EastEnders actress Lisa Faulkner has said “she lost sight of everything” after discovering she was unlikely to have children.

The actress, who became engaged to Masterchef judge John Torode on Christmas Day last year, suffered an ectopic pregnancy over a decade ago.

The 47-year-old went through three rounds of IVF treatment before adopting her daughter with her first husband Chris Coghill in 2008.

John Torode and Lisa Faulkner
John Torode and Lisa Faulkner (Ian West/PA)

She told Hello! magazine: “Everyone around me seemed to be pregnant, and that made me feel such a failure.

“I lost sight of everything – my marriage, my friends, my family. All I could think was: ‘I want to grow a baby.’”

She also told the magazine she found her celebrity chef fiance attractive because he is an “alpha male” as well as a “leader and provider”.

Lisa Faulkner
Lisa Faulkner suffered an ectopic pregnancy (Ian West/PA)

She said: “He’s a very different person to me. He is an alpha male in that he’s a leader and provider. But then I’m probably very alpha female, and fiercely independent.

“But he’d say we’re a team now. We both love yoga and looking after our bodies and mindfulness, as well as walking, eating, chatting, cooking.

“We look after each other, and that’s because of hindsight – when you don’t look after each other, things fall apart.”

The full interview is available in Hello! magazine, out today.