Anthea Turner’s sister Wendy has revealed that she offered to donate her eggs when her sibling struggled with fertility issues. The eggs failed and they didn’t speak for four years.
At the time of their split, the 64-year-old TV presenter had just split from Grant Bovey in 2013 due to his infidelity and their fertility issues. Journalist Wendy, 57, was also going through a difficult time with her husband Gary Webster.
Writing in a collaborative piece in The Sunday newspaperthe sisters shared how they found it difficult to be there for each other because of their own trauma.
Wendy recalled, “When he [Grant] When he left her for the last time, his PA rang me to say, “Can you come over? Anthea is really hurting.” There were lots of incidents like this. There was talking about everything, a few G&Ts and shouting at the world.
“It was heartbreaking: she had already been through a lot of IVF treatments and we had even talked about donating my eggs.”
Anthea Turner’s sister Wendy has revealed she offered to donate her eggs during her sibling’s fertility struggles, before they fell out and didn’t speak for four years (pictured in 2004)
When they started talking again, the sisters discovered they could pick up where they left off, simply because they are family (Anthea pictured in May 2024)
Anthea added: ‘Wendy and I have never been on each other’s lips, but it was still difficult when we didn’t speak for a couple of years. I had just gotten divorced. I had put all my eggs in one basket with Grant and I didn’t expect it to blow up.
‘Wendy and Gary had problems, but it was their life and there wasn’t everything I could do about it.’
The former Blue Peter star insisted her sister and brother-in-law are now ‘completely healthy’, before revealing the impetus for their reunion was their mother’s ill health.
The couple lost their mother Jean in 2022. Anthea and Wendy had resumed contact in the years before, but the former GMTV presenter insisted they would ‘never talk about’ their split.
Nowadays, Anthea, who is still close to her stepdaughters Claudia (27), Amelia (29) and Lily (30), and her sister communicate ‘every other day’.
When they finally spoke again, the sisters found they could pick up where they left off, simply because they are family.
The sisters spoke about their feud during an appearance on This Morning in June.
Presenter Cat Deeley wondered: ‘The interesting thing is that you both have an intrinsic friendship and sisterhood, you’re so close, but yet you had a huge falling out.
“Our phone call today is about family feuds and I think they’re mainly interested in how you heal a rift?” wondered presenter Ben Shepherd.
The former Blue Peter presenter married Grant Bovey in 2000, but they divorced in 2015, years after it emerged he had had an affair
The marriage ended after Anthea discovered that Grant, then 52, was having an affair with interior designer Zoe de Mallet Morgan (pictured 2013)
Wendy said of their renewed relationship: ‘Well, I think in our case it definitely helped that our mother was ill and then died. We had to work together for our father.
“It’s very difficult because it just happened.”
Anthea then gave advice to others who were in a similar situation.
She said, ‘Last time, the best is restored, and sometimes you don’t pick up on things. You’re sisters, we just talked about the reference points there, for whatever reason, you come back together.’
And Wendy added: ‘We never analysed what went wrong and what went right.’
The sisters spoke about their feud during an appearance on This Morning in June