Rachel Riley now reported to have got PTSD from Strictly too

[chachacharcoal]

Both the Daily Mail and the Mirror are now reporting that Rachel Riley also claims to have developed PTSD after doing Strictly. She went on to marry her partner though so he doesn't seem to have been the problem. One of the articles is also claiming she says that many of the other former contestants she's spoken to since doing the show have shared similar experiences. I was surprised by some of the vitriol Amanda Abington got for saying similar but I do realise most people have a fairly basic understanding of trauma. Anyone else very interested in this story?

Faye Tozer is also being reported to have had a negative experience with Giovanni. But the word trauma hasn't been used in that story as far as I'm aware.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13262881/Rachel-riley-strictly-come-dancing-ptsd-amanda-abbington-exit.html

https://www.mirror.co.uk/tv/tv-news/rachel-riley-reveals-bbc-strictly-32493863

Strictly speaking (no pun intended) , in order to get a diagnosis of PTSD one has to fulfil criterion A of the diagnostic criteria which is to experience or witness an event which involves actual or threatened death or serious harm including sexual harm to self or a loved one . I think when people talk about PTSD from something like Strictly then they would probably more accurately be talking about acute stress, anxiety or what some in the field call ‘small t trauma’, which is certainly distressing but not quite PTSD. Unless there were things happening on set which none of us know about involving significant abuse and threat of harm, in which case then yes it may well fulfil the criteria.

RR looked terrified doing SCD, she wasn't very good and was out of her comfort zone and I think a bit humiliated by the experience. Others clearly haven't enjoyed it either, I remember Sophie Ellis Bextor saying she hated the touchy feeliness of it all and so did others. However, it was their choice! No one is forced to do the show and if by now (and even back then) you are unaware of how demanding it will be - then more fool you. They keep calling it the Strictly Bubble fgs, it is meant to be all-encompassing.

But should we also blindly believe everyone that they are recounting the experience as it had happened, at the cost of others?

What is the cost to others? There isn't a finite amount of suffering to go around.

People deal with and respond to situations differently. The kneejerk dismissal is potentially far more damaging to others, than someone saying that they felt damaged by a specific experience, frankly.

See also the examples given above about "better" and "worse" forms of rape, etc.

Exactly.

She seems an intelligent woman, surely all the suffering in the world that she'll see on the news puts her no doubt challenging, but hardly traumatic, participation in a dance show in perspective.

Ptsd my arse. She should be ashamed of herself saying such goady bollocks.

I'm not dismissing anything.

I'm sure it was stressful, hardwork, very challenging. It is her vocabulary I'm dismissing not her experience.

What annoys me about celebrities claiming a diagnosis of PTSD, or other conditions like autism, means that genuine people who struggle end up getting less support because it trivialises it. It also means that huge amounts of people try to get a diagnosis because they hear from this that it doesn’t take very much to be diagnosed with these conditions and as a result there are huge waiting lists of people who genuinely have them and others who don’t. It prevents ordinary citizens getting a much needed diagnosis or waiting for years to be assessed.

I got diagnosed with depression by a psychiatrist in 2019. I had suffered with depression most of my life due to a war zone of a childhood and being brought up by a narcissist. Took me three years of fighting to get the diagnosis of Chronic Complex PTSD. That fight alone was enough to add to my already overloaded plate of traumatic experiences.
I am not one of those people who thinks my crap trumps everyone else’s. God no, but stuff like this makes those out there really struggling, who can’t get the help they need, to feel even more insignificant and worthless than they already do.

Oh this. It's the use of trauma and ptsd that Is issue for stressful and hard situations it's absolutely fine to say I found strictly extremely difficult and hard work but come on PTSD !

I'm finding language very dramatic. I'd like to throw toxic into the mix.

I genuinely don't understand why she would marry her dance partner given he must surely be the cause of the PTSD or at least a constant trigger?

She's a grown up! SCD is a Saturday night light entertainment programme. If she felt unhappy she could have walked away at anytime.
This is an insult to all those who actually suffer PTSD. The reality of PTSD is devalued every time yet another "celebrity" announces a diagnosis.

