Helen Skelton opens up on how end of her 8-year marriage left her ‘battle-hardened’ – but Strictly has been like therapy
THE end of an eight- year marriage – with your husband immediately setting up home with another woman – would floor most women.
Not Helen Skelton, who instead took to the TV dance floor and has been waltzing through her heartbreak.
The Strictly Come Dancing favourite believes the show has acted as “therapy”, getting her through the end of her marriage to rugby player Richie Myler.
She says: “I came into this show quite battle-hardened.
“Strictly is probably quite overwhelming for a lot of people but for me, weirdly, I was actually in the best place to be in it.
“Other people were worried about all the attention that comes with being on Strictly, or baring their souls on the telly, whereas I was ready for that.
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“I love that we talk about mental health more now, but I’d love that we could talk about how people can address their mental health.
“I’ve always seen my brain as being like a muscle — one which I need to exercise to keep my head in check.
“So that’s what Strictly is doing for me, it really is. It’s the most brilliant, all-consuming thing to be a part of.”
Countryfile host Helen, 39, announced her split from 32-year-old Richie in April — just four months after the arrival of the couple’s first daughter, Elsie.
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It subsequently emerged he had embarked on a new relationship with Stephanie Thirkill, the daughter of the multi-millionaire President of the Leeds Rhinos club he plays for.
The pair have posted loved-up photos across social media — often within hours of Helen taking to the dance floor.
And last month The Sun revealed that businesswoman Stephanie was pregnant with the couple’s first baby, which must have been a bitter blow.
Refusing to condemn her ex, instead Helen stoically took to the dance floor and nailed a sterling paso doble.
Even now, she is reluctant to discuss the toll the situation must have taken on her.
On a scale of one to Adele — Adele, the singer famed for her heartbreak ballads — she admits she was “quite” Adele in the wake of her marriage crumbling.
But now, she says, the conversation has moved on from sadness to salsas.
“I love that my family are having a great time through me,” she smiles.
“And I am having a great time too. We are all talking about Strictly now, and that’s what I love.
“I decided to do it because I wanted to have some. I’d been asked before but always said no.
“And then this year they asked me last-minute — they were already announcing people when they approached me again.
“My friends made me do it, and this time around I had nothing holding me back, so I said yes.
“I’m so glad I did. I’m happy, and doing Strictly, it’s like being a part of Disneyland. Everyone is just so happy all the time. It’s amazing.”
While Helen refuses to say a bad word about her ex — and his new domestic bliss — it was left to her dance pro, Gorka Marquez, to say what most viewers were probably thinking.
‘GORKA HAS MY BEST INTERESTS AT HEART’
In an unprompted — and clearly unexpected — speech, he wrapped a supportive arm around his partner and said: “I know you’ve been having a difficult time and I know . . . you may feel like you’re not beautiful or good enough or anything.
“But if you don’t believe in yourself, I believe in you. Everybody here believes in you.
“It’s only you who is going to be the one who can make the change and the one who needs to believe in you, because you are an amazing woman, very inspirational. An amazing mum and incredible dancer, so believe in you, please.”
While the audience started applauding — and Gorka was widely praised on Twitter — poor Helen had a face like thunder.
Memes of her furious “side eye” also quickly went viral. So was she mad at him?
“Erm, let’s leave that in the past, shall we?” she laughs.
No, Helen. Let’s address it.
“What I love about Gorka is that he has my very best interests at heart, and we are genuinely very good friends,” she expands, eventually.
“But sometimes, maybe, we need to talk about what he’s allowed to say publicly . . .
“I was like, ‘Oh God, where is he going with this?’ That’s why I jumped on the table, to shut him up!
“But Gorka has the measure of me. He brings me a coffee and a pastry every morning because I’m losing so much weight, training constantly and doing the show.
“He writes on the coffee cup, ‘You’re brilliant, you’ve got this’, because he knows I’d be mortified and embarrassed if he did it to my face.”
Chatting ahead of her usual daily rehearsals — she and Gorka are training for up to eight hours a day, and “everything hurts, everything aches” — today Helen is also trying to do her bit in the ongoing energy crisis.
Encouraging people to get smart meters installed — “they don’t cost anything from your energy supplier” — she hopes to reduce the collective national anxiety around heating versus eating this winter.
“Everybody going into winter is conscious of the cost of living and cost of energy, and for most people their biggest outgoings is going to be energy bills,” she sighs.
“We want to be able to spend money on things they want to do, not just have to do. This is about helping people to know what they’re spending — no-one wants this anxiety. It’s scary but we can arm people.”
She says she has stopped buying a morning coffee in an effort to save money, and has her fireplaces sealed off to conserve energy.
Not even celebs are immune to the hell ahead, it seems.
Helen, who hosted cult kids’ TV programme Blue Peter from 2008 to 2013, was a household name long before the prime-time Saturday night dance competition came along.
However, she admits she was warned by bosses early on in her career that she would never make it on TV because of her distinctive Cumbrian accent.
Much like sports commentator Alex Scott and her good pal Steph McGovern, depressingly she says she has also been trolled because of how she speaks.
She was even taken off air at snooty Radio 4 over concerns she wasn’t “posh” enough.
“People always comment on my accent and my voice, sometimes good and sometimes bad,” she explains.
“But I was once told, ‘Be good enough that people have an opinion, good or bad. If you’re just boring, people won’t have an opinion’.
“If they’re slagging me off, at least that means I’m distinctive.
“I was studying journalism [at the Cumbria Institute of the Arts] and someone once sat me down said I’d never get a job at the BBC until I went off and got a masters in journalism from a proper university.
“I ignored it, and a year later I became the youngest breakfast presenter on the BBC network.
“But I used to do Wimbledon for Radio 5 Live, and also did the scores for Radio 4 once — but that became an area of concern.
‘I DON’T NEED TO KNOW WHAT THEY SAY ON TWITTER’
“They thought I wasn’t BBC enough so they wouldn’t let me do it again, and sent me off to cover a match at Wimbledon, which went on to become the longest tennis match in tennis history, so screw them.
“They tried to keep me off the radio, then they were landed with me commentating more than anyone else for hours and hours! I get trolled, but I don’t read any of it, ever.
“I have this theory — everyone has their own back yard and if it’s there, I need to deal with it and if it’s not, I don’t need to get involved.
“I simply don’t need to know what people on Twitter think of me.”
Helen — who made her name as the daredevil one on Blue Peter, once completing a 78-mile ultra-marathon in the Namibian desert — will turn 40 next summer.
Unlike most female celebs, she’s not remotely bothered.
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She laughs: “I’m excited about it. As I’ve got older, I feel a sense of freedom.
“Heading towards 40, I don’t have to answer to anyone other than my kids. I’m looking forward to it and to whatever the future holds.”
- For more information and advice on smart meters, see smartenergygb.org or search “Get a smart meter”.