Phillip Schofield has stated that he has ‘lost everything’ as a result of his romance with a former colleague.
Last week, the former This Morning host, 61, made headlines after admitting to an affair with a considerably younger male colleague who worked as a runner on the ITV daytime programme.
Schofield left from ITV after lying about the connection to colleagues, superiors, and his family, and his career has since fallen apart.
He stood down as host of the British Soap Awards earlier this week, with Jane McDonald taking his place.
He has also been withdrawn as an ambassador for The Prince’s Trust and has lost sponsorships.
Brands are allegedly refusing to deal with This Morning, and guests are reportedly refusing to conduct interviews.
In his first complete interview since admitting to the affair – which Schofield believes was ‘unwise, but not criminal’ – the former Dancing On Ice presenter stated that he does not believe he can recover from it.
‘I am not sleeping, I am not eating,’ he told The Sun, having fled to be in Cornwall with his 87-year-old mother.
‘My mind is in constant, utter turmoil. I think back to regrets, forwards to… What do I do now? What I am going to do now?
‘I do not think I will be able to walk down a street ever again. It is like everybody knows.
‘I am dressed like this because I haven’t been able to go home. I can’t go out. I don’t think a charity will want to be associated with me.’
He added that he ‘understands’ why he was dropped by The Prince’s Trust but it ‘broke my heart’.
‘I’ve lost everything. It’s all gone,’ he said frankly.
‘Telly was my safe space, the one thing I loved. Now I don’t know if I will ever work on telly again.’
He also doesn’t know what his ‘identity’ is anymore.
‘I don’t know who I am now. What happens in six months time? What am I going to do?
‘I have the rest of my life now to try and plan for Steph and the girls, and hope that I can look after them.’
Schofield’s wife of 30 years, Stephanie Lowe, and they have two kids, Molly, 29, and Ruby, 27.
Schofield claimed that his wife was’very, very upset’ when he informed her about the affair, which she was unaware of.
He also thanked his girls for their assistance.
The ex-daytime star admitted he felt suicidal in the aftermath of his confession and stated they ‘guarded’ him.
‘I am in a very bad way,’ he said. ‘Mentally, utterly, utterly broken.’
‘And if it hadn’t been for my girls last week I wouldn’t be here.
‘I know I deserve it but they said, “Don’t you dare, we’re here to look after you”. I feel embarrassed and ashamed.
‘I have just felt like I was going lower and lower and lower and lower. And then, this bizarre, numbness washes over you, like a selfishness.’
Phillip Schofield statement in full
‘I am making this statement via the Daily Mail to whom I have already apologised personally for misleading, through my lawyer who I also misled, about a story which they wanted to write about me a few days ago.
‘The first thing I want to say is: I am deeply sorry for having lied to them, and to many others about a relationship that I had with someone working on This Morning. I did have a consensual on-off relationship with a younger male colleague at This Morning.
‘Contrary to speculation, whilst I met the man when he was a teenager and was asked to help him to get into television, it was only after he started to work on the show that it became more than just a friendship. That relationship was unwise, but not illegal. It is now over.
‘When I chose to come out I did so entirely for my own wellbeing. Nobody “forced” me out. Neither I nor anyone else, to my knowledge, has ever issued an injunction, super or otherwise, about my relationship with this colleague, he was never moved on or sacked by or because of me. In an effort to protect my ex-colleague I haven’t been truthful about the relationship.
‘But my recent, unrelated, departure from This Morning fuelled speculation and raised questions which have been impacting him, so for his sake it is important for me to be honest now.
‘I am painfully conscious that I have lied to my employers at ITV, to my colleagues and friends, to my agents, to the media and therefore the public and most importantly of all to my family. I am so very, very sorry, as I am for having been unfaithful to my wife.
‘I have therefore decided to step down from the British Soap Awards, my last public commitment, and am resigning from ITV with immediate effect expressing my immense gratitude to them for all the amazing opportunities that they have given me.
‘I will reflect on my very bad judgment in both participating in the relationship and then lying about it. To protect his privacy, I am not naming this individual and my deepest wish is that both he and his family can now move on with their lives free from further intrusion, and that this statement will enable them to do so.
‘I ask the media now to respect their privacy. They have done nothing wrong, and I ask that their privacy should be respected.’