'I DREAM OF A WORLD IN WHICH THERE IS NO SUICIDE'

STRICTLY JUDGE AND CALM AMBASSADOR SHIRLEY BALLAS FACES HER FEARS IN A NEW CHALLENGE TO HONOUR HER LOVED ONES

- ISOBEL PANKHURST

THE SKY'S THE LIMIT

Strong, sparkly and sassy are the three words that best describe Strictly Come Dancing head judge Shirley Ballas. But her bubbly persona masks a tragedy that can still reduce her to tears two decades on.

In 2003, her elder brother, David, took his own life at  the age of 44. The fact that he had kept his mental anguish hidden still haunts the world-champion dancer. She revisited her grief in her 2020 autobiography, Behind The Sequins: My Life, and those feelings resurfaced recently when she revealed a 38-year-old student she tutored had ended her life.

Saying depression and suicide ”runs in my family”, Wallasey-born Shirley is no stranger to mental health struggles. But she has coping mechanisms in place. “I’ve had down and dark days throughout my whole life, but I’ve always had music and I’ve always had dancing,” she says. “And, of course, I’ve got my mother, and we’re glued at the hip.”

This month, Shirley, 62, will take on a fund-raising challenge in memory of David and her student – while facing down her own deep-rooted fears. She will be swapping the ballroom for the skies in Shirley’s Skyathlon to help the suicide-prevention charity Campaign Against Living Miserably (CALM). It will mean Shirley braving the world’s fastest zip line, doing a wing walk at 700ft in the air and making a 15,000ft skydive.

“This is the most terrifying thing ever for me to do,” she admits. “I’m terrified of heights. But you know, I lost a loved one and another loved one’s just gone, so that’s what I’m going to do. I just need people to get behind me.”