Andrea McLean in Celebrity Wellbeing
Loose Women’s Andrea McLean talks to GABRIELLE FAGAN about regaining control of her health and managing the menopause
ANDREA MCLEAN is undoubtedly glamorous and successful – she’ll celebrate 12 years as a panellist on the hugely popular daytime show Loose Women in March – but she’s had her share of personal challenges.
It’s only now – after more than a decade battling emotional and physical trauma – that Glasgowborn Andrea, 49, feels confident enough to declare “I’ve kind of broken my own curse”, and is finally “content and not afraid any more”.
She was diagnosed with the blood disease medium-vessel vasculitis following a hysterectomy in 2016, which also triggered a “tough” early menopause. Andrea, who candidly charted the experience in her book, Confessions Of A Menopausal Woman, is now fronting a Holland & Barrett campaign to banish the taboos surrounding menopause.
The mother-of-two – who’s been married to Nick Feeney since 2017 – hopes that sharing her experiences will help women navigating this tricky phase of life.
What does Loose Women mean to you?
IT’S been like therapy for me because I’ve been through so many life experiences while I’ve been on it, and it’s saved my life on many occasions during those tough times.
When I first joined, I had a 12-week-old baby – my daughter Amy will be 13 this year! During the time on the show, I’ve gone through post-natal depression, got married, got divorced, was very sad, met a new man and got married again.
We’re all great friends, best friends, and completely open with each other about our lives and what’s happening to us.
We know each others’ secrets, and trust that everyone will have your back and catch you if you fall.
Unlike any other friends, who might sympathise with your problems and agree with your views, the Loose Women are much more honest and won’t be afraid to tell you what’s what.
That’s so lovely and helpful because you never learn anything about yourself if someone just nods and agrees with you all the time.
There was discussion on the show about the Loose Women ‘curse’ because so many panellists have split from their partners – does it exist?
I DON’T think there’s any curse. If you get a group of women who are are a bunch of friends or work together, 90% of them will have gone through what we’ve gone through. The only difference is we’re open about it all on telly. But I feel I have kind of broken my own curse, let alone a Loose Women one. I’m content now. When I was younger, I spent a lot of time being afraid.
In your 20s, you make decisions based on what you want and hope for, but what’s liberating at my age is I know the things I don’t want to do and can make decisions based on that, which is more realistic.
How is marriage third time around?
WE’VE been married a year and it’s proved so much better than I ever thought it could be. I was so nervous before the wedding, because the thought of maybe going through divorce again was worrying.
To the outside world, ‘TV presenter gets divorced twice’ is a really easy mocking headline, but from a deeply personal point of view, on each occasion there was a lot of trauma involved.
Nick helped dispel my wedding fears by saying quite logically, ‘But you’ve never been married to me before’. That made total sense, and being married to him is completely different to any other experience I’ve ever had. We’ve found marriage actually works for us.
What makes the relationship work?
WE’RE very similar, we want to make each other happy, and we’re very kind people. Nick’s incredibly thoughtful. Of course, we have rows occasionally, just like any other couple, but there’s something really joyful about coming together in middle-age, because we’ve learned from past experiences, give each other space to do our own thing, and are brave enough to speak out about the things we don’t like instead of letting things fester.
How do you feel about turning 50 this year?
I’M thinking – ‘Wow – 50!’ – and looking forward to embracing a whole new decade and putting a lot of stuff behind me. In my 20s, I did all the crazy things people put on their bucket lists – I’ve bungee-jumped, skydived, survived white water rafting – and in my middle bit leading up to now, I’ve just been dealing with life, dramas, living and surviving.
Now, I feel I’m lifting my head up and trying to figure out what I actually want to do. I’ve just taken part in Celebrity SAS: Who Dares Wins (set to run on Channel 4 later this year) – it was probably the most insane thing I’ve ever done.
You’ve been open about your experiences with menopause – how are you coping with it now? THE menopause was, and sometimes still is, a scary time. I wanted to be open about my experience of this stage women go through because when I started mine, I couldn’t identify with anything the media was telling me.
Getting involved in Holland & Barrett’s Me.No. Pause campaign to break the taboos around menopause was a no-brainer for me. It encapsulates everything I think about the menopause and also of women of my age – you’re not invisible any more, you’re still a strong and capable woman who’s able to do different things, and you come from all different walks of life.
How are you coping with the symptoms?
HAVING a surgical menopause – a full hysterectomy and my ovaries removed – isn’t like a normal menopause, because you’re dramatically plunged into a different stage in your life.
I go through spells where, for a few months, I literally wake up every night soaked in sweat because of hot flushes, or lie awake in the early hours because of insomnia.
For me, the worst symptom is overwhelming anxiety. It feels like there’s a lion in the room and I have an overwhelming feeling of apprehension, awfulness, and a conviction everything’s going wrong.
How do you look after your health and wellbeing?
HAVING my hysterectomy saved my life, because the vasculitis (a disease that causes blood vessels to inflame) might not have been discovered.
I do what I can to stay healthy. Going to the gym and doing yoga regularly is good for my head. I’ve started a strict diet to cleanse and rest my gut for two months. I’ve suffered constant dull stomach pain and discomfort for years.
I have allergies, can’t tolerate dairy, and I’ve also had a five abdominal operations, including two caesareans and surgery for hernias as well as hysterectomy. The hope is this cleanse will allow the area to heal and I can reintroduce certain foods slowly.