Strictly Come Dancing star Amy Dowden has revealed that she has Chrohn's disease and how it has impacted on her dancing career.
Amy has been part of BBC Strictly's dance professionals for the past two years and had kept it secret until now, as she wants to use her experience to help others.
The NHS describes Chrohn's as a lifelong condition in which parts of the digestive system become inflamed.
People with the disease commonly experience phases of intense abdominal pain, severe vomiting, exhaustion and bloody diarrhoea, among other symptoms.
The 27-year-old Strictly star has lived with the condition since she was a child and she opened up to Hello! magazine that she "didn't want to be known as 'Amy with Crohn's."
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Speaking about how she wanted to forge her career, Amy said: "I wanted to establish myself as 'Amy the dancer' first.
"But I've done two seasons on the show now, and I think it's important to speak out.
"It will be a relief that people will finally know, but I don't want any sympathy. It doesn't define me, it's just part of me, and I want this to be a positive story."
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Amy, who has been paired with comic Brian Conley (2017) and actor Danny John-Jules (2018) during her time on Strictly, said that she has so far only confided in a handful of her co-stars about her illness, including professional dancers Oti Mabuse and Dianne Buswell.
Amy revealed the reason for telling so few: "I didn't want any sympathy, but there's been days when I've not been myself and returned home from rehearsals and been really unwell.
"People are often shocked by my day-to-day, but for me it's just normal."
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She added: "There are occasions when I'm on tour, like the other week on Here Come The Girls, when I'm being sick in between the dances.
"The theatre wanted to call an ambulance. But the performance must go on. I come out and put a smile on my face. It won't stop me."
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Amy is working with the charity Crohn's and Colitis UK, and said she will keep an eye on her symptoms in the run-up to her wedding day to her professional dance partner Ben Jones next summer.
She said: "Obviously leading up to it I need to make sure that if there's a symptom I'm on top of it."
*Read the full interview in Hello! magazine, out now.
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