Jacques O’Neill
(Picture: ITV)Love Island’s Jacques O’Neill has admitted appearing on the show was the worst decision of his life.
The TV personality said he had reached breaking point when former contestant Adam Collard, who is known for his womanising ways, made a play for his love interest Paige Thorne - rocking their shaky romance.
Speaking about his experience, the reality star said he was crying his eyes out and he knew it was his time to leave but he claimed TV bosses tried to get him to stay.
He told The Sun: “It broke me and I was already broken. I was crying my eyes out. I couldn’t cope. I was literally feeling awful. It was the worst I’d ever felt in my life.”
He went on: “Producers tried coming to me, they were like, ‘Jacques, are you OK?’ I was saying, ‘I don’t want to speak to you or anyone. I want to be left to myself.’ It was too much. I was saying to them, ‘This is more than a TV show to me’, it was genuine feelings involved and my headspace wasn’t right to be in a TV show. I dealt with stuff in there that I’ve never dealt with in my life.”
On reflection, Jacques worried he could get “physical” as tensions were rising in the Love Island villa.
“I thought if I don’t get myself out things could go horribly wrong and I could get physical,” he added.
A spokesperson for Love Island said: “We cannot comment on any individual’s medical records owing to confidentiality and our own duty of care towards the Islanders, however we have rigorous and extensive checks in place to assess Islanders’ physical and mental health in advance of being cleared to enter the villa.
“This is something we take extremely seriously.
”As we said at the time, Jacques made the decision to leave and we respected that decision. Islanders are welcome to leave should they choose to do so and we would never put pressure on someone to stay in the villa.”
