North East star Jill Halfpenny talks about double tragedy of losing her dad and partner to heart attacks

Gateshead born Jill Halfpenny is one of the most recognisable faces on British television. She’s had a career spanning more than 30 years and has appeared in some of the country’s best loved shows, including Byker Grove, Coronation Street and Waterloo Road. More recently, she’s appeared in a string of Channel 5 dramas, the latest being The Feud which began on Monday.

But, away from the success of her TV career, Jill has had a lot of pain to deal with. The star, who will celebrate her milestone 50th birthday in July, lost her dad Colin Halfpenny to a heart attack in 1979, when she was just four years old. Then, almost 40 years later, in 2017, her partner Matt James also died of a heart attack.

In a new interview with The Guardian, Jill has spoken about how losing two of the most important men in her life has impacted her. She told the publication: “My dad died of a heart attack when I was four. It was never addressed and as a result I liked to stay busy. I was always filling my time trying not to think, and I hated the idea of going home and realising that I had nothing on.”

Colin died at the age of 36 after he had a heart attack during a game of five-a-side football. She added: “The quietness of Sundays was awful. I thrived on stress and stimulation; I danced as much as I could. Without knowing, I was learning a lesson: ballet is often painful, but if you stay with the pain it gets a lot easier. It took me decades to realise the same method applies to dealing with grief.”

She continued to say that the loss of her father affected her all the way to adulthood, and admitted that there was a time when she used alcohol to help her cope with the grief which had been “unaddressed” up until that point.

“All of that unaddressed grief stopped me from being able to fully feel present with happiness,” she said. “I kept waiting for something to fill the hole; for everything to fall into place. When success started happening, and I still wasn’t fixed, I started to unravel. I spent my 30s working on that: I had been leaning on alcohol to stop the thoughts, and eventually I went to AA. I got sober. I thought ‘hey, look at me. I’m ready for my life now!’”.

But, sadly, Jill’s happiness was somewhat short-lived, and her feelings of grief only compounded, when, in her forties, her partner Matt died suddenly at the age of 43 - also of a heart attack.

She went on: “I met a man named Matt. We fell in love. We were so happy together. Then, in 2017, he died. I was like ‘huh? That doesn’t seem right. That’s not how that was supposed to happen.’ I thought I’d done the work, I thought I’d been a good girl, I thought I’d done all the things I should do. Matt dying of a heart attack brought me to another level of surrender entirely.”

Jill has spoken about the day Matt died in a previous interview, saying that he left to go to an exercise class in the morning and “never came home”.

The pair, who were trying for a baby, looked lovingly at one another before he left - not knowing it would be the last time they would see each other.

The actress went back to sleep afterwards,but she was woken up by people banging on her door who had come to alert her of Matt’s medical emergency. She rushed to his gym and found him lying on the ground. He could not be revived.

Later in The Guardian interview, the actress said the second tragedy led to her having an important realisation: “I realised that what you have to do when life implodes is . . . nothing. You can’t productivity your way out of grief.”

She candidly went on: “Some days, I still struggle. I am prone to existential moments where I honestly don’t know what life is about or why I am here. Then other days, I go: “That’s a real crock of s*** that, Jill. It’s all overthinking, so get on with it and have a nice time.”

The star also said that having so much experience of firsthand grief taught her how to approach others who are also dealing with it.

“My experiences of losing my dad and Matt have taught me such valuable lessons about how to treat others who are grieving, too. When I was in the thick of it, I could never answer the question ‘how are you?’, it was too big. ‘How was this morning?’ or ‘how was school drop-off?’ were far better. Breaking the grief into specific bits makes it easier to talk about,” she said.

Jill was previously married to actor Craig Conway from 2007 and 2010 and they are parents to 16-year-old son Henry. She has since found love again with marketing executive Ian McAllister, 48.

The Feud began on Monday, April 14 and airs at 9pm each Monday to Wednesday thereafter.