Davina McCall felt ‘less of a woman’ as she opens up on health struggle

Davina McCall felt ‘less of a woman’ as she opens up on health struggle

Davina McCall has shared her anger over the lack of information she had about the menopause, which spurred her to speak out on the issue.

The former Big Brother presenter is renowned for her relentless campaigning and advocacy around open discussions about the menopause, but recently admitted that she was completely in the dark when her perimenopause started.

Speaking at an Advertising Week Europe 2025 event in London, the 57-year-old revealed: “I was f*****g furious at the lack of knowledge that I had as a 43-year-old woman going through perimenopause, and [I was] terrified, lonely, not knowing what it was.

“I had no idea. And I thought, ‘how, why? Why do I not know about this?’ I spoke to a couple of doctors. I was like, I know nothing. I literally know nothing. This is so insulting.

“There’s nothing you can do to avoid it. There’s no magic pill that you can take… It’s going to happen to all women. And then I thought, ‘well, I’ll just start talking about it’.”

In 2021, the star received widespread acclaim for her Channel documentary titled Sex, Myths and the Menopause, where she chronicled her own experience and offered any advice and help available for other women, reports the Manchester Evening News.

Davina previously confessed: “When I was taking HRT, I was so ashamed of it. In some way, I thought I’d given up, I was less of a woman, I wasn’t as strong as my other female counterparts. I didn’t think that any of my friends were on HRT.

“We never talked about it, it was such a shameful subject. It was ageing. It kind of gave this impression that you were washed up.”

Recently, Davina discovered she had a benign brain tumour last year, thanks to a health scan she received after giving a talk on menopause.

She revealed in a video: “A few months ago, I did a menopause talk for a company and they offered me a health scan in return, which I thought I was gonna ace.

“But it turned out I had a benign brain tumour called a colloid cyst which is very rare. Three in a million. So I slightly put my head in the sand.”

Davina co-hosted Comic Relief’s 40th birthday bash in late March with Jonathan Ross, Joel Dommett, Alison Hammond, Rylan Clark and Alesha Dixon. Reflecting on her diagnosis, she became emotional as she spoke about the support she received from her family and partner Michael Douglas.

“And it’s been, quite possibly, the hardest thing I’ve ever been through and this whole experience,” she shared, “weirdly, kind of weighing up all the risks and all the positive things about having this tumour removed made me think deeply about what life is all about, and what really, really matters when things get tough.”

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