Christine Lampard regularly describes herself as a “goody two shoes”, but the TV presenter and Loose Women star now reveals that she isn’t always as innocent as she makes out.
Christine Lampard, 44, says she once “ghosted” a close friend when she began dating her now-husband Frank Lampard, because the woman had got too handsy with him.
She says, “It was in Frank and mine’s very early days and there was a certain person, who we don’t actually see anymore, who could get very flirty and touchy-feely while I was there! I found that really awkward – at least a kiss is out there and in the open, but sneakiness under a table? I avoid confrontation – I don’t like confrontation – but I’m brilliant at ghosting. I can easily step away, and that’s how I deal with things that annoy me.”
Christine Lampard – who shares daughter Patricia, four, and son Freddie, two, with Frank, 45, and is also stepmum to Frank Lampard’s daughters, Luna, 18, and Isla, 16, from his marriage to Elen Rivas – rose to fame in 2007 when she became co-host of The One Show alongside Adrian Chiles, before the pair went on to host Daybreak in 2010. After a stint on Dancing On Ice, she then joined Loose Women, as well as regularly covering for Lorraine Kelly when she’s on holiday.
And despite rumours about feuds among the Loose Women panellists, Christine Lampard adores working on the hit ITV show, saying, “We all come into our morning meeting, and if Denise [Welch] is on the panel that day, it’s probably about a 40-minute chat before anything else starts – a general catch-up and the gossip as usual. I very much enjoy that. We’ve been very lucky to meet and interview lots of great people over the years. We don’t shy away from tackling tough debates, and we talk about pretty much anything.”
Addressing the rumours of discontent, Christine Lampard adds, “We get along even though we’re different ages and come from different walks of life. We’ve marked milestones together, cried together and laughed together – I feel blessed to be able to say that.
“We’ve managed to get ourselves through situations in our personal lives as well. Our panel is a whole range of ages – we’ve got Frankie Bridge who’s about 12, right the way up to Gloria [Hunniford] who is 83.”
While Christine Lampard’s fellow Loose Women, such as Janet Street-Porter and Denise Welch, have been open about their party-animal pasts, Christine admits she was less of a rebel than her co-stars. Reflecting on her upbringing, she says, “My mum managed to instil some weird thing in me where she didn’t ever tell me off or warn me off anything, but I just knew. You got the side eye from Mum, and you knew not to cross the She loves working line. I never wanted to disappoint her.
“So, of course I went out and got tipsy and did all those things at university, but I never got into trouble. Weirdly, I look back now, and think should I have? Should I have been just really crazy? But I think I’ve made up for it, from my late twenties on I caught up with everyone else. I’m not quite Denise – I wish I had known her then!”
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