Sue Perkins health: ‘It makes me mad’ – star on the ‘epic destruction’ caused by condition

The Masked Singer: Sue Perkins and Mel discuss show

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Back in 2015, the star was diagnosed with a benign brain tumour. Unsuspecting of her condition, it wasn’t until she underwent a health screening as part of the show Supersizers that her health ordeal truly began. Reflecting on the diagnosis on BBC Radio 4, Perkins said that the news “destroyed” her, leading to a “very dark time”. If her own diagnosis wasn’t enough, two years later in 2017, Perkins’ father Bert passed away from a similar condition after he refused to get checked.

“I have been through a very, very dark time since the tumour started to make its presence felt.

“Sometimes it’s big and makes me mad, and sometimes it’s small and is in the background,” Perkins explained when talking about her own condition.

“It’s only really now that I consider the epic destruction this tiny little rice-shaped thing in my pituitary gland has caused. Sometimes it screws up my hormones. I have various tests now to make sure the side effects aren’t too onerous.”

Due to the devastating impact that the diagnosis had on her, Perkins remembers the tiniest details about how the fateful day she was told about the tumour.

“In this small, very clinical white side room, this woman said ‘your bloods are very awry and you have a brain tumour,” she said.

As part of the news, Perkins was also told that she may not be able to have children, something that the medical professional said would be “easier” due to the fact that she was a lesbian.

“I don’t know if I would have gone on to have children, but as soon as someone says you can’t have something, you want it more than anything,” she went on to add.

“Oh, OK. Well, that makes it easier. You’re infertile. You can’t have kids.

“Does a lesbian not have a fallopian tube? Am I not human, and [am] I not somebody who could be a lovely, wonderful mother?” she wrote following the comments from the medical expert.

Cancer Research UK explains that the pituitary gland is a small gland that lies behind the eyes and mainly controls body function by making and releasing hormones into the bloodstream.

A pituitary tumour is an abnormal growth in this area. Typically there are two types of tumour – ones that produce hormones (secreting), and ones that do not (non-secreting).

Cancer.net explains that some people do not experience any signs or symptoms of a tumour, but those who do often experience the following:

• Headaches
• Vision problems
• Unexplained tiredness
• Mood changes
• Irritability
• Unexplained changes in menstrual cycles
• Erectile dysfunction, which is the inability to achieve or maintain an erection and is caused by hormone changes
• Infertility, which is the inability to have children
• Unexpected breast growth or production of breast milk.

More seriously, individuals can experience either Cushing’s syndrome – a combination of weight gain, high blood pressure, diabetes, and easy bruising that is caused by overproduction of the hormone ACTH – or a condition known as acromegaly, which is the enlargement of the arms or legs, and thickening of the skull and jaw, caused by too much growth hormone.

Although most pituitary tumours are benign (not cancerous) and slow growing, when noticing symptoms it is important to get checked by a medical professional, something that Perkins’ father Bert kept putting off.

Speaking to the Metro in 2022, Perkins revealed how her late father was “very considerate” of other people and tried not to be a nuisance, so his terminal condition went undiagnosed for months.

She said: “I remember when his brain tumour got bad and terminal he apologised for being a nuisance. He was very considerate of other people.

“My father put off everything medical really. My earliest memories were of him going to the hospital for things that wouldn’t have been a problem if he’d gone to the doctor six months before. It was a combination of he didn’t want to bother people or waste time, which is a generational thing, but also possibly being frightened. [Before the tumour diagnosis] his health massively deteriorated and he was lying about how bad it was.”

Due to Bert’s reluctance to accept help, it was down to the Perkins family to take him for an eye-test, which has the potential to detect multiple serious health conditions such as diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis, Lyme disease, multiple sclerosis, and in Bert’s case a brain tumour.

Sadly it was too late for Bert who passed away six months later, but learning from the ordeal, Perkins urged others about the importance of getting regular eye-tests. She added: “For me it’s more a question of it alerted me to the suite of things that a regular eye test would show, glaucoma, hypertension, diabetes and even tumours – and very, very positive outcomes can come [for other people].

“There’s a lot of cultural nervousness between thinking something is not right and having it diagnosed. My dad didn’t want to know what it was because he found it hard to deal with.”

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