Victoria Coren Mitchell's fear of flying has a heartbreaking origin: her therapist died in a plane crash. The 53-year-old Only Connect star has been open about suffering from aviophobia, and a recent social media post highlighted the tragic link.
The Tragic Backstory
In 2000, the professional poker player was seeing a therapist to help overcome her fear of flying. The therapist then died in a plane crash, leading her to choose travel only by rail or boat.
Writing in the Evening Standard, she explained: "My approach to aircraft technology is that of an ill-travelled New Guinea tribesman: 'Big metal bird not stay in sky. Me stay on ground'. I was once only mildly afraid, until I went for treatment with a fear-of-flying counsellor. Then he died in a plane crash. I'm not kidding. Since then, I have tried everything from hypnotherapy to good old-fashioned train travel, so I'm quite prepared to have a go at a book which might prove reassuring."
Her Perspective on Flying
She admitted that "those of us who fear flying tend not to be logical people", adding: "We do not operate by statistics, so don't come to us with your 'millions-to-one'. When we board a plane, it will either crash or it will not."
Fear of Motherhood
The broadcaster, who married Peep Show star David Mitchell in 2012, also shared her fear of motherhood. She confessed she was "terrified all the time" when she first became a mum. The couple have two daughters: Barbara, born in 2015, and June, born in 2023.
Writing in 2016, Victoria said that the sheer number of celebrity deaths meant she couldn't look forward to the festive period. That year, Victoria Wood, David Bowie, Alan Rickman, George Michael and Prince all passed away just days after she published her article. She said the sense of devastation was only strengthened by becoming a mum for the first time.
In her column for the Guardian, she described the first few months of motherhood as being "dizzy with sleep deprivation, aching in every corner and crevice, baffled by breastfeeding, terrified of cot death, riddled with guilt about every failure, nervous and tearful, ravaged with misery at the news of any slightly negative thing happening to anybody anywhere in the world."
She added: "Women do laugh about the physical disintegration, so you know about that in advance. But nobody tells you about the sadness and the terror. Not really, anyway. I'm so grateful (and besotted by) my daughter, but I was the freest person I'd ever met, and I'll never be free again. I'm frightened all the time."
