This article first appeared in Radio Times magazine.
When Amy Dowden signed up for the new series of Who Do You Think You Are?, she hoped to solve rumours of a murder, confirm that she was 100 per cent Welsh and discover whether any of her ancestors were dancers. She anticipated “plenty of drama” and was looking forward to giving her parents, who still live in her hometown of Caerphilly, daily updates.
“It was a rollercoaster of emotions,” she says. She certainly wasn’t expecting to discover that her paternal great- grandmother Louisa died in 1921, at the age of 39, from breast cancer. Dowden has endured years of ill health due to Crohn’s disease, the inflammatory bowel condition she was diagnosed with at 19. More recently, aged 32, she was diagnosed with breast cancer, which led to gruelling treatment, a double mastectomy and side effects, including a blood clot on her lung. When medical historian Dr Agnes Arnold-Forster tells her about Louisa’s cancer in this week’s episode, Dowden is visibly shocked.
“It took me back to being diagnosed with cancer myself [in 2023],” she says. “Agnes told me that cancer was incurable back then, so Louisa had to endure breast cancer without access to chemo or any modern medicine – it made me even more grateful for the NHS. Thinking about Louisa leaving behind her husband Bill and six young children, I got quite emotional on camera. But I’m fine with that; when I was having treatment, a nurse told me to have a good cry and not hold my emotions in.”
Dowden already knew that her great-grandfather Bill had given up his youngest child, Frank, for informal adoption, but had no idea why. Finding out about Louisa’s death provided answers. Having served in the Royal Navy during the First World War, Bill hoped to return to work as a miner, but the collieries had been privatised in 1921. The new owners announced they were halving workers’ wages, which left miners relying on soup kitchens. Louisa died during their subsequent dispute with the colliery. “Bill had one of the hardest jobs there was. He was a grafter, just like my dad, but he couldn’t feed all six kids, so Frank – my dad’s dad – went to a loving family who lived nearby.”
Dowden says the family resilience and work ethic have been passed down the generations. She can see it in her parents and in herself – she’s been dancing since she was eight, is a four-time British national finalist who went on to become
a British national champion, and is one of the UK’s highest-ranking ballroom and Latin dancers. Next year it will be a decade since she joined Strictly as its first Welsh professional dancer and she’ll be returning to the show in the autumn.
It hasn’t, of course, been easy. She’s spent time away due to illness and last year, she and partner Thomas Skinner were eliminated in week two. But, she says unequivocally, Strictly helped to save her life. “It’s more than a show for me because it helped me get through the darkest days. A lot has happened to me in a decade! From joining the show to getting married [to fellow dancer Ben Jones], to my cancer diagnosis, to getting back on the dance floor. Dancing is, for sure, my saviour. In standing by me, the BBC gave me the hope and courage to get back to work. But not as the old me.”
Can she elaborate? She smiles – looking very well, which she attributes to a recent holiday in Majorca. “I’m a new version of myself now – literally, I have a new upper body. I can’t be the same person after everything I’ve been through. I live life very differently because you just don’t know what’s around the corner; I don’t worry about the things that I used to [worry about]. Every day is a privilege.”
She can’t wait to get back in the studio, although at the time of our interview the new presenters, Emma Willis, Josh Widdicombe and Johannes Radebe, hadn’t been announced. “It’s sad that it’s the end of an era, but hopefully the new presenters will carry the series through the coming years, or even decades. The foundation of Strictly is watching the celebrities on their journeys. Partnerships and friendships form, which is the core of the show, it’s what the nation loves. The outgoing presenters never made it about them.”
Other than her episode of Who Do You Think You Are? – in which she also turns detective by investigating why her three times great-aunt was shot, in 1888 – and the new series of Strictly, Dowden is looking forward to delving more into presenting. She has made several documentaries, including Crohn’s and Me in 2020 and Cancer and Me four years later, but would like to front something a little different.
“My dancing was taken away from me when I was ill, so I’m making the most of that now, but I love talking to people – I’m a chatterbox! A people person. I had a great time co-hosting The One Show and I love doing radio. I’d like to talk to people about their experiences rather than talking about what I’ve been through.”
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Who Do You Think You Are? returns to BBC One on Tuesday 26 May at 9pm.
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