BANKRUPTCY and a life-changing diagnosis in one year might be enough to break most couples.
But Jess Impiazzi insists the traumas have actually strengthened her bond with former bad-boy footballer Jermaine Pennant.
In an exclusive interview, the 33-year-old actress told The Sun on Sunday: “He’s a really nice person, otherwise I wouldn’t be with him.
“When two people have been through something traumatic it can be toxic or healing.
“Luckily we’ve been the healing thing for each other.”
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Last month former Liverpool and Stoke winger Jermaine, 40, told The Sun how he had blown his £10million career fortune on holidays, homes and a fleet of supercars.
And the former ladies’ man, who is now a presenter on talkSPORT, also revealed he was diagnosed last year with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, a mental condition that is typically characterised by inattentiveness and impul- siveness.
It was Jess — who recently appeared in BBC One drama Strike: Troubled Blood — who first picked up on his behaviour and urged him to seek help.
She said: “I just knew something wasn’t connecting right with him. I thought we should go and speak to someone.
“I didn’t say, ‘I think you have ADHD’. I didn’t know what it was but I knew there was something, especially given his childhood. Something like that doesn’t not leave any scars.
Domestic violence
“We met the therapist and then the doctor. It’s changed everything and it’s much better for him to understand and think about what he’s doing before he acts on impulse.
“Just knowing has changed every- thing. If I ever get upset or triggered by anything, he always knows how to calm me down. It’s all been because he’s got himself sorted.”
Jermaine was also diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder linked to his chaotic childhood.
He has told of coming from “a little bit of poverty” and added: “My childhood was never settled. By the age of ten I probably had four different stepmums.
“I never had a mother around, so I never felt that maternal love.
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“My dad did his best, but he was a young, single father. He did what he could, but I craved the attention from women.
“Survival is all I knew, growing up. From around eight years old I’d get myself dressed, take myself to school, take myself to football.”
Jess was able to share her own experiences of PTSD — which is linked to trauma and can result in flashbacks or severe anxiety — with Jermaine.
She said: “I had a lot of nasty things happen in my childhood and I really struggled with my mental health.
“My parents split up when I was very young and I grew up around a lot of domestic violence.
“It wasn’t my dad, and I don’t want to name the person, but it gave me PTSD.
“I think that’s why me and Jermaine work so well, because he had a really traumatic childhood too and we’re able to support each other.
“We understand why one another acts a certain way.”
Now the loved-up couple, who live in Surrey, couldn’t be happier.
Jess puts their strong bond down to them having started out as friends.
The Harry Potter fan explained: “For years there was never anything romantic but we’d always got on really well.
“We’d see each other out and about. Then in November 2021 he asked me out on a date. I wasn’t keen on going at first. I knew about his past and kept thinking, ‘Don’t repeat a pattern, Jess!’
“So I said to him, ‘If you go on your radio show and say a Harry Potter quote then you can take me to Harry Potter World on our first date’. And he did it. We’ve pretty much spent every day together since.”
The couple kept their relationship hidden for what Jess terms “ages”.
She said: “I’d had quite a few relationships and I was like, ‘I just want to get this one right and if we keep it hidden for a bit there will be no outside pressures from anyone else’.
"We ended up keeping it quiet for about five months, which really helped us get to know each other.”
Jess, who won an award for her work for Guide Dogs UK at last month’s Inspiration Awards for Women, also opened up about her own mental health battles.
She said: “I was always hyper vigilant and alert. If I was in a room with a group of people, or went out for dinner, I wouldn’t be able to focus. I’d be thinking something would kick off. I was always on edge.
“I still get triggered now, but having been through therapy I’m able to deal with it and understand the way I’m feeling.”
Jess was just 13 when she won a full scholarship to the Italia Conti Academy of Theatre Arts stage school.
While she was studying for her degree in performing arts, her 13-month-old nephew died from meningitis while she was looking after him.
Six months later her mum, Debbie, started to lose her sight due to a rare eye disease, so Jess made the difficult decision to quit her course.
It set her on a path that saw her posing for lads’ mags and appearing in reality TV shows Towie and Ex On The Beach — and also led to too much drinking.
Jess said: “At first it was really hard. I felt like I’d lost everything. I just lost any sense of purpose in my life. My mum went completely blind and I became her full-time carer.
“I started to do a bit of modelling but I hated it because I wasn’t dancing or acting.
“Then along came reality TV and I thought, ‘Well, at least I’ll be back in front of the camera’. But then I just lost myself trying to be something I wasn’t.
"I was always on edge. I’d do weird things or drink too much and I’d be like, ‘Why have you done that? You’re trying to be an actress, you had a full scholarship to one of the most prestigious theatre schools in the country, why are you doing a reality show and getting drunk?’.”
She added: “But what I’ve learned since is that I kept doing the same things to escape. I also had a lot of self-esteem issues.
“I was monumentally unhappy. I’d wake up each morning with the worst anxiety, then I’d go out and do it all again. And then, before you know it, you’re in the deepest depression you’ve ever been in.
“Luckily I never got into any other substances. It was just alcohol, but that was bad enough, especially when you have issues you haven’t dealt with.
“When I was younger you wouldn’t feel about your worst enemy the way I felt about myself.
“I had such low self-esteem, I just thought I was a loser and hated myself. When you have had childhood trauma you don’t feel good about yourself. It became quite difficult to love myself.”
Jess started going to therapy and realised it wasn’t too late to resume her acting dream.
She plucked up the courage to attend classes and has been working hard ever since, auditioning for film and TV roles.
In December she got her biggest role to date, in the BBC adaptation of JK Rowling’s crime thriller Strike: Troubled Blood, alongside Holliday Grainger and Tom Burke.
She said: “I’d worked so hard. I’m a serious Harry Potter fan too, so when I got the audition I remember thinking, ‘This was meant to be’.
“I’d been trying to get back into acting for so long, had done a number of small indie films and here I was auditioning for Strike. I’ve had such a positive response since it aired, which has been so lovely.
“And I’m really proud of myself for pushing through all that doubt. Sue Tully, who was directing the show, was so nice to me, as was Holliday.
"I came out of the make-up room and she was there. She’s so beautiful and was really nice and friendly. I still pinch myself about it.”
While both Jess and Jermaine are concentrating on careers, a family is in their plans.
She said: “We definitely want children, we’ve had that discussion.
"But with work we’re just seeing how everything is going. He’s doing talkSPORT and he’s doing so well, he’s got such a soothing voice.
“He’s so lovely, and of course he’s hot too. We just really get on. He makes me laugh and we can just both be so silly together.
“We do the stupidest things and have such a good time together.
“We couldn’t be happier and I’m really excited for the future.”
