Just weeks before the shock announcement that she had been diagnosed with a brain tumour, Davina McCall opened up about how she had prepared her family for the event of “something happening” to her.
The fitness guru and former Big Brother presenter explained how she believed in being open and honest about death, rather than shying away from the subject.
Discussing Emma Willis’s TV show, Delivering Babies, Davina told The Observer: “It’s a privilege to be at someone’s birth and it’s a privilege to be at someone’s death. And I feel like I’m quite good at it.”
She described how she had witnessed the deaths of both her father, Andrew, who died in 2022, and her older sister, Caroline, who tragically died of cancer in 2012, when she was only 50 years old.
Now 57 herself, Davina believes in coming to terms with mortality: “It doesn’t frighten me,” she says.
She adds that she has already prepared her loved ones for her death, whenever it might come.
Davina explained that, from her own experience, she has found the key to helping people in death is reflecting upon who they were in life.
The TV star told the publication: “I spend a lot of my time now telling the people I love what a f*****g great life I’ve had. So that if something were to happen to me suddenly, they’d know – I’ve loved my life.”
Just two months later, Davina revealed in an Instagram post announcing her diagnosis of a “very rare” colloid cyst that she had put her “head in the sand for a while”, before taking control of the situation and seeking out top neurosurgeons for advice on how to deal with it.
“I realised that I have to get it taken out,” she said. “It’s big for the space – it fills the space. It’s 14mm wide. And it needs to come out because if it grows it would be bad.”
Davina shared how she would have to have part of her skull removed to allow surgeons to gain access to the 14mm growth.
She urged fans to “Say a prayer for me” before the operation, which could require surgery of up to six hours.
Exercise fanatic Davina will be ordered to avoid any strenuous activity for at least a month after the operation, but the outlook for patients undergoing a craniotomy has improved dramatically in recent years.
