Olly Murs says 'hate' he received as a TV presenter led to him having a panic attack and needing therapy

Fans of the huge noughties reality show will remember that Murs was a contestant on The X Factor first. He came runner up in 2009, with Joe McElderry being the winner and Stacey Solomon finishing in thrid place. But despite not winning the show, he went on to be hugely successful. Six years later, he returned to present the show which had launched his career alongside the late Caroline Flack.

However, his transition from singer to presenter was not an easy one, as he accidentally announced the results too early during a live show, which led to fix claims. At the time, Murs posted an apology on his social media, writing: “I apologise to everyone tonight I made a massive f*** up at the end. It was so tense!! I'm still learning & hope that never happens again!”

Murs told Auto Trader's 'Show On The Road' podcast: "[It] felt like the worst news that could ever happen to me. I had a massive panic attack over it. I know what I went through was nothing compared to what other people go through. But mentally at the time, I was freaked out."

The star and dad-of-one, who went on to be a coach on rival singing contest The Voice between 2018 and 2023, added: "I wondered, going back on TV again, was I going to make a mistake? Because that's all I got when I did X Factor, I was told, 'You're useless, you're not good, you're not a great presenter, you're not this, you're not that'.Don't get me wrong, there were loads of positives too, but I just got loads of hate."

Hearing that makes me feel so sad as nobdody deserves to be subjected to such abuse, but it also made my heart sink for another reason - the realisation that this was almost 10 years ago and we still haven’t actually moved forward.

Back in April, Love Island star Georgia Steel called on social media sites to do more to tackle trolls as she admitted vile comments online left her feeling suicidal and wanting to quit her reality TV career. One month later, fellow Love Island star Ekin-Su Culculoglu spoke out about her experience in the ‘Celebrity Big Brother’ house back in February, and said she was made to feel like a ‘villain’ and told she was “cancelled” because of her appearance on the show.

This isn’t of course, just an issue with online trolls, however - and I’m not blaming social media websites - as trolls also operate in real life. In June, Married At First Sight Australia star Olivia Frazer gave details of a ‘terrifying’ incident that left her fearing for her life, after she claimed she was made to look like a villian on the hit reality dating show.

That’s just three examples from three consecutive months this year. There are countless more. They have all happened simply because TV viewers didn’t like how someone acted on television. Having an opinion is absolutely fine, and sometimes that means we’re going to say things that aren’t exactly glowing and disagree with others, but there’s a line that should not be crossed.

You can point out that someone has made a mistake or perhaps acted in an inappropriate way, in your opinion, without drawing their whole character or career in to question. Attacking someone, or trying to attack someone, verbally or physically, is never okay. When are we going to learn this lesson? I pray it’ll be in my lifetime, but realising how little progress we have made in the best part of 10 years doesn’t fill me with much hope if I’m honest . . . and I’m only 31 so I do hopefully have many more decades left!

The 'Dear Darlin' hitmaker also explained that having therapy sessions helped him feel ready to return to a television role. Speaking further about his therapy, he went on: "One of the things I learnt was how to cope and understand how I was feeling. She gave me these techniques on how to deal with that other voice in your head that's like telling you ‘you can't do this, run away’.”

He went on he was "petrified" on his first day on The Voice, but he told myself ‘you're great at what you do. You're really good on TV. You've got it. You've got this, Olly. You've got this’. He concluded: “It was the best thing that ever happened to me. I loved it. It was brilliant."

I’m so pleased to hear that Murs went on to have such a positive experience with The Voice, and got the help he needed with therapy. . . On another note, I also applaud him for being so open about having therapy as I think this should be normalised. This is because I whole-heartedly believe that everybody would benefit from at least one therapy session as nobody’s life has been without some struggles. But, that’s a seperate point.

I am once again reminded of a saying, and important life lesson, that’s stuck with me since childhood, thanks to a rabbit called Thumper in the Disney classic film Bambi: “If you can't say something nice, don't say nothing at all”.