Jade Jones: I left my Olympic gold medal in the toilets

My Sporting Life is The i Paper’s look behind the curtain at what drives sports stars to greatness. Double Olympic taekwondo champion Jade Jones opens up on the highs of London 2012, the devastation of falling short in Paris, losing her beloved grandfather and finding a new purpose in boxing after being diagnosed with ADHD. Nothing can compare to London 2012 Home games, first Olympics… I think I was the youngest Team GB gold medallist. I was a council estate kid. Jones burst onto the scene as a fresh-faced teenager at London 2012 (Photo: Getty) No one really expected me to win. Even the bookies, the odds were something like 14 to 1. It was crazy. But I believed I could win. In my head, that wasn’t even a question. I knew I had to win. My granddad used to keep all my medals He passed away six months ago. Best mate is a strong phrase, because he was quite a serious man, my granddad. But no, he was my biggest fan and my biggest critic. He was the one who got me into taekwondo. It was him who took me. It was him who kept me on the straight and narrow. We were so close. He completely changed my life. I’d always just give them to him to look after. He kept them in his safe, and he would polish them and look after them. Whereas, literally, I had my first gold medal for two minutes, and I left it in the toilet. I nearly lost it about 10 times. I can be quite forgetful at times. I felt like the biggest loser after the last Olympics Obviously, trying to chase history and win a third gold medal. I genuinely believe I could have done it. It’s easy to say that now, sitting here when you haven’t. And then I lost. When I came home, my whole life was up in the air. I was recently single. It felt like I was at rock bottom for me. I felt like it was all over. It was horrible because in my head I’d failed. I have two gold medals, but I should have three. That’s how it made me feel. My friends roasted me for going on Celebs Go Dating I went on it with Gemma Collins. She definitely is the GC – she was a drama and a diva and everything. She is a really nice person. But yeah, I did get ripped. Because everyone gets to see it as well, don’t they? It was hard to know whether you were actually dating or it was all for the cameras. Again I was really young, so I’d probably be a bit more confident if I did it a second time. I was quite shy, didn’t have a clue what I was doing and basically winged the whole thing. But it was an amazing experience. Misfits is a circus – but I love it The 33-year-old says boxing has given her a new lease of life (Photo: Getty) Randomly after the Olympics I was thinking, “what am I going to do now?” Then I had this bright idea that I was going to become a boxer. So it was my coach who said [celebrity boxing circuit] Misfits would be a good starting place, because if I went pro, I’d never had a boxing match in my life. I remember I was sat there at the last press conference and you’ve got people like Jordan McCann [a rapper who became famous after releasing a song while in prison] swearing and blinding. I won’t even say any names, but it’s a car crash of people. And that’s what makes it so fun, especially after the seriousness of the Olympics. Don’t get me wrong, I am still so serious. I’m there to win, I’m there to perform. But you get to have a laugh, unlike taekwondo, which is very respectful. Whereas with Misfits, you’re weighing in and you’re getting in each other’s faces. I absolutely love it. Now I know I’ve got ADHD, everything makes sense For years I was just bumbling around, not knowing anything. And then after the last Olympics, I knew something wasn’t quite right. So it was nice to get a diagnosis, not to label it, more to understand it, so I could learn more about it, which was a relief. I’d get frustrated over the simplest tasks. It could even be sending texts or emails that I’d find hard. Then I found little ways to manage and teach my brain how to adapt. If I was in a normal job, I’d probably have struggled a million times more. One of the main things to help ADHD is exercising, so it makes sense that all my life I’ve had to train to keep myself in order. I’ve almost been self-medicating for years, in a way.