Tulisa Contostavlos to face her biggest past trauma in the I'm A Celebrity jungle

Tulisa Contostavlos will face one of her biggest fears while competing on I'm A Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here! as she will be forced to sleep in the dark.

The 36-year-old singer is one of the contestants taking part in the 2024 season of ITV's long-running popularity contest and will join her fellow campmates to sleep under the stars and out in the wild. The N Dubz icon has previously explained that she has a strong fear of the dark and would be too terrified to sleep on her own.

The singer remarked that her irrational concern stems from her childhood fear of being abandoned - which she has attributed to witnessing her mother being carted away to hospital when she was young and she wasn't able to join her. The Young singer - who is expected to unleash her long-awaited second album in 2025 - will have her other campmates around her for comfort, however.

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Tulisa wrote in her 2012 autobiography, Honest: "My aversion to being alone has never really gone away, however, and to this day I still have a massive phobia about sleeping on my own in the dark. If I’m sharing a bed with someone I don’t mind darkness, but if I’m on my own I have to have a lamp on.

"As I said, I slept in the same room as my parents until I was about 10, so when Mum or Dad would put me to bed, they’d always leave the light on until they came to bed later. Consequently, I was never on my own when it was dark, and I guess that’s what I got used to."

She added: "I like to have someone around me always, even if we’re not talking or doing anything in particular. I like to know there’s someone else present. I’m certain that stems from my childhood fears of being abandoned."

Ahead of entering the I'm A Celeb jungle, Tulisa shared that viewers may be surprised to see a softer side to her while she learns to survive in the Australian bush. She said in a pre-show interview: “I’m a big softie and I’m an emotional person. I will probably struggle in the first few days as doing something like this is a big deal for me.

"I haven’t been thrust this much into the spotlight in a while and I have avoided it out of irrational fear. I will probably be the most emotional when I first go in. It will take me a while to settle in, but I know I will get past that.”

Proving she is also quite smart, she refused to say what trials she would find most terrifying out of fear it will prompt viewers to vote to see her suffer through them. She said: “It’s definitely sinking in now, I am going to need more than hypnotisation to help me as there will be a lot of stuff I am scared of in there.”

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