‘It's never nice reading comments about your body but this one was a saviour'

Michelle Heaton opens up to new about having breast reconstruction surgery after a fan’s alert and how she works on her sobriety every day

- ANNA MATHESON

When Michelle Heaton posed with her family for a piece in our sister magazine OK! to celebrate her first Christmas since getting sober, she wasn’t expecting to get hundreds of concerned messages about her breasts.

The star had a double mastectomy and reconstruction surgery 10 years ago. She made the drastic decision after she was found to carry the faulty BRCA2 gene – which meant she had an 85% chance of suffering breast cancer in her thirties.

In 2015, Michelle, 42, also had a hysterectomy due to ovarian cancer fears.

In the years that followed, she has been open about her troubles with booze and drugs – and last April she beat them with rehab. But while she was celebrating being sober, Michelle was surprised by comments about her breasts looking odd.

“Quite a few people pointed it out and there was one that really did make me pay attention,” Michelle tells new.

“It said something like, ‘Look at her. If I were her I’d be more worried about her breast looking like it’s exploded.’ It’s a difficult one as I always like to say I don’t read nasty comments. But for me, that wasn’t nasty, it was a saviour.”

After reading the comment, the Liberty X star went to her doctor, who feared her implant could be leaking or ruptured. And last month, Michelle – who shares children Faith, 10, and AJ, seven, with husband Hugh Hanley – had further reconstruction surgery.

Here, in our exclusive shoot, the brave star tells us how she’s getting on post-op, why she’s keen to help others who suffer from addiction and reveals her worries about her daughter Faith’s health...