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  Question time: ZoÃ' Ball |
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The radio DJ talks about presenting a new, grown-up TV show, giving up drink and being pregnant againYou haven't been on television for a while.
Did you want to get back into it?The last couple of things I did weren't particularly great, so I just sort of retired into hiding a bit.
I was questioning things: am I just doing this for the money? This show [Britain's Best Brain, a gameshow that tests contestants' brainpower] is not something I thought of doing, but they said, "Do you want to work with Jamie [Theakston]?" and I was like, "Yes!" It was about eight years since we last worked together and it was like putting on an old pair of shoes.It is quite a "safe" show - it's not exactly The Priory [the Friday night show Ball previously presented with Theakston].It is quite safe.
It is nice to do a slightly more grown-up show now that we're slightly more grown-up.
When I told my dad [science TV presenter Johnny Ball] that I was doing Britain's Best Brain, he just said, "Why have they chosen you?" I think the maths and science gene bypassed me - my son is brilliant at it and my dad is like, "thank God".How do you feel about your reputation as a party girl?I look back and think, compared with some of them now - look at Amy Winehouse and that lot - maybe I wasn't so bad.
In a way, I got away with a lot because a lot of our partying was done behind closed doors.
But I don't ever want to be that person again, who embarrasses my family with my behaviour.I know you've given up drinking .
.
.I had reached the point where I thought something had to change, that we both [she and husband, DJ Norman Cook] had to grow up a little bit.
We partied hard as a couple, but you get to the point where your body is less resilient and you get older.
I don't think that sliding down a wall with a bottle of Sancerre in your hand at 6.30 in the morning is particularly attractive when you're approaching 40 and you've got a kid.
Last year I really started to struggle with that side of stuff.
I went to New York with some girlfriends and I remember very little beyond the first night.
What's the point in that? This year has been a real turnaround for us.Was your husband ready to give it up too?He wasn't really ready for it.
I think he had the fear that if he gave up drinking, he wouldn't be able to do his job.
It was tricky.
I stopped, and he carried on, and that was really hard.
I was thinking that he wasn't ever going to stop, and that he didn't want to.Did you ask him to stop?It did come to a bit of an ultimatum.
He said, "Give me a year," but I couldn't.
I was worried that we would lose each other if he didn't stop and my son was going to be really affected by everything.
I was worried [Norman] was going to get really sick as well.
I think we were scared of what we were going to do, and who we were going to be underneath it.
It was really tough but he did it, and it was a miracle.
And we're so well and happy.
We're so boring! We sit in our pyjamas watching Morecambe and Wise, but we've got each other back, and Woody's got his parents back.And you're pregnant again.
You have talked before about considering IVF or adoption.That's the best thing out of all of it.
We had tried to have a baby for years with no joy.
Then, bang, six weeks sober, it happens.
I feel like the baby is our little gift of sobriety.How have your lives changed?It was scary at the beginning and I cut myself off from a lot of my friends.
There are friends whom I wouldn't be so tempted to see now because they're still in that world, and I think you're one step away from slipping back in to that.
Also, I'm getting back in to work and really appreciating it.
I was given a lot of opportunities when I was younger that I kind of threw away.
To be given the Radio 1 breakfast show was huge, but I was partying so hard I barely remember it.
So I'm really grateful to have been given a second chance [Ball has a show on Radio 2].
We celebrated our 10th wedding anniversary in Ibiza [without drinking] and we really enjoyed it, and I just thought, "Yes, I'm really happy that we're in this place."Britain's Best Brain is on Wednesdays at 8pm on Five
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