Joel and his mum Clare only joined TikTok in January but they're already getting used to strangers recognising them in the street.

Clare Cerasuolo began sharing videos of the pair's amusing tiffs and heart-felt conversations at home in Port Talbot because she wants people to "see how amazing people with Down's syndrome are".

In the weeks since joining the platform these glimpses into their relationship have won them more than 42,000 followers and Joel is clearly thrilled with his new status as a local celebrity.

"It's an amazing thing being a TikTok sensation," says Joel, 24.

"I'm going to be rich and famous one day."

Clare's TikTok account thelifeofjoeloates shares moments from their home life, everything from Joel getting a puppy to him being told off after cheekily taking a beer without asking first.

Joel loves to sing and act and Clare also shares their trips to the theatre.

She has been left in tears by some of the lovely responses to her posts.

"A mum messaged me to say she has a baby boy with Down's syndrome and she also has an eight-year-old daughter who is struggling to accept her brother," says Clare, who is sharing their story to mark World Down Syndrome Day 2025.

"But she's been watching Joel on TikTok and she now thinks that Down's syndrome is really cool and as long as her brother will be as cool as Joel then that's brilliant.

"I was crying [when I got the message]. I was saying to my husband 'look at this message, how brilliant is that'. I'm just so glad that it has reached somebody and did good."

Joel was also touched by the message.

"It's amazing… TikTok's been an amazing thing," he says.

Clare says she has also had to deal with a small number of hurtful comments.

Following a "really horrible comment" she posted a video in response.

She said: "To that person and all the other people that didn't get enough love as a child, I'm going to prove on here that people with Down's syndrome can do absolutely anything...

"[Joel] certainly wouldn't say a nasty word about anybody, certainly not somebody he doesn't even know so I wish there were less people like you in the world and more people like Joel."

Recalling that post, Clare says she usually chooses to "ignore the negativity" but felt she had to speak out that day.

"It doesn't bother us," she says.

Claire was 24 and had not long been married when she discovered she was pregnant.

She says she had all the usual scans throughout her pregnancy but only discovered Joel had Down's syndrome after he was born.

"I thought there was something off because everyone kept asking if I was okay and put me in a room on my own," she recalls.

When a paediatric consultant came to see her she asked him if everything was OK.

"He said 'we're 99% sure that your little boy has Down's syndrome'," she says.

"It frightened me to death because I didn't know anything about it at all… it was a scary, scary time."

Clare and Joel's dad barely had time for the news to sink in before Joel became critically ill.

Clare says after being told he had two holes in the heart, bowel disorder Hirschsprung's disease and seeing him in an incubator she gained a new perspective.

"I didn't care what he had, I just wanted Joel to be alive and be OK…. so I came to terms with [him having Down's syndrome] relatively quickly," she says.

Joel spent his first five years of his life in and out of hospital.

"You're so grateful for every single milestone and I still am," says Clare.

Clare and Joel's dad separated when he was a teenager and Joel now lives with Clare and his step-dad and has four step siblings.

He spends two nights a week at his dad's house.

"You've got a hot tub there haven't you Joel, you like to put the music on," says Claire.

"We're away with the fairies having a few cans," says Joel, prompting Clare to erupt into laughter.

"Away with the fairies," she laughs.

With Joel now a grown man there has inevitably been some talk of him moving out of the family home.

But there's a sticking point - some of Joel's friends who are slightly older than him have moved into assisted living but that does not appeal to Joel.

"Joel wants to live in the West End with all the actresses so I'm trying to get into Joel's head that's not going to happen," laughs Clare.

"But no Clare, let me speak," interrupts Joel.

"I want to be in the West End, on stage."

"But we're not thinking about moving out yet are we," says Clare.

"Not yet," answers Joel, "but if I had a girlfriend - Sophie Evans?".

Joel is a super fan of Welsh singer and actress Sophie Evans, who played Glinda in the West End production of Wicked.

The pair have met many times when Joel and Clare have gone to see her perform and she visited the family in August for Joel's birthday.

"She's married," laughs Clare.

"She has a child and another one on the way."

"I'm the father," says Joel, and the pair peal into laughter.

This kind of exchange is typical and precisely what is keeping their followers on TikTok entertained.

"We laugh most of the time and then cry from laughing," says Joel.

"I've got a wonderful mother, she's the best. Since I've been a baby I've had an amazing life and she's been with me every step I take and she's an amazing, amazing cook."

Clare says listening to Joel speak about her like this this makes her emotional.

"We're always together, we're very tactile, Joel loves a cwtch [cuddle] and we have nice chats," she says.

"I'm just really extremely proud of him."

"My life is amazing, fantastic," says Joel.

"I wouldn't change it for the world."