Davina McCall feared she’d lose her job due to menopause memory fog

The TV presenter forgot co-star’s name during filming
Davina McCall is now a campaigner for HRT
PA
Dominique Hines14 October 2022
The Weekender

Sign up to our free weekly newsletter for exclusive competitions, offers and theatre ticket deals

I would like to be emailed about offers, event and updates from Evening Standard. Read our privacy notice.

Davina McCall has admitted that she thought she’d lose work because of memory blackouts during menopause.

The Masked Dancer UK judge, 54, revealed she experienced such bad brain fog that she was filming with interior designer, “Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen and I couldn’t remember his name”.

She added: “I thought I was going to have to give up my job – and I love my job. I was just at a stage where I thought I really knew how to do this job and then thought, ‘you are going to take it off me.’”

The TV presenter, who also said she thought she was “going mad”, spoke out on ITV’s Lorraine on Thursday. She told host Lorraine Kelly that she was too ashamed to speak to her production team about her menopause symptoms.

The mother of three, who eventually found relief through hormone replacement therapy or HRT, added that she felt quite lonely going through the entire process.

McCall joined the likes of Mariella Frostrup and Penny Lancaster in Parliament Square in 2021 to celebrate the Government’s reducing the cost of repeat prescriptions for hormone replacement therapy
PA Wire

However, McCall, who is now a campaigner for HRT, wanted to reassure women going through the change that they are not alone.

“It’s so lonely [going through menopause], I thought I was disappearing and my world was getting smaller and smaller,” she said.

“I felt very lonely and isolated,” she said.

“‘It’s only when you come out of the grey, you think, I haven’t belly laughed for months …

“It can be a fantastic time in your life, of freedom. It’s just the next stage.”

McCall recently did documentary Sex, Mind and the Menopause – the follow-up to her 2021 programme Sex, Myths and the Menopause, which explored menopause myths and the taboo around HRT.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in