Dawn O'Porter hid in cupboard to grieve Caroline Flack without her kids seeing

Dawn O’Porter has revealed she "cried in cupboards" as she mourned Caroline Flack's death, in order to protect her children from her grief.

The writer - who has two sons aged five and seven with actor husband Chris O'Dowd - was a close friend of the Love Island host, who took her own life in February 2020 aged 40.

O'Porter, 43, told Sophie Ellis-Bextor's Spinning Plates podcast: "[My children] were so young at the time, only five and two, she died on the 15th of February, just before the pandemic got its claws into us all.

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"I got COVID on the way back to LA from her funeral on the Friday, and then the world shut down on the Monday. It's just this weird period of grief, not being able to leave the house and still being in floods of tears for six hours a day.

"With two kids at home, I cried in cupboards. I just didn't want them to see.

"They were going through enough, school had just been shut down, my five-year-old is being forced to do some weird thing on his computer which he didn't know what was going on."

She added: "I didn't have a very big one but I had a walk-in wardrobe, that a mum must always have one so she can always go there and cry."

Flack died a month before she was due to face trial, accused of assaulting her boyfriend Lewis Burto., though he did not want the charges to go ahead.

Flack firmly denied being an abuser, and said in an unpublished social media post released by her family that the incident was an argument and accident.

An inquest revealed Flack had had suicidal thoughts prior to her death and had been prescribed medication for insomnia in December 2019, just after being charged.

Her family have accused the Crown Prosecution Service of pursuing a “show trial” against her because she was in the public eye.

In July this year O'Porter was among Flack's friends and family who organised Flackstock, a festival to celebrate the TV presenter's life.

Money raised is to be shared equally between the charities Choose Love, Mind, Samaritans and Charlie Waller Trust.

O'Porter said: "It was absolutely incredible. We put on a festival for my good friend Caroline Flack because she loved festivals and she loved dancing, singing, it just felt like the right tribute.

"My thing at the start was we're doing this with the hope of abolishing shame around people dying this way, we want people to feel they've got support and can talk about this, and as much as it was a memorial it was that too.

Read more: Olly Murs pays birthday tribute to late pal Caroline Flack with karaoke video

"I just feel like everything about it was perfect. There was so much crying, so emotional. You would be having the best time and then you'd think, "I don't want to be here, I don't want to put on a festival for Caroline - what the f**k, where is she?"

For confidential emotional support at times of distress, contact The Samaritans at any time by calling 116 123 or emailing jo@samaritans.org.