DANNY Jones has revealed he's chosen to "block out" his father completely after winning I'm a Celebrity helped him finally overcome the scars of feeling abandoned as a child.
The McFly star says his jungle victory over Coleen Rooney and Reverend Richard Coles last year held a deeper meaning, enabling him to finally “feel enough” and put to bed the demons that have troubled him for decades.
Viewers were moved to tears during the series when the Bolton-born musician, 38, said he had "found a dad" in co-star Barry McGuigan, hinting at his long-running rift with his own father, Alan.
Following his parents' divorce, Danny - who has starred on The Voice and The Masked Singer - admits he has failed to reconnect with his dad, who in a tragic final straw bailed at the last minute when they arranged to reconcile after two decades last year.
The pop icon says he has felt "constantly guilty" for having a happy marriage to former Miss England Georgia Horsley - with whom he shares six-year-old son Cooper - because it’s something his mum Kathy hasn’t had since the split.
In an upcoming chat with , he says he hasn’t had a relationship with Alan since his teen years and when asked if picking up the phone would help, he flatly says: “No.”
Danny, who has now cut off all contact with his dad, continues: “No, because I don't know him any more. He doesn't know me and I don't recognise his voice.
"I didn't choose to be born, he chose to have me. I could never leave my son and I'd be fighting to speak to him, and yet my dad isn't. Why should I bother?
"I think it would bring more problems in my life if I had him back in my life, so I have to block it out and say 'That's over.'"
Danny's relationship with Alan became strained after his parents split up, which left him in a "cold, damp, dark house" with his mum, who struggled in the aftermath.
He suspects the tensions first emerged when he challenged his dad, explaining: "I think because I sat down with him and said 'Can you not just sort it out with mum?'
"Your kids should be your first thought and I didn't feel like that with my dad - he left us and you're just abandoned. Like 'I idolised you and now you've just gone'.
"He had some issues as well. I wish I'd known what I know now to be able to go 'Dad, talk to me, let's talk about it'.
“I was always scared of talking because talking in my house always ended up in conflict and fights.
"I wish I could have gone for a beer or a coffee with my dad and just gone 'Are you ok, what's going on, tell me?'"
After decades apart, last year Danny agreed to meet his father when he flew over from Spain to attend a pal’s birthday.
He says he was “buzzing” at the idea of reconciling, only for Alan at the last minute to cancel, stating he would attend the party but not travel to London to see his son.
The star said the last time he spoke to his father other than that, after many years, was in a phone call to say he'd got engaged.
But even then Alan annoyed him by telling Danny how he had been carrying £500 beer barrels up the stairs in his pub, adding that amount of money did not mean much to his celeb son.
The long-standing rift haunted Danny, who believed it was actually winning I’m A Celebrity - alongside “various therapy, for different reasons” - that finally cleansed him of his difficult emotions and feelings of abandonment.
He says things came to an emotional head when talking to the ITV show’s welfare team as he sat with the crown on his head, “stinking” and starving after losing six kilos.
I felt guilty for cuddling at night - I was like 'my mum's not got anyone'. I wasn't living my life because I felt so much pain for my mum. It was hurting me too much
Danny Jones
Danny recalls: “She said 'How are you?' And it was just me and this therapist. I was like 'I think I'm on top of the world, I think I'm alright'.
“And I hadn't really connected with anybody in the outside world by this point…
"I've just been on a show where someone's voting for me, but not just me, but me when I'm hungry, when I'm tired, when I'm covered in stuff that I don't want to be covered in.
“It's the worst of me. And she just said to me 'So do you feel enough?' And I just burst out into tears. It's like 'Oh my God, maybe I am'.
"That was like one moment where I was like 'Woah, I have never felt that emotion'. I've never asked that to myself or been asked that.
"So for me that was like one of the most rewarding moments I think I've ever had in my life, because yeah I think I am.”
