The ex-This Morning host, 61, describes losing her mother, aged 94, as hugely painful. Fern said: “I find it very difficult to accept that my mum is no longer here. “I still can’t quite believe it because she’s so very present in my mind. I can still hear her in my head. I dream about her and the dreams are so vivid. “She’s always telling me off about something. The grief hit me the day her ashes were scattered.
“As soon as it was over, I thought, ‘I just want to sit and drink gin and go to bed’ – and that’s what I did.
“I did some bonkers things in the aftermath – you do when you’re in shock. I booked a cruise on the Queen Mary 2 on my own.
“I cried a lot in those two weeks, but I also wrote a lot and I found that very soothing.
“I never know when the grief will come now but I feel in a much better place.
“Therapy really helps me. I’ve had a weekly session for the past five years, which keeps me on track and gives me a lot of food for thought. You learn so much about yourself when you sit in a room and feel safe enough to tell somebody absolutely everything. It’s made me much stronger.”
When Ruth died last year, Fern tweeted: “My Mum. Ruth. Both mother and father to me.
“Funny, ferocious and a woman once met, you couldn’t forget.”
Ruth and her father, the actor Tony Britton, 93, split when Fern was a baby and her elder sister Cherry was eight. Fern is married to TV chef Phil Vickery and they have a daughter Winnie, 16. She also has children Harry, 24, and Grace, 21, from her previous marriage to TV boss Clive Jones.
The full interview with Fern appears in the April issue of Prima, on sale now.