Kate Thornton says her menopause weight gain was like Gwyneth Paltrow's Shallow Hal character.
The 49-year-old TV presenter made an appearance on Thursday's Loose Women - where she was previously part of the panel from 2009 to 2011.
She opened up on her experience with the menopause and how she "lost" herself, as well as revealing she gained weight as part of the process.
Talking to viewers, Kate revealed: "I approached the menopause like how I'd approach a documentary. It's controlling and consuming me so I'm going to push back and regain control.
"It stripped me of the personality that I liked and 15 others moved in. I didn't trust myself. The weight gain was like Shallow Hal, I just woke up one day like [blows air]."
Kate added: "I wasn't eating anything different, I was so weepy."
In Shallow Hal, actress Gwyneth Paltrow stars as a 300-pound woman named Rosie who Hal (Jack Black) falls in love with.
Kate is a proud mum-of-one to son Ben - who she previously vowed to quit smoking for.
During the coronavirus pandemic, she revealed: "Now I’ve achieved the levels of fitness that I want, it’s time for me to seal the deal and give up smoking.
“The first time I gave up was in my early 30s when I got a chest infection.”
But she later slipped back into the habit, before quitting again to have a baby with former boyfriend DJ Darren Emerson.
“That was a brilliant incentive, and I used Nicorette patches," she said.
However, about four years after having Ben she began puffing once more. Kate says her lapse was down to “difficulties in my personal life”.
But this time she’s determined to give up permanently.
She says: “My son is of an age now where he’s mortified. When I smoke, he gets really, really angry, which I completely understand.
“I don’t smoke around him. I keep it to social events as best I can. But he says it’s ridiculous and stupid and ‘Why do you do it?’, on repeat. I get where he’s coming from.
“It’s not nice to be around. It’s time to stop. He’s why I’m doing it. My job is to be his role model. I know that smoking is a great disappointment to him.”
During lockdown, Kate worked hard on her fitness levels.
She said: “I’ve been doing HIIT training six times a week and I’m fitter than I’ve been in a long time. It got two weeks into lockdown and I thought, we’re going to go one of two ways here. I’m going to be that woman who sits and drinks or eats their way through this or I’m going to be the woman who says this is a reset."
