Ore Oduba has revealed he contemplated suicide during the darkest days of his porn addiction.
The former Strictly Come Dancing winner, 40, opened up about his ‘life destroying’ porn addiction to Paul Brunson on his podcast We Need To Talk late last year.
Ore has now said that the addiction, which started when he was just nine years old after he was shown adult images, left him on the brink of ending his own life.
In an emotional interview, the TV presenter this week described the moment he realised that he’d hit rock bottom.
Speaking on the Hurt to Healing podcast on Tuesday, Ore said: ‘I was pushing a lot of red buttons in my life that I knew were not working. I had to change the way that I was living, and I had to change the people that were in my life, because for me if it carried on that way, it was going to be lights out.
‘I knew that the person that I was becoming, it was either, save myself or carry on for the betterment of others and… it’s a very sensitive topic, but I’m talking about suicidal ideation.
Ore Oduba revealed on the Hurt to Healing podcast that he contemplated suicide during the darkest days of his porn addiction
Ore has now said that the addiction, which started when he was just nine years old after he was shown adult images, left him on the brink of ending his own life
‘I was thinking I can’t carry on like this. So, I knew I had to save myself, I had to save my life.
‘So when its that, when its life and death that we’re talking about, there’s only one way out. I have to stop this.’
Ore separated from his wife Portia in September 2024 after nine years of marriage. The former couple share two children, Roman, seven, and Genie, four, whom they co-parent.
But Ore says coming to terms with his addiction sadly underscored the lack of love in other aspects of his life.
He told podcast host and mental health activist Pandora Morris: ‘Trying to find the abundance of love in other areas of my life, just didn’t exist.
‘So, I had to re-prioritise friendship, changing the relationship with my children, changing the relationship with my mum, finding hobbies and finding things that made me feel alive, because as fair as addiction is concerned, it’s a way to make you feel alive, its vitality.’
In November he bravely opened up for the first time about his porn addiction, as he admitted spending ‘thousands and thousands’ on adult content after becoming hooked when he was first shown adult images aged nine.
Ore told the We Need To Talk podcast that it was only 18 months ago that he ‘escaped my addiction’.
Speaking on the Hurt to Healing podcast on Tuesday, Ore said: ‘I was pushing a lot of red buttons in my life that I knew were not working’
In the years following his winning stint on the BBC show Strictly his nine-year marriage to ex-wife Portia broke down (Seen together in 2016)
‘Shame kept me silent for 30 years. It took me 30 years, two deaths, and a divorce to finally go: here’s what’s happening,’ he revealed.
The father of two said he wanted to speak out now to highlight the issue of children seeing sexual imagery on social media.
An emotional Ore said: ‘This is me putting my life as it is on the line, to save my children and to guide anybody else’s children going into a world where at their fingertips, they can fall into something they never asked to.’
He added: ‘Part of me is terrified, the vast majority is terrified because I feel like, personally, for me, the rest of my life begins the day after this, as it’s a kind of a seminal draw-the-line moment.’
Ore said that he was first shown adult content on a computer by a friend’s older brother, explaining: ‘I remember being very intrigued and a feeling of eyes being opened. Whilst I wouldn’t say addiction set in immediately, the intrigue started immediately.’
‘And it didn’t take long relatively speaking, for that intrigue to start running my mind over because at nine, at that age, you haven’t necessarily got full access.’
‘Wanting to find a way to address that intrigue, wanting to find ways of that awakening, wanting to replicate it or find it whether it was on television or in magazines.’
The former CBeebies presenter became a household name after he lifted the glitterball trophy in the show’s most-watched final ever.
Over 13million viewers tuned in for his charm and natural dance ability, as he triumphed alongside dance partner Joanne Clifton in 2016.
Since then, he’s branched out into a successful Musical Theatre career, starring as Caractacus Potts in the UK tour of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang among other shows, in recent months.
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