Gethin Jones just got very candid (Picture: Gethin Jones/Instagram)
Gethin Jones has opened up about his battle with depression and the breakdown of his marriage to Katherine Jenkins.
The presenter, 45, just got very candid about a particularly difficult moment in his life in which he found himself suffering a ‘bad bout of depression’.
Describing being on top of New Zealand’s Mount Cook and ‘feeling really sad and low’, Gethin remembered how people were confused by his low mood, but he was in a ‘rut’ and couldn’t work out why.
He was engaged to the Welsh singer but after four years the pair split in 2011, with Katherine later claiming it was he who initiated the break up. Both posted statements saying they were heartbroken at the time.
Katherine and Gethin met on Strictly Come Dancing in 2009, when she was singing and he was a contestant partnered with Flavia Cacace.
‘I was engaged and then breaking up, afterwards, or even during that period, it was just awful,’ Gethin told Tom Bryant on The Mirror’s Outdoors in Mind podcast.
‘I remember doing BBC Radio 5 Live and going into the toilet at 5.30am going, “All right. Come on. Just focus for the next three hours, and then you can go back to being sad again.” I definitely had a bad bout of depression during that time.’
The presenter has opened up about his mental health (Picture: Gethin Jones/Instagram)
He was engaged to Katherine Jenkins before their 2011 split (Picture: Samir Hussein/WireImage)
The Blue Peter star described how he wanted friends to tell him what to do, but now reflects that he put too much pressure on them when he needed to work things out himself.
While he didn’t go into detail about his split with Katherine, he did say it was a ‘horrible’ time, continuing: ‘A lot of what I read about myself wasn’t right.’
He confessed to being proud of never talking about their split in public, but instead dealt with his emotions in therapy.
Gethin was partnered with Flavia Cacace on Strictly in 2009 (Pictire: Jim Steele/Popperfoto via Getty Images/Getty Images)
Reflecting on the older generations’ grin and bear it mentality, Gethin said trying to do the same ‘almost broke [him]’.
The star went on to recall how when his close cameraman friend ended their life out of the blue, it had a ‘profound effect’ on him.
Chatting about recent times, Gethin reflected on the moment he was wrongly accused on social media of being the anonymous BBC presenter who’d been suspended over allegations of inappropriate behaviour, and how that was ‘tough’ to read, and he was at a loss of what to do.
Gethin also candidly revealed he’s always wanted to adopt a child, and that might be in his future after seeing a friend do it.
The Welsh presenter started his career in children’s TV in shows such as Popty, Mas Draw and Uned 5.
In April 2005, Gethin became a Blue Peter presenter and this, coupled with his appearance on Strictly, rocketed him to fame.
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