The judges called her ‘a sexy vixen,’ ‘a sassy minx,’ and even a ‘dominatrix’ after her steamy dance floor performance on Dancing With The Stars.
And now MasterChef winner Julie Goodwin, 53, has revealed what she really thinks of the stunning response to her makeover for the dance competition.
‘That was unexpected and unfamiliar,’ Julie laughed when speaking to Daily Mail Australia.
‘My family thought it was hilarious. I’m normally cooking and running around after my granddaughter, not pushing a good looking man around on the floor.
‘I was stoked with the judges’ feedback,’ she said. ‘It was nice to hear that I’d gotten the dance pretty right.’
Julie was sent home alongside Australian Olympian and former politician Nova Peris in the double-elimination round on Sunday night that upset fans of the series.
However the beloved TV personality says simply hitting the dancefloor after injury felt like winning.
The celebrity chef had just six days in real-time to recover from the ‘blindingly painful’ calf muscle tear she sustained in week one.
MasterChef winner Julie Goodwin , 53, has revealed what she really thinks of the stunning response to her makeover for the dance competition
‘It certainly impacted our training and I wasn’t over it by any means,’ she said of her elimination performance which aired on Sunday.
‘When I was dancing, I had that much adrenaline in my system I didn’t really feel it, but as soon as I got off the floor I had to ice it.’
‘I’m really happy I was able to get on the dancefloor,’ she said when asked how she felt about exiting the competition.
The celebrity cookbook author shot to national fame after winning the inaugural season of Network Ten’s MasterChef Australia in 2009.
The judges called her ‘a sexy vixen,’ ‘a sassy minx,’ and even a ‘dominatrix’ after her steamy dance floor performance
However, the mum of three was secretly battling mental health demons, which culminated in a mid-range drink driving offence in 2018 and an attempt on her own life two years later.
‘I’m doing good,’ she told Daily Mail Australia on Monday.
‘I’ve just got to keep doing all the right things and keep all those lifestyle changes and all the treatments and the therapies and the time. All that stuff, I’ve just got to keep doing it, and I will every single day, for the rest of my life.’
‘Life is much better now than it was.’
Fans have praised her for openly speaking about this period of her life and shedding the stigma of mental illness.
‘Of course I’m sad that Dancing it’s over,’ Julie continued. ‘There’s a couple of dresses and routines that I didn’t get to bring out for a spin, but I was honestly really grateful to be asked to be a part of it and I had a ball.’
The chef’s heartfelt message to Australians who might be going through mental health struggles with anxiety, depression, and trauma is this: ‘Speak up. If you know that something is not right, speak up.’
‘Get the help. I know it seems like the hardest thing in the world to do, but it’s actually the best thing in the world to do.’
Julie pictured after tearing her calf muscle in week one of DTWS
Julie went public with her struggles in April during an interview on The Project in which the star chef revealed two passer-bys had likely saved her life. A young couple sensed her distress and approached her in a park to ask if she was alright.
‘I couldn’t see how to keep living. I didn’t want to leave my family, but I just honestly believed that they would be a lot better off if I did,’ she told Project host Hamish Macdonald.
She shut her cooking school and departed her Central Coast breakfast radio gig after a 2020 admission to a mental health unit for five weeks.
Julie discovered that her trauma, which is detailed in her memoir titled Your Time Starts Now, has stemmed from being sexually abused as a seven-year-old child. She didn’t tell anyone about the abuse and carried on, a high achieving student, before attempting suicide as a teenager.
‘Nothing triggered it, it was just like the memory was always there, like a dusty book on a library shelf,’ she told Women’s Weekly. ‘And one day I took it down and looked at it and went, “Holy crap, how have I not thought about that for nine years?” Then, as I sat with it, I realised why I hadn’t thought about it and shoved it away again.’
As for what’s next for Julie now, well, she says she is still ‘always cooking’ and making the most of her ‘second life’.
If you or anyone you know needs support, you can contact Lifeline on 131 114, or Beyond Blue on 1300 224 636