Strictly’s Shirley Ballas to have breast implants removed over cancer fears – but will only take three days off work
STRICTLY’S Shirley Ballas is having her breast implants removed over cancer fears. The BBC1 dance show’s head judge, 59, will go under the knife next month. She revealed: “I’m scheduled for the operation on Tuesday, October 29. My doctor says I have recuperation of a week, but I want to do Strictly on the Saturday night.” […]
STRICTLY’S Shirley Ballas is having her breast implants removed over cancer fears.
The BBC1 dance show’s head judge, 59, will go under the knife next month.
She revealed: “I’m scheduled for the operation on Tuesday, October 29. My doctor says I have recuperation of a week, but I want to do Strictly on the Saturday night.”
Shirley — whose mum and auntie have cancer, and who lost another aunt to the disease — vowed to reverse a boob job she had in 2002 after a nurse’s words in the middle of a mammogram made her freeze.
She was told: “There’s no guarantee that we can ever really see behind the back of the implants.”
After a string of personal cancer scares and diagnoses in her family, the BBC1 show’s head judge decided “this is a sign” and started investigating getting her breast implants removed.
Seventeen years after undergoing augmentation to combat chronic confidence issues, the 59-year-old will next month go under the knife to rid her body of the implants and possibly the scar tissue around them.
It’s a big decision in the middle of filming Strictly, but she has the support of BBC executives.
In an exclusive interview with The Sun, she says: “I’ve been to a new doctor and I’m scheduled for the operation on Tuesday, October 29.
“My doctor says I have recuperation of a week, but I want to do Strictly on the Saturday night. It’s not like I have to dance and do the cha cha cha or the samba.
“I spoke to the BBC and they have been very, very supportive. They said you have to do what you feel most comfortable for your health.”
Shirley believes she has been suffering from chronic fatigue as another unexpected side effect of the implants.
She explains: “Assuming there is no cancer, we are debating whether to take out just the implants or the scar tissue as well.
“There are rumours that the scar tissues cause chronic fatigue which I have suffered with even over the last year. Usually I don’t get tired and I’m like an Energizer bunny.
“But if they take out the scar tissue the whole breast will collapse because it’s been holding everything in place around the implant.
“So it would involve bigger surgery and perhaps a reconstruction — you’d have to maybe take fat out of your tummy to rebuild the breasts. Or you put smaller implants in. But I don’t want any implants in. I don’t want any foreign bodies in my body.”
Shirley decided to have implants in 2002 after years of pressure in the dance world over her appearance.
But she regrets it now, saying honestly: “I did mine not to be vain but because I thought I looked ugly.
“If I could go back and talk to my younger self I would say, ‘Never get them done.’ But I did them because I had low self-esteem and no confidence.
“People told me, ‘Oh you’ve got a chest like two currants on a bread board.’ They would say they’re joking, but you still absorb it. It still goes in your mind.”
Then in 2012 there was more trauma when Shirley needed to have the implants replaced during an operation in London’s Harley Street after the recall of Poly Implant Prostheses.
But seven years on and Shirley is a new woman. We are sitting in the living room of her stunningly renovated South London home surrounded by newly framed pictures of her with boyfriend Danny Taylor.
Celebs up to the challenge
SPARKS could fly between some of this year’s Strictly contestants, according to Shirley.
She declares: “It’s only been Week One but you can see chemistry developing. Watch this space.”
The head judge is already “dreading” this weekend’s show “because I don’t want to send anybody home”.
Early stand-outs included former Emmerdale star Kelvin Fletcher, 35.
Shirley says of him: “The clothes fitted where they touched and then he did that samba, the hardest dance to do?
“Most people cannot come to grips with the samba. He was beyond incredible.”
She is excited for TV host Anneka Rice, 60, adding: “It’s interesting to see what Kevin Clifton is going to do.
“I mean this is a lady who’s got bags and bags of personality, also never danced before.