While Danny is grateful to have moved past the pain of his childhood, he can see how the trauma bled into his own relationship with his stunning wife Georgia Horsley.
He met her at a Miss London event in 2008, while she was the reigning Miss England, and he credits her with having helped him battle anxiety and panic attacks that plagued him from the age of 19.
Danny believes a lot of his struggles stem from “all the loss” - including his dad’s abandonment, the death of his grandparents, which led him to suffer “night terrors”, and the death of his “best, best mate more recently”.
And at times, the McFly frontman - who married Georgia in 2014 - was crippled with “guilt” over having such a great relationship.
He explains: "I felt guilty for cuddling at night - I was like 'my mum's not got anyone'. I wasn't living my life because I felt so much pain for my mum. It was hurting me too much."
Recalling his childhood, Danny reflects: "For me, my parents are like your first idols.
"Getting in a band and coming back to a house that wasn't home any more - that had happy memories - I was healing from that and I was catching up from there.
"There was this song called 'Last Mistake' - that's actually never been released - about the very first time I went home and I saw this house that used to be a home and I was explaining how cold it was and dark.
"I didn't want to go home and go to this dark place where my mum was in bits over this divorce. Seeing my mum like that it wasn't very nice.
Danny Jones is worth more than £4million and is set to make considerably more money since his I'm A Celebrity win last year.
PR expert Carla Speight, who's launched the , predicts advertisers will be lining up to work with him.
She believes he could become the "next Olly Murs", should he want to transition to presenting where he would be seen as a "safe pair of hands" for ITV shows or to rescue flailing formats.
Having endeared himself to an army of fans on The Voice, The Masked Singer and MasterChef, prior to I'm A Celebrity, Carla suspects the only way is up for him.
Part of the reason for this is because he "appears to be a genuine and a real family man", which the public "latch onto, especially in the wake of the Gregg Wallace scandal".
But Carla says Danny could make an even vaster fortune should he follow in the footsteps of Take That and take advantage of his huge fanbase and go solo.
She adds: "The world is his oyster really, he's loved, very genuine and massively popular. The future is very bright for him."
PR expert Carla Speight has released a new app using AI technology, find out more here:
"From what I thought was an amazing perfect family home to this destruction and this cold, damp, dark house - I didn't want to be there. It was like a tornado, getting bigger and bigger.
"My dad used to do the little things like the DIY, and like the curtains were falling down or the shelf was hanging down.
"I was like 'My mum's here on her own'. I used to feel guilty for having a good relationship because my mum didn't have one.”
Thankfully Danny seems to have moved past those problems, describing himself as being in a “good place”, thanks to behaviours including going to the gym, getting good sleep, visualising and “mouth taping”.
The latter is a technique that forces people to breathe through their nose while sleeping, which is favoured by the likes of footballers including Erling Haaland.
Danny also follows an 80/20 diet plan, which comprises 80 per cent being good, 20 per cent bad, meaning he’s strict during the week and can “enjoy yourself at the weekends”.
Reflecting on his journey to happiness he says: "It was healing and I've learned something about myself - that I still need to heal. I clearly have something that is still hurting.
"I think I'm healing from a lot of things. I've had various therapy for different reasons, but I'm trying to find another one now."
Previously, when Danny was on I'm A Celebrity, Alan said he believed their falling out was due to his son siding with his mum in the divorce.
He told the : "I think because he loves his mum so much he's protected her, and I think any reunion with me, and this is only my opinion, would upset his mum. I don't think he wants to do that and I understand that.
Prior to this recent interview, Alan claimed he wanted to reach out again to Danny to try to make amends.
He said: "At the end of the day I can sleep at night, I know he's okay, he's safe…
“But I would like to think if anything bad happened, like an accident or something, that someone would message me to let me know, and I don't know if that would happen…
“But hopefully one day we'll have that pint, sooner rather than later, time's getting on.”
Danny Jones speaks on The High Performance Podcast, which airs tomorrow, visit: .
