Fatima Whitbread says she will keep taking on reality shows and new challenges to help learn more after a sheltered youth.
The former Olympic athlete has competed on other reality shows like Celeb SAS, and she insists she will continue similar journeys on screen and off as she is learning and making up for lost time as an orphaned child.
Fatima said: "The greatest thing that I took away from all my sport, and the same with experiences like South Africa is the journey of learning more about yourself.
"That's what it's about for me. And to the day I die, I will always feel like that because having spent the first 14 years of my life in children's homes, I feel that I missed out an awful lot on education, life, and learning. And it just felt like I'm like a sponge to water.
"Even at this age, I wanted to learn and live and about stepping out and taking on new challenges and experiences to see and learn more about myself and how I operate and who is Fatima Whitbread, at age 62? And that's what it was about for me."
Fatima also insisted shows like I'm A Celebrity allow viewers to see a different side to famous faces.
She explained: "The celebrity status, once that disappears and the ego goes away, then you see the true person. I think that's the authentic person. That's what everybody wants to see. I think that's so important to be able to get that message across in that short space of time."
She admitted on the new I'm A Celebrity South Africa show there are days when camp is left with just rice and beans and some celebs lost a lot of weight. There also is set to be a divide in camp or two camps at some stage, with only one side winning meals.
She added: "A lot of us, there were days where we didn't eat properly at all. Whereas some of them, the camp mates were embarrassed because they won some of the Trials and they got to eat a lot more than the others. I mean you see people's characters then more clearly."
*I’m A Celebrity…South Africa begins on Monday (April 24) at 9pm on ITV1 and ITVX.
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