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Sophie Ellis-Bextor has spoke about the "heavy price" she and husband Richard Jones paid when she appeared on Strictly Come Dancing in 2013.
During her time on the BBC One dance show, the singer, 42, was partnered with Brendan Cole and together they made it to the final coming fourth.
Sophie said that despite her husband Richard, 42, liking Brendan, 45, and knowing that "nothing was going to happen there", he still "struggled" with her involvement on the show.
The star said that her spouse felt “left out in the cold” as she became “consumed with the intensity” of the show.
Talking about her time on the show in her new book, Spinning Plates, which has been published in The Mail on Sunday, Sophie admitted she even considered leaving the show before her first dance.
Sophie recalled: "Richard started to struggle with my involvement from the launch show onwards.
"It was so hard for him that I can remember wondering if they’d ever had a contestant walk away from the show before they’d even danced their first dance."
Sophie continued: "All the while, Richard was feeling left out in the cold. He was worried he was losing me. Not that I was going to run off with anyone – he liked Brendan and knew that nothing was going to happen there – but I think he thought that something was awakening in me and he felt he wasn’t part of my future.
"I never, ever felt like that, but I couldn’t convince him. He could see that I was completely wrapped up in the show and consumed with the intensity of it and the constant learning, learning, learning which you share with one other person – your dance partner."
The Murder On The Dance Floor singer went on to recall how her husband started to "spiral" and that he was just waiting for the BBC One dance series "to end".
Sophie said: “Richard became unusually insistent on knowing where I was all the time. If I didn’t reply to a text, he’d spiral.
"Supporting me in all that I do usually came so easily to him, but with Strictly I think he was just waiting for it to end. He’d message me all day when I was rehearsing, extra keen to know my schedule.”
She continued: “We would argue when I was home about how distracted I was and about whether I’d get through to the next week. He just felt as if I might slip into a new life that left our family behind.
“I had no such desire, but was too spent at the end of the day to give the reassurance he needed. I think the only real reassurance could come with the show finishing."
Sophie admitted that she felt "terrible" that she did that to him and that he started to see a counsellor while she was on the show, which "really helped".
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The star added: "Perhaps I should have, too. We never doubted our love for each other but I think Richard worried that I just wouldn’t want our life again. But of course I did. To me, my family is everything."
Sophie continued: "For all the glitter and sequins and stagecraft it taught me, I had to pay quite a heavy price, and Richard, too. Luckily what Brendan said was true: 'If you start off happily married, you’ll leave that way too. But it wasn’t immediate.'"
The star and Richard married in 2005 and they share five children together.
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