Corrie star and former Strictly champ Jill Halfpenny has opened up about her experience finding love again.
It comes seven years after the sudden death of her partner at the age of 43.
Jill’s partner Matt Janes suffered a tragic heart attack while at the gym in 2017, something it took her two years to address publicly.
Devastatingly for Jill, losing Matt happened in very similar circumstances to those in which she lost her father in 1979 aged just four, after he passed away playing football.
Jill Halfpenny on partner Matt’s death
“There was a sense of feeling cursed when Matt died after what happened to my dad,” Jill, now 48, recently told Prima magazine. “Like, how can that happen twice? That drove me to therapy to investigate those feelings because I thought, I’m not going to live alongside that narrative.”
On a previous podcast appearance, she described the sense of “dealing with a double loss – a loss I’d never dealt with”. “My grief at losing Matt, my partner, was so brutal, and so shocking, but then what happened was it brought out all of my grief from my dad as well,” she explained.
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Jill on new love
Seven years on from the awful tragedy, Jill has now bravely opened up about how she dealt with the bereavements in her upcoming memoir, A Life Reimagined: My Journey of Hope in the Midst of Loss.
I didn’t know if I’d ever meet anyone again.
She has also shared the lovely news that she has found love again with partner Ian.
“It sounds so cheesy, but I think Ian and I met at the perfect time. After Matt died, I didn’t know if I’d ever meet anyone again, but Ian is my cheerleader… I know I’ve met somebody who I love and who loves me,” she said.
Read more: Jill Halfpenny on mum guilt and blended families
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