Shirley Ballas has revealed she thought ‘she’d be better off dead’ and turned to alcohol to cope with depression during the menopause.
The Strictly Come Dancing judge, 64, explained that she felt anxious, depressed and desolate during the time.
In her upcoming book, Best Foot Forward, the dancing star confessed that she thought she was ‘losing the plot’ during her ‘darkest hours’.
She penned: ‘In my darkest hours I went to some terrible places in my head and while I hate to use the word suicidal, those thoughts crossed my mind.
‘I could never have gone through with it because I wouldn’t want my mother to suffer the agony of losing a second child to suicide, but there were certainly times when I thought I’d be better off dead because the way I was living felt so hideous.’
Shirley’s brother David died by suicide aged 44 back in 2003 and the star has spoken openly about her ‘overwhelming grief’ after the tragedy.
Shirley Ballas has revealed she thought ‘she’d be better off dead’ and turned to alcohol to cope with depression during the menopause (pictured November 2023)
The Strictly Come Dancing judge, 64, whose brother David died by suicide aged 44 in 2003, explained that she felt anxious, depressed and desolate during the time
The TV personality also revealed that she used to turn to booze to try and numb the pain.
She penned, as per The Mirror,: ‘I’d been trying to manage the ‘situation’ myself with antidepressants, sleeping tablets, more medication to wake myself up and, I have to say this, alcohol.’
Since her brother’s death, Shirley has become an ardent campaigner for mental health awareness, even setting up charity The Ballas Foundation with her son Mark, 38.
Her son, who was a professional ballroom dancer on Dancing With The Stars in the US, previously opened up about the incident on his website.
In a blog post on his blog unearthed by The Mirror in 2017, he wrote: ‘For me, it’s about raising awareness of depression. It’s not like a mood swing.’
‘People struggle with it every day. Nothing matters. My uncle’s daughter was everything to him, but it didn’t matter because he was sick.’
‘You have to make people aware of it so they can recognize it and help people get better.’
The post continues: ‘The family was not only left with overwhelming grief, but guilt. You keep thinking maybe you could have done something.’
Since David’s death, Shirley has become an ardent campaigner for mental health awareness, even setting up charity The Ballas Foundation with her son Mark, 38 (pictured with her mum)
David and Mark had been especially close since he helped look after him while Shirley pursued dancing opportunities in the US.
Shirley and her son decided to go public with their story in 2010 in a bid to raise awareness for suicide prevention.
And in 2024 Shirley revealed she ‘blames’ herself for her brother being alone the day he died because she encouraged her mother to come to a show her son was in.
Speaking on the Great Company with Jamie Laing podcast, Shirley told how her brother had been struggling with his mental health and the family had previously tried to get him sectioned but he wouldn’t go to the hospital.
She said: ‘I was wrapped up in my life, because at that time, I had two other children I was taking care of, plus my own son, and they were all dancers, and I was just wrapped up in my world of ballroom dancing.
‘I was in London. He was up north, and my mother went to stay with him for six weeks. But my mother’s old school, and they don’t share.
‘So, what I should have done then, if I look back now, is gotten the car straight away and gone to see the situation for myself. He was just in a bad place.
‘He explained it like being in a dark, black hole that he couldn’t climb out of. He’d lost a lot of weight, and the doctors couldn’t help him.
‘We tried to get him sectioned, and when, apparently, I wasn’t there, but my mum was. When they took him in the car and they pulled up to the hospital, he recognized somebody that was stood on the steps, and he was too he was the macho man on the housing estate, and he was too embarrassed, he made them turn the car around.
‘So had she not been there that day, then maybe things could have been different. And it just nobody talked about things like that. No one talked about things like that at all, and they just popped in with pills, you know, like these antidepressants.’
If you have been affected by this story, you can call the Samaritans on 116 123 or visit www.samaritans.org
