As her 54th birthday approaches, judge has found herself acutely aware of life’s fragility, with two close friends undergoing grave health issues.
Her colleague Jamie Theakston, co-host of the Heart FM Breakfast Show, took a harrowing hiatus after being struck by throat cancer, leaving fans concerned during his three-month absence.
Simultaneously, The Masked Singer panelist Davina McCall faced brain surgery to remove a threatening colloid cyst.
shared her alarm with the Daily Mail: “And with Jamie on top of that you just think, ‘This is all going to s***'”.
She opened up about her personal response to health concerns, revealing to the publication: “‘I’m really good at facing up to things. I have a mammogram and my bloods checked every year. I think that you become very much aware of your own mortality when you become a parent.”
Don’t miss…
Davina McCall had to have a brain tumour removed (Image: Handout)
Throughout Jamie’s ordeal, Amanda was a pillar of support, staying in touch as he negotiated a challenging prognosis that could have silenced his career forever. Thankfully, due to timely detection, Jamie triumphantly resumed his role on Heart Radio.
Amanda recalled: “They kept his return as a surprise as they had to be sure he could talk for three and a half hours,” and marvelling at his recovery, she shared, “He looks so much better. He’s on a vegetarian diet too. He’s got a different perspective on life as people who have survived cancer often do.”
Jamie Theakston has been battling cancer (Image: INSTAGRAM)
The mother of two has faced her own severe ordeal when a critical bleed occurred during the birth of her daughter Hollie in 2012. The situation was dire enough to induce a coma, with her heart ceasing to beat for an alarming 40 seconds.
In her autobiography, Amanda recounted the frightening moment she confronted mortality and alerted her husband Chris: “Unbeknown to everyone, my placenta had attached itself to my bladder, and when they lifted it out, it snagged a large artery and ruptured it. I had haemorrhaged and was bleeding to death.”
She pleaded earnestly with him, “I looked at Chris and said, ‘Don’t let me die’.”