He made her shine.” Despite a low score, Shirley hopes that rowing champion James Cracknell, 47, can overcome his nerves.
She says: “I could tell automatically, never talking to the man, that he was shy. And I could see out of all the contestants he was going to struggle with doing it in front of 15 million people.
“But if every single dancer was at the same level then how boring.”
Shirley was disappointed by East-Enders star Emma Barton, 42, but says she will bounce back because her partner is “king of the ballroom” Anton Du Beke.
She is also pleased that love rat pro dancer Katya Jones, 30, was given another chance on the show – despite a fling with comic Seann Walsh that tarnished last year’s series.
Shirley concludes: “We can’t judge a person from one mistake. She’s young. Everybody learns lessons.”
Shirley credits the actor — who she met while performing in panto last Christmas — for changing her entire outlook on life. She says: “Over the last year, I’ve become the most confident I’ve ever been because of him.
“Danny’s not into whether you’re this or that or on a diet. He’s made me feel phenomenally good about myself. In the past one husband said to me, ‘If you get fat I’m out the door.’ It sticks in your mind.
“I’m a curvy figure person, but my weight can go up and down. I can go anywhere from a size six to a size ten. Last year I was really small. This year I haven’t gone as small because it’s not necessary.
“Now I’ve learned that curves are good, it’s OK to have a bit of a bottom. You’re all right as you are, God made you the way you are.”
But that’s not to say Shirley is judgmental about people who choose to alter their appearance, just more aware of the impact on society.
She explains: “I look at young people and they’ve got their Botox and they’re 18. Or young people getting facelifts.
“I think it might be a choice when you get to my age if you want to keep yourself looking fresh, but I think you have to realise there’s a knock-on effect for the younger generation as well. If I had a daughter, my advice would be not to do it.”
Shirley has come a long way in opening up about her body.
It was only last year that Craig Revel Horwood publicly revealed Shirley’s boob job, prompting him to apologise.
He described her boobs as “like La BaZooKa things hanging out” and “not very Strictly”, before adding that “they’re fake”.
While she accepted his backstage grovelling, Craig’s comments deeply impacted her because she had never spoken publicly about her surgery.
She recalls: “I was coming in on an airplane and I had ten missed calls from him and he said, ‘I may have said a few things’ and I was like, ‘oh, no big deal, no big deal’.
“But then when I read, it became about years of other people always saying that to me and it was a trigger. I don’t need a man to make me feel bad about myself I can do that myself.
“I don’t need it, you know what I’m saying? But I’m a team player. I would live and die to protect the BBC, that’s where my job is, it’s the people I love, it’s the people who give you opportunity.
“I’m a loyalist, I’m a loyal, loyal, loyal person. So when you sit on a panel with four people, you expect the same in return. But I would like to think it was misjudgment on his part.”
Craig was forced to apologise again — this time publicly — for a comment he made during the recording of this year’s launch show about 2018 winner Stacey Dooley sleeping with her pro partner Kevin Clifton.
Craig has said he’ll quit at the end of the series if the BBC continues to tone down his caustic comments.
Shirley is clearly torn on the issue.
She says: “I think everybody should be who they want to be. But there are other human beings involved and one should think before they speak.
“I’ve lived that life when people haven’t thought about what they’re going to say to me and it’s long term lasting damage and it can hurt.
“We’re not there to judge their personal lives, we are there to judge their dancing, and that is the angle I will always come at it from.
Shirley will today host around 70 people at her house as part of cancer charity MacMillan’s biggest coffee morning in the world.
She will be with her beloved mum Audrey, 82, who is battling the disease.
Shirley adds: “Her sister’s also got cancer now. And her other sister died of it and a great grandfather.’
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As a result, Shirley is vigilant about her health situation and raising money to help the fight against cancer.
She explains: “I have had several scares and I had to go to hospital even recently because of some bad cells.
“I have to go back again at Christmas. They can get rid of the cells — but you have to keep on top of it and catch it early.”
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