I tried to take my own life twice after end of my marriage & beat breakdown by acting like toddler, reveals Rylan Clark
HE’S the reality TV favourite who’s been tipped to take over veteran DJ Ken Bruce’s Radio 2 slot.
So it’s hard to believe that less than two years ago Rylan Clark had such a severe mental breakdown that he went into isolation at home, twice attempted suicide and spent time in a psychiatric hospital.
Now the brave 34-year-old presenter has opened up about the steps he used to overcome his problems and admits he had to treat himself like a “toddler” and praise himself just for turning on the kettle and shower.
He said: “I couldn’t make my mum a cup of tea. I had the fear.
"I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t listen to music and I couldn’t watch TV.
“What I look back on is little things. You need to look at yourself like a toddler.
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"Going to the kitchen and pressing the button on the kettle is a step.
“The day that you go, ‘I’m just going to press the button — I’m not making the tea, let it boil, f*** it off’.
"The day you do that, that’s a little step.
“And the reason I say toddler is because you sit and applaud yourself for that.
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“I remember I didn’t want to clean myself. I didn’t want to shower.
“I remember the first step, another step on that ladder, I would turn the shower on then go away then turn it off.
"That’s one step. I’d turn the shower on, I’d put my leg in and turn it off and go away.
"My mum was on at me, ‘You’ve got to have a shower’, and I didn’t want to make her upset.
“I just went under the water, come out — like when you’re faking it as a kid — and come out in a towel and sort of pretended I’d had a shower.
“I didn’t wash myself, I didn’t have shower gel, I didn’t wash my hair, but that was a step.
“A few days later I did put shampoo in my hair.”
Even now Rylan says he has continued the “toddler” habit because he lives alone. He hit rock bottom in 2021.
It was believed to be down to the end of his six-year marriage to Dan Neal that spring, but Rylan now says it was also the combination of working non-stop for nine years.
He cheated on Dan “years ago” but decided to come clean in 2021, which caused the former police officer to walk out on their marriage.
While the pair did attempt to give their relationship another go, Dan ultimately left again after just two weeks.
Rylan said: “I think my marriage ending was the catalyst for the machine stopping.
“But actually, it was nine years of never stopping and never having time to breathe and actually understand what happened to me.
“For five months I just stopped and shut down. I tried to take my own life. I tried to do it twice.”
Rylan was 23, with bright blond hair, when he auditioned for The X Factor in 2012.
By 2013 he had won Celebrity Big Brother.
He went on to present The One Show, Strictly Come Dancing: It Takes Two, Supermarket Sweep and Ready Steady Cook.
He presents Rylan On Saturday on Radio 2, where he is now tipped to take over the weekly mid-morning show from veteran DJ Ken, who quit this week.
Rylan, who is also famed for his tan and sparkling teeth, has managed to build a £4million fortune and buy an Essex mansion complete with a Big Brother-style diary room, dressing room and swimming pool.
He now lives alone but is near his mum Linda, who he teamed up with when he joined Celebrity Gogglebox in 2019.
Rylan, who later this month fronts the Eurovision 2023 handover ceremony to mark the UK becoming host nation, also presented This Morning with husband Dan in 2016, becoming the first gay couple to host the ITV daytime show.
After their split he says his family and friends gathered around him.
‘DON’T SWEAT THE SMALL STUFF’
He said: “I know that feeling of people trying to help you, your loved ones, like my mum, my family, my friends trying to help me.
“People saying, ‘Snap out of it’ ain’t going to help you.
“But the one thing I know and I can say, hand-on-heart, is the only person who’ll get you out is you.
“If you’re not at that point, that’s all right. Sit there and stew.
“Being in that situation, you might as well be deaf and blind at the same time because you cannot see and you cannot hear.”
Speaking on the High Performance podcast this week with presenter Jake Humphrey and leading organisational psychologist Damian Hughes, Rylan told how he had therapy but wasn’t keen on taking antidepressants.
He said: “They didn’t work for me at first. That’s a very trial and error thing.
"I don’t even take a paracetamol when I’ve got a headache. I like just getting on with s**t. I was very anti all of that.
“Do I think they helped me in the end? Yes, I think they did but I’m not on them now.
"I’ve managed to come off them.” And now he manages to worry less.
He said: “Before I went through my episode, things would really bug me.
"But now — I hate the term because it’s such a cliche term — but it’s a full-on case of ‘don’t sweat the small stuff’.
"I just remind myself, ‘Listen, that’s not going to happen, not a problem, you’re all right, you’ve got your health, you’ve got your house, you’ve got your car, you’ve got some money in the bank, you’re all right’.
“I was at the airport the other day and I knew my flight was going to be cancelled.
“The panic started going, but then I just stopped myself.
“It’s almost like this cut-off before it boils over.
“I went, ‘Stop’, and, ‘If this flight’s cancelled I’m going to miss that which is sad but it’s fine, and all I need to do — I’ve got my credit card on me — I’ll just stay in a hotel, I’ve got clean underwear’.
"I try and go, ‘Is there another avenue, is there another airline?’
“So I work out the solution to the problem before the problem really gets me. It’s that simple.
“I feel like I’ve gone from Stevie Wonder to Specsavers.
“I feel like I’ve lived so long with not seeing anything in front of me and just grabbing, and doing, and living.
“But was I really living it?”
He is also determined to have more of a work-life balance despite being so in demand.
He said: “Everyone has the right to go, ‘F**k, I don’t want to go to work today’.
"I will get to the point where I feel like I just want a day off.
"That’s all right to think that. It’s all right to go, ‘Give it to someone else then’.”
Rylan now has a very small but tight circle of showbusiness friends who he truly trusts.
He told the podcast: “I feel that I can, hand-on-heart, say I’ve got friends in this industry that I can count on one hand.
“One hand is more than enough for me.
“I think I led with my heart for so long, which I don’t think is a bad thing because my heart has got me into places that I’m grateful that I did get to.
"But I forget to use my head sometimes and now I think I’m finding that perfect balance of the head and the heart.”
The TV host says he would eventually like to find love with someone again and share his life.
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But he admits: “The one thing I’m not secure in is a relationship at the moment.
“But I’m having a relationship with myself now that I’ve never had — and maybe I need to do that for me.”
You're Not Alone
EVERY 90 minutes in the UK a life is lost to suicide.
It doesn't discriminate, touching the lives of people in every corner of society - from the homeless and unemployed to builders and doctors, reality stars and footballers.
It's the biggest killer of people under the age of 35, more deadly than cancer and car crashes.
And men are three times more likely to take their own life than women.
Yet it's rarely spoken of, a taboo that threatens to continue its deadly rampage unless we all stop and take notice, now.
That is why The Sun launched the You're Not Alone campaign.
The aim is that by sharing practical advice, raising awareness and breaking down the barriers people face when talking about their mental health, we can all do our bit to help save lives.
Let's all vow to ask for help when we need it, and listen out for others... You're Not Alone.
If you, or anyone you know, needs help dealing with mental health problems, the following organisations provide support:
- CALM, www.thecalmzone.net, 0800 585 858
- Heads Together, www.headstogether.org.uk
- Mind, www.mind.org.uk, 0300 123 3393
- Papyrus, www.papyrus-uk.org, 0800 068 41 41
- Samaritans, www.samaritans.org, 116 123
- Movember, www.uk.movember.com
- Anxiety UK www.anxietyuk.org.uk, 03444 775 774 Monday-Friday 9.30am-10pm, Saturday/Sunday 10am-8pm
