The Chase's Anne Hegerty on why she 'deliberately' spends Christmas on her own

Anne 'The Governess' Hegerty is more than happy to spend Christmas Day alone.

Beloved by fans of The Chase and I'm a Celebrity... Get Me Out of Here! (she was a 2018 jungle campmate alongside Emily Atack and Harry Redknapp), the quiz maestro was writing in The Mirror's No Filter column where she confessed her love of solitude.

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"For the last 40 years, I've spent Christmas Day quite deliberately on my own," she stated.

"I like to be able to eat whatever I feel like and watch whatever I like and not have to hang out with people. It's a bit of a treat, really.

"Men think I must be terribly lonely, but women envy me!"

Hegerty was diagnosed with autism in her mid-40s, and while appearing on The Chasers Road Trip back in 2021, she claimed that "one of the things that goes along" with her condition is the inability to "hold down relationships".

"I've tried," she said, confirming that her longest romance lasted just four months.

"He was a lovely bloke but I am just not good with the sort of amount of attention that people need."

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Elsewhere in the TV star's column, Hegerty teased a secret Dancing on Ice "try-out" she'd once done.

"I would love to learn to ice skate," she admitted.

"It was then discovered it was going to clash with panto, and the experience of being on a stage, working with an audience, getting to act and sing and be funny... I really valued that.

"I mean, I would just be one of those people who would be towed around behind a penguin and never actually let go. It would be quite sad."

Watch: Anne Hegerty reveals The Chase's backstage secrets