Earlier this year, Tanya Hennessy, comedian, author, radio and TV host, took on the challenge of I’m A Celebrity. Before we all became well acquainted with lockdowns, Tanya and her campmates gave up all the comforts of modern life to rough it in the African jungle.

Here’s what we learned.

How would you describe the show to anyone who has never seen it?

It’s a really fun family show that gives celebrities or people in the public eye — no matter how relevant they may be — a chance to show their real selves in a raw, authentic way, while not eating a bunch of food and doing really traumatising activities for your pleasure!

After leaving the jungle, what question did people ask you the most?

How much weight did you lose? And is it really as bad as it looks?

And was it as bad as it looked?

It’s worse! The toilets are gross and sometimes you really want a Coke or, like, a burger, and you just can’t have it. You can’t put headphones in, you can’t run away (even though I tried!).

There are spiders on you, you can’t wash yourself properly, you can’t dry your clothes properly, your bras smell! You can’t find your swimmers and then, when you do, there’s a scorpion in them. It’s like a nightmare camping experience.

People are like, “It’s just like camping”, I’m like, are you f**king kidding?! There’s no beer and wine! You know what I mean? There’s tinea and sadness! It’s not like camping at all.

Every year there are rumours that the celebs actually get snacks delivered to them throughout the day, are those rumours true?

I HATE THOSE RUMOURS!

Put me on record saying no one gets snacks. There’s no f**kin’ roll-ups or Dunkaroos in the jungle!

You want minerals? Lick a rock.

What about contraband? Is it easy to sneak in?

I was so nervous that I didn’t think of it, but if I had my time over I would have put Nescafe in my socks. The thing I missed the most was coffee… and carbohydrates, but mainly coffee.

It’s hard to sneak in because you have to be really strategic. It has to be on your person because you change from your entrance outfit to your jungle outfit. It’s got to be in your bra or your hair or in your socks! You have to be really covert.

Was it difficult getting used to being filmed 24/7?

You forget about the cameras! I mean, you wake up and there’s a camera on you but you just forget about it because they’re there the whole time.

That’s scary as well, though. Like, am I going to fart in my sleep and are they going to use that? Is that going to make the promo? I don’t know!

What do you do with the days if you’re not at a Tucker Trial?

The conversation is so dull towards the end, you know what I mean? You start talking about, “Was that rock there yesterday?” You get down to the end and you’ve got nothin’ left! All you do is tap-dance with Rhonda Burchmore and think… what is this?

You play weird games. We used to play stick cricket. It challenges your imagination because you have nothing. Nothing to do and you’ve only got yourself, a couple of sticks and a spider. That is very challenging on the mind.

Lucky I learned some choreography otherwise what would I have done?

Looking back at your experience, did the jungle change your outlook?

I found a lot of gratitude for the life I have and how little other people have and it made me very thankful. It just really shifted my mind in a really tough year.

If it wasn’t for the jungle, I don’t think I would have had that gratitude for 2020 which has really kept me afloat.

You also just released your SECOND book, Help Self, what can you tell us about that?

If you’ve had a really shitty year, you’ve felt unmotivated and you’re like, what’s the meaning of life? What am I doing? I don’t know what I’m doing!

Help Self is like a really good book to make you feel motivated, push you forward, maybe push you into a new dimension of your career or life but it’ll also make you laugh.

You can binge all of Tanya’s moments in the jungle and catch up on the last season of I’m A Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here Australia on 10 play now.

I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here! premieres Sunday, 3 January on Network 10 and 10 play