I think so, by and large, but understand increasingly why others don't think being kind trumps being right.
One's lived experience is subjective.
We can imagine what's it like to be in someone else's shoes but we weren't there. Do you invalidate someone else's feelings because you don't feel they've "earned" them?
But in terms of allegations, that is trickier, because someone else's reputation and livelihood is impacted. Mud sticks and cancellation in the court of public opinion is unfair when you don't know the whole story.
Often, in a conflict, there'll be the truth lying somewhere in the middle.
Finding the truth in "he said, she said" allegations is notoriously difficult because of a lack of corroborating evidence.
I'd be interested how Rose's interpreter viewed training and whether their signing neutralised any tone. I'd have thought filmed footage would count for a lot if Amanda has decided to instruct a lawyer. Artem, James, Brendan, Ola and Danny John Jules were all accused of bullish/insulting comments in the past. Nobody should put up with that crap at work. If a cameraman being present doesn't help change toxic behaviours then perhaps they need to have an independent observer present/set hours of training.
I am amazed there hasn't been more trauma from IACGMOOH tbh - if you didn't have an insect phobia going in, I'm amazed you don't end up with one!
There have been lawsuits from the hoi polloi in various reality TV competitions dating back twenty years.
'Scarred' reality show survivors queue to sue TV companies | The Independent | The Independent
Safeguarding and Wellbeing now has to be a priority (the same as intimacy coordinators on set) but guidance on established duty of care for a reality TV company towards contestants wasn't brought in officially till 2021.
Ofcom's new duty of care guidelines to protect TV talent | Royal Television Society (rts.org.uk)
The BBC will have protections in place for slebs and pros alike but perhaps production need to look at them again to prevent clashes and allegations in the future (although I wonder if the "leaks" regarding conflicts are deliberate in the same way showmances are created; all publicity is publicity).
The constructed reality genre is also murky.
‘We won’t take this any more!’: the reality TV stars battling to unionise | Reality TV | The Guardian
What are the legal rights of reality TV stars, really? - BBC Culture

Not to mention remaining friends with Claudia Winkleman and smiling ruefully as Jimmy Carr made Strictly jokes at her every week on 8 Out of 10 Cats Does Countdown for years. I'm sure there are loads of war veterans with PTSD who surround themselves by others from the battlefield and laugh at killing jokes.

Whatever. A tv show all the same. Hardly traumatic.

Traumatic is holding your mother's hand and watching her die, not putting on a pair of dance shoes and doing a few routines in front of an audience. I've done both.

i think we have to do a little from Column A and a little from Column B here.

Yes, RR has trauma connected to SCD. This was not entirely unforseeable because of previous years, and confirmed by subsequent years.

I believe her - but i have very little sympathy for her because she comes across as a thoroughly dislikeable character. that doesn't mean i don't take her woes in this regard seriously, just that i care less because she uses her fame to get things she wants too.

So what can we do? For starters the BBC need to take much more care of their contestants and maybe be much more upfront about the hours they will be required to train (still lol-ing at the idea of Jerry Hall just jacking it in for tea at clariges)

I also think, given the clear make up of each phalanx of contestants, that they need to identify which ones are going to be at risk of problems. It is always clear there's an old biddy nobody thinks will have a chance but is actually lithe and fit (Felicity Kendall) and an old biddy who can't keep a beat (Anne Widdicombe). A young starlet who has done all the training and already danced on stage (erm - i don't know any off hand but certainly all the ringers from the last few years) a middle-aged presenter/politician on their way to retirement but having a last fling - and/or converting their serious MP/newsreader persona to something more fun in the hope of further presenting work. etc etc. The BBC know already which ones are likely to be in the later stages either because they can dance and the judges will save them, or because the public will save them week after week.

It can't be rocket science, most of us are able to identify the winner by about week 4. (I've stopped watching, i think the format has slightly changed?)

