Patsy Palmer says turning 50 gave her the courage to do Dancing On Ice

Patsy Palmer reckons turning 50 has given her a new lease of life – and it even pushed her out of her comfort zone with Dancing On Ice.

The former EastEnders star celebrated the milestone on May 26 last year.

She was later the first star announced for the line-up of Dancing On Ice 2023, with the likes of The Wanted’s Siva Kaneswaran, Joey Essex, and drag queen The Vivienne joining her.

Patsy – who is skating with show legend Matt Evers – has revealed that hitting the big 5-0 motivated her to start saying yes to more things.

Speaking on The One Show after sailing through the first week on the public vote, she said of her age: ‘It was such a shock, I can’t believe it,’ adding that it didn’t feel ‘real’ when she woke up on her 50th birthday.

‘It was very odd,’ she admitted. ‘It’s just a weird age to turn when you feel 25.’

‘They asked me to do it and I was like, right, everything I do now I have to have some sort of sparkle, or something fun, so I did it this year.’

Pro skater Matt then revealed this was far from the first time the daring ITV show has approached Patsy to take part.

‘We’ve been asking her for probably the past, well, since the series reboot, which was five series ago, and we’ve been trying to get her on! So we finally got her!’

Matt – who has appeared on the show since the beginning, for all 15 series – then laughed when asked how Patsy compares to previous partners Gemma Collins and Pamela Anderson.

‘Oh jeez, it’s a huge question, it’s apples to oranges. Everybody does the show for their own personal reasons and everybody takes away from the show their own individual thing,’ Matt began.

‘I think what I love about Patsy is that she has fallen in love with our sport and that doesn’t always happen.

‘She’s already said that she wants to take up skating when she gets back to LA, join a local club, so for me, I’ve already done my job because we love our sport, it’s such a beautiful sport, and the fact that I’ve transferred that onto her is really nice.’

Patsy added that taking part in the dangerous yet glitzy programme has been ‘amazing.’

‘It keeps you completely in the moment, very hard not to be because, you know, you can be standing… I’ve stood still before on ice skates and then I’ve just hit the deck and I’m like, how the hell did I do that? So when you’re moving around, it can be dangerous.

‘But the key is to try and relax. But it’s so difficult!’

Despite how challenging she’s finding it, Matt was full of praise for how his partner is doing and clearly fans love her, as the votes came streaming in, meaning Patsy and Matt will skate a second time next week.

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