Helen Skelton has revealed the profound humiliation she experienced following her public split from former husband, rugby league footballer Richie Myler, four years ago. The 42-year-old former Blue Peter presenter, who married Myler in December 2013, saw their relationship end just shy of a decade later when Myler moved out of the family home in 2022.
Despite her long career in entertainment, including becoming one of the BBC's youngest breakfast-slot hosts on Radio Cumbria in 2005, Skelton admitted the aftermath of the split felt deeply humiliating. Growing up in a small Cumbrian village, she noted that people around her knew intimate details of her personal life and would often stop to ask her family questions.
Public Scrutiny and Family Impact
"It felt humiliating to me because of where I'm from," Skelton told The Times. "I didn't enjoy walking down the street and people knowing stuff about my past." Her father, Richard, would overhear conversations about Helen at his local golf club, and employees at her local Sainsbury's would question her about her love life while she shopped for groceries.
The public scrutiny extended to her children and wider family, adding to the distress of the separation. Skelton has three children with Myler, and the split was widely covered in the media.
Strictly Come Dancing as Empowerment
Just months after the split, Skelton landed a role competing on BBC's Strictly Come Dancing, which enhanced her public profile and added a new dimension to her personal narrative. She finished in second place, using the platform as a form of "revenge" to demonstrate she was thriving independently.
During her stint on the show, Skelton performed a dance to "Mein Herr" from Cabaret, which became known as her "revenge dance." She explained: "It struck a chord, one of the dancers said, 'You did that for all of us, didn't you?' I wanted to have my own narrative. I was sick of the patronising looks, the 'Ooh, how are you?' I didn't have the capacity to say, 'I'm brilliant, how are you?' That's what the dance did." As part of the routine, she mouthed Sally Bowles' legendary line "You're better off without me," a pointed message to those who doubted her.
Rumours and Dating Life
Following her appearances on Morning Live, speculation arose that Skelton was romantically involved with co-star Gethin Jones. However, she dismissed these rumours, calling him one of her "best friends." She said: "No, well, he's in Manchester working away, so yeah, no, all good. We just work together, we are not together. No, no, no. We are just work friends. They printed pictures of us at work and that we're together because we are at work together."
Skelton also ruled out joining dating apps like Tinder anytime soon. She recently pushed back against the notion that women become "invisible" in midlife. "I think that's just a reflection of where people think they are on the priority list," she revealed. "When you're in your 40s, you've got house commitments, family commitments, relationship commitments, and feeling good in an on-trend outfit is sometimes far down the to-do list."
She added: "When you hit this chapter of life, you've got a lot of people to look after, so you have to step forward and be the matriarch rather than stand in the background. That's the irony – the time when you feel invisible is the time when everybody needs you. But if you haven't got a spring in your own step, how can you make sure everybody else is springing?"