All the over-the-top "we're a team" (Jeanette, is that the dancer? was awful for this, and pushing herself to the front of the group, even when she was out)

anyway, the TL;DR is: the BBC need to employ therapists.

I've seen enough to surmise that Rachel Riley is over- dramatic and not the nicest of individuals.

Thus, take whatever she says with a pinch of salt.

I'm sure there are loads of war veterans with PTSD who surround themselves by others from the battlefield and laugh at killing jokes.

to be fair, i know a fair vew veterans with lost limbs and PTSD who do exactly that. It is their way of bonding though.

I also don't think we need to fall into the trap of the fallacy of relative privation. We are all individuals and things affect us in different ways. Heck, the same thing will affect me in different ways according to where i am/what i'm doing at the time, or if I've eaten or am hungry, or have just had a stressful day, or it's morning / afternoon /middle of the night.

I do think we need to take a long hard look at what we call entertainment though. It's not quite the Hunger Games, but who knows where it will end?

I feel like so many people are glossing over the fact she was literally shagging her dance partner while this was going on. While married. She can’t have been having that bad a time other than what was self inflicted and if she looked terrified while dancing it was probably through fear of giving the game away!

If we keep hearing terrible stories from the celeb contestants at some point even if you don’t trust each individual celeb, collectively the number of similar stories does suggest this format (or possibly just some professional dancers), is pretty horrific.

while some people are strong enough to cope, it will be just coping. They need to possibly be a lot more careful about the emotional strength of the celebs, and perhaps monitor more closing the teaching methods of the professional dancers, maybe what it takes to get an amateur to professional dancer level in a short period of time isn’t something they should be doing.

If Rachael Riley is traumatised by anything, it's likely to be the shit state of her "career".

I mean, had they not watched Strictly begore agreeing to do it?
Maybe there is an argument for producers to reiterate to the celebs that Strictly is extremely challenging, and if they are short of a few £100k there are far easier ways of getting it. If they don't do due dilligence and just see the cash, that's their look out. Its annoying for the viewers when it's obvious people are just phoning it information a paycheck. I like Sophie Ellis Bextor but it's nobody's fault but her own if she didnt think through the possibility of having to wear a skimpy dress on a dance show. Maybe she ( and Louise Redknapp) should have taught their sons not to judge women by their clothes. Her career has had a complete revival, in no small part due to Strictly.

Still lol-ing at the idea of Jerry Hall just jacking it in for tea at Claridges
I warmed to her. Her nonchalance/self-proclaimed laziness reminded me of me!
Her kids said she was a lazy mare in her VT and she part-walked/part-posed through her cha cha. At the time, training minimum was around 12 hours a week and the committed would do 30 hours. Now some on it, who have the time, do 12 hours a day.
Jerry said she'd get paid exactly the same if she stayed in two weeks or two months. Allegedly, she'd arrive at 10am and leave for a long lunch at 12.30. She said about Anton, "He’s elegant, he’s sophisticated and he’s the most beautiful dancer. And we’re having lovely lunches together!"
I think her longest training session was until 3pm. They went out week two.
Others will say contestants shouldn't be doing it if they're lackadaisical/not giving their all but Jerry, complete with laconic Texan drawl, amused me no end. But I also loved Holly*, who, whilst an accomplished dancer, had a "no fucks to give, I'm engaged to a billionaire anyway" laid-back Aussie vibe
And I also loved Chelsea, who Pash had to ban from her mobile phone.

God might love a trier but I empathise with the insouciant. An easy-going pro over a slave driver. I'd make Gio implode.

*Still no idea why she did , she was already engaged, had nothing to promote, wasn't bothered about resurrecting her career, took her fiancé's private jet to Blackpool(!) and was refreshingly casual throughout. My favourite ever contestant.

It's not quite the Hunger Games, but who knows where it will end?
We haven't yet had They shoot horses, don't they? but the Channel 5 endurance competition Touch the Truck back in 2001 was a nadir in broadcasting.

Wearing pretty dresses and adding numbers and letters to a magnetic board ??