Amber Gill has admitted that she ‘didn’t want to leave the house’ as she struggled with sudden fame and social anxiety after her appearance on Love Island.
Speaking on mental health podcast, Question The Default, the TV personality, 28, who has since been diagnosed with ADHD, discussed the pressure of public scrutiny after finding herself in the spotlight.
Amber went on to win the 2019 series, during which she found love pretty quickly with Michael Griffiths, but he cruelly dumped her in favour of Joanna Chimonides.
She brushed herself off, and looked ready to finish the show single, when Irish rugby union player Greg O’Shea swept her off of her feet for the finale.
Amber has now recalled how she found herself ‘constantly overwhelmed’ after leaving the show, which she described as an ‘out of body experience.’
She told host Harry Corin: ‘I started to get really bad social anxiety, I didn’t want to leave the house, I didn’t want to do anything.’
Amber Gill has admitted that she ‘didn’t want to leave the house’ as she struggled with sudden fame and social anxiety after her appearance on Love Island
Speaking on Question The Default, the TV personality, 28, who has since been diagnosed with ADHD, discussed the pressure of public scrutiny after finding herself in the spotlight (pictured on the show in 2019)
Amber continued: ‘When I handed my phone in [before Love Island], I had 4,000 followers. When I got it back, I had 2 million. My phone literally crashed.
‘I walked into JD Sports after the show, and people were queuing outside to see me. I was like – what do you mean they’re here to see me?
‘I didn’t understand what would happen after and I certainly didn’t think I would win the show. It was an out of body experience.
‘It was really hard for people to sympathise [because] on the outside my life looked fabulous, but I felt so low.’
Amber, who previously admitted she felt like ‘the most hated woman in Britain’ after her first week on Love Island, recalled how the public said she was ‘a bad role model’ who ‘needed to be de-platformed.’
She added: ‘I was in the hotel on my own…and I felt like I’ve made the worst decision of my life. This is what people think about me. Everybody wants me to be cancelled. I was just sat in my bed, and I’ve never felt worse in my life.
Reflecting on her ADHD diagnosis, Amber recalled how she first started to notice the signs after Love Island.
She explained: ‘When I came out, it seemed like everyone was doing so much more than me. I could not get it together to keep up the same momentum that everyone else had.’
Amber has now recalled how she found herself ‘constantly overwhelmed’ after leaving the show, which she described as an ‘out of body experience’
She told host Harry Corin: ‘I started to get really bad social anxiety, I didn’t want to leave the house, I didn’t want to do anything’
Amber added: ‘I got overwhelmed quite easily. I can be inconsistent. I get hyper fixated probably on the wrong things, or on minor details – like perfectionism.
‘There’s so much ADHD paralysis… it’s like a state of overwhelm where you just can’t do what you need to do.
‘You can have funny content, but if you think it’s funny, then you don’t have ADHD – because it’s not. There’s nothing funny about it. It’s horrible.’
After Love Island she went on to star on shows like Celebrity SAS: Who Dares Wins, but feels she is now done with TV.
