Paralympian and Strictly Come Dancing star Ellie Simmonds has revealed that she is adopted, and has reunited with her birth mother.
In the upcoming ITV documentary Ellie Simmonds: Finding My Secret Family (previewed in The Mirror), the swimmer shared that she decided last year to go looking for her birth mum, after "questions started to bubble up".
In her journey, Ellie read the report given to her mother shortly after her birth, informing her that she had achondroplasia, a form of dwarfism.
She was also given an information sheet provided to her birth mother, which stated that children with the condition "have to deal with being stared at and laughed at by other children".
"Can you imagine reading that and thinking, 'That's my child'?" Ellie said in the documentary. "In a way, I understand, when you don’t know anything about the disability and you get this. You're going to be scared."
Ellie was left further devastated on reading a social worker's report which went into detail about her birth mother's guilt and emotions regarding her disability.
She had doubts about whether to continue her search, but decided to do so after meeting the daughter of a woman who had fostered Ellie between two weeks and three months of age.
Ellie learned from her that her foster mum recognised the swimmer after seeing her on the TV during the Olympics and Paralympics, but didn't want to reach out as she wasn't sure if Ellie knew she had been adopted.
Unfortunately, Ellie's foster mum passed away before she began her search.
"What got me was the fact she knew. She was watching me on TV and knew it was me. I left it too late," Ellie said after meeting with her foster mum's daughter.
The Paralympian eventually received a letter from her birth mother, revealing that she struggled with her mental health and a "traumatic" break-up – she had separated from Ellie's birth father before learning she was pregnant.
In the letter, Ellie's birth mother added that she has long felt guilty that she wasn't strong enough at the time to keep her in her life.
She also expressed how happy she was that Ellie had been raised in such a loving environment and had done so well for herself.
The two eventually met privately in a hotel and talked for hours, with Ellie stating that they have a very similar sense of humour.
"I kept looking at her and thinking, 'Wow that's my mum,'" she said. "I felt like her face was just like mine.
"What touched my heart was she said she thinks about me every day, and she still sees me as her daughter...
"Questions I've carried for years have been answered. I'm proud of my life and I love my family, and maybe that family just got a bit bigger."
Viewers will be able to see all these moments when Ellie Simmonds: Finding My Secret Family airs on Thursday, July 6 at 9pm on ITV1.
