Fiona Phillips has sensationally revealed that she had secretly split from her husband Martin Frizell as tension grew in their marriage before Alzheimer’s diagnosis

Fiona Phillips and husband Martin Frizell share sofa on breakfast TV(Image: Press Association)

To the outside world, Fiona Phillips’ marriage was nothing short of perfect. But now, the former breakfast TV presenter has revealed that her relationship was anything but a happy one as Alzheimer’s disease was starting to take its toll on her and her family – unknowingly.

The relationship between Fiona, 64 and her husband – former This Morning producer Martin Frizell – had broken down beyond repair as she recalled the moment he announced he was moving out of their family home.

In a first person piece for the Mail On Sunday, the TV star, who was one of the main presenters of GMTV, opened up on the fact she was not aware she had developed the disease which had taken both her parents.

Fiona Phillips and husband Martin Frizell attend the funeral of Derek Draper the husband of Kate Garraway(Image: PA)

In the run up to their secret separation, Fiona explained that she was in denial over the fact she was experiencing the initial symptoms of the disease and put it down to the menopause instead.

Their marriage became more and more fractured as Martin felt Fiona was becoming increasingly distant from him and their children and their arguments were becoming far too regular.

Fiona explained: “Was I worried that there might be something sinister lurking beneath the surface? That Alzheimer’s could one day be coming for me too? ”

She added: “On one level I did think I would get the disease, but there was also another part of me that was in a strange sort of denial about it all. This illness has devastated so much of my life already, surely it’s not going to come for me too?’ I’d tell friends.”

Fiona Phillips was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease in 2023(Image: Dave Benett/Getty Images for The Prince of Egypt)

Fiona went onto reveal that she’s sure that the disease was “at least partly responsible” for her marriage breaking down but that neither she nor Martin could see that. She became “more and more disconnected” from her family, with Martin accusing her of zoning out of their marriage.

She said: “But, if I’m honest, I think he was right. I just didn’t seem to have the energy for any of it any more. I didn’t realise quite how seriously Martin felt about it all until one evening he announced he was moving out.”

In that moment, Fiona did not believe that her marriage was completely over, in fact she said that she felt he was simply “trying to shock me into behaving differently”.

They had separated for three weeks before they started to exchange text messages between each other and then arranged to meet at a hotel in Hampshire, in a desperate bid to save their marriage.

They reconciled their differences but Fiona recalled that she was still suffering with the same symptoms. In 2023, at the age of 62, Fiona revealed that she had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s.