What Not To Wear host Susannah Constantine gives major health update amid hearing loss struggle

Susannah Constantine, known for starring in TV show What Not To Wear, has issued a major health update. The TV host told The Mirror she began to notice a change in her hearing earlier this year.

However, she went on to admit that she thinks the problem may have gone on for a year and a half before she took action. The 60-year-old said: "The penny didn’t really drop until spring.

"I live in the countryside, birdsong is something I’ve always loved and found very comforting. I was sitting in a big barrel of water doing my cold water immersion, listening to the birds, thinking, ‘There’s a mistle thrush and there’s a… why aren’t I hearing it?’

"It was a cacophony of noise without the clarity and differentiation. That’s when I realised. Well, that coupled with my children [Joe, 23, Esme, 21 and Cece, 18] calling me deaf and getting really frustrated with me."

She added that social situations were becoming a struggle for her due to her hearing.

She said: "Ambient noise is awful. I wasn’t able to hear the person sitting next to me. I’d become an amateur lip reader, but if I couldn’t see someone’s face, I had no idea what they were saying. It was embarrassing.”

The TV star, who lives in Handcross in West Sussex with her husband Sten Bertelsen, admitted she’d always shied away when asking for help with age-related hearing loss. When she booked a test at her local Boots store, the results concluded that there were years of wear and tear, and the TV star needed to wear a hearing aid.

She said: "I won’t lie, I did feel ashamed in a way. There are lots of young kids who have hearing disorders, which is obviously completely different.For me, it’s always been one of the greatest physical signs of ageing, like wrinkles and dentures.

"There can be a huge stigma around wearing hearing aids, I felt like I might as well go to the funeral director and order my coffin, it made me feel so old."

However, the TV presenter has gone on to embrace her new hearing aids. She explained: “I started showing people and the reaction has been, ‘That’s so cool, they’re amazing! I can’t even see them.’

"I’ve been lifting up my hair saying, ‘Can you see anything different about me? People have asked what I’m talking about, if I’ve had a piercing. I chose black ones and they look like an extension of my glasses."

The 60-year old urges anyone who fears they may be dealing with hearing loss to get their hearing tested. She said: "A lot of my mother’s friends refuse to do it for the same reasons I did. Even though they’re 10, 20, 30 years older than I am, there’s still that stigma. And they do feel isolated.

"What I found is, saying, ‘What? Excuse me?’ all the time can feel so ageing. When you hear with crystal clarity, it makes you feel younger. It’s kind of liberating."