MARTINE McCutcheon has opened up about her life-changing health diagnosis. The Love Actually star says she went into "complete denial" after being told she had ADD (attention deficit disorder) as she struggled to cope with the death of her brother. Martine - who also has ME (chronic fatigue syndrome) - was struggling to get out of bed after her sibling LJ - Laurence John - passed away with "no medical explanation" at the age of 31 in 2022.
Opening up about her diagnosis, the former EastEnders actress said: "I always felt there were certain things that I looked at differently, different things I struggled with compared to other people, but different things I found so easy, and I realised, when I got my ADD diagnosis, that I had spent so much time trying to be a square in a round circle, and it was exhausting. "It was so draining. It was just so hard.
And in a way, I feel like I wasn't meant to find out, as sad as it was, because I did lose a lot of things in my life. "I did struggle with a lot of things that I don't think I would have done necessarily. I think that if I'd have known before those four years ago that I had ADD, I don't know if I would have been able to have coped with it the way that I do now .
READ MORE ON MARTINE MCCUTCHEO "I think, thank god people are being kinder and more knowledgeable about ADD and ADHD. People says, oh, everybody's got something these days - but I don't think it's these days. I think we've always been around but we all blossom in differen.