In Kate Garraway’s Life Stories interview, talk show host Jeremy Kyle opens up about some of the darkest times of his life, including when he broke down in tears following a cancer diagnosis
He made a career of getting other people to discuss their most personal problems in front of an often unforgiving public. So viewers will be surprised to hear the tough-talking Jeremy Kyle opening up about some of his most difficult and vulnerable moments.
In an emotional interview on Kate Garraway’s Life Stories on ITV tonight, he talks for the first time about the suicide of studio guest Steve Dymond, a week after he failed a lie detector test on the Jeremy Kyle Show. The tragedy brought an abrupt end to the long-running chat show and sent the host’s successful career into freefall.
But Kyle, 59, whose ITV show regularly pulled in up to a million viewers per episode, speaks about an even more personally devastating moment – when he was told he had testicular cancer. His ordeal began in 2012 when an examination found he had a lump on one of his testicles. Within 24 hours of being referred to a specialist, he was undergoing surgery to remove it.
Speaking about his diagnosis for the first time, he remembered breaking down in the arms of a doctor after being told the tumour was cancerous. He remembered: “I got to the hospital and I was on my own. I remember walking down this corridor and this huge bloke opened the door.
“He was an anaesthetist, he was about 11ft tall. I collapsed into his arms and started crying. I remember thinking, ‘I’m dead’.” After the surgery in December 2012 came the agonising wait to find out if his cancer had spread to other parts of his body.
He said: “I remember waking up to this amazing nurse, who stayed with me all night and held my hand. I was terrified. I thought if she went out of the door and the light went out, that was it. I thought I was dead.”
Finally the news came back that the testicle was ’90% toxic’. If it had been “95 or 96 per cent toxic, it would have spread. I was very lucky,” he said. The TV host underwent rounds of chemotherapy and was finally given the all clear.
He later told The Sun: “It’s been a horrific time – a very sobering experience – but now I just feel lucky to be alive. I feel lucky that I’m here for family and can see my kids grow up.”
Kyle, who in 2021 married his third wife Vicky Burton, with whom he has two children, Ollie and Iris, later revealed that the terrifying cancer diagnosis encouraged him to launch a new medical show, Jeremy Kyle’s Emergency Room.
Talking on This Morning to Eamonn Holmes and Ruth Langsford in 2015, he said: “I’ve moved on but over the last couple of weeks I’ve met people who are terrified of what they’re going to find out. If you’d asked me five years ago, I’d say I was too squeamish [to do the show] but it’s been seriously fascinating. There’s real constructive help here from the doctors.”
The show, which run for two series from June 2015 to February 2017, has been described as a cross between The Jeremy Kyle Show and Embarrassing Bodies in which he joined staff in hospital wards who were treating patients with a number of ailments.