STACEY Solomon seems to be the perpetually bubbly, sunshine-bright, endlessly positive star we first met on the X-Factor, who became a regular household name, thanks to Loose Women and I’m A Celeb.

You get the sense she will always give a person the benefit of the doubt, so while she doesn’t think most people judge parents on purpose, “sometimes people don’t think about what they’re saying”.

“Most of the time, it’s because they want to help you or give you good advice, but a lot of the time, as a parent who’s exhausted, and struggling and constantly questioning yourself anyway, it ends up feeling like you’re doing everything wrong,” she says, explaining why she’s teamed up with breastfeeding brand Lansinoh on the #MyBabyMyWay campaign, to highlight how unhelpful parental judgement can be.

Solomon, 30, has dealt with a quite a lot of unsolicited criticism over the years, “from having my first child when I was 18, to my decisions whether I breastfed or not.”

Now a mum of three to Zachary, 11, Leighton, seven, and nine-month-old Rex, recently she’s had people grilling her on how she puts her youngest to bed. “Rex sleeps through the night sometimes; sometimes he doesn’t, we have good and bad days, and I love cuddling him to sleep, we don’t do controlled crying,” she explains, “and I’ve had people wondering why.”

It’s when you’re not asking for advice and get bombarded with it that your confidence can really take a hit, she says, particularly when “you’re doing something and you’re happy doing it, and then someone tears you down about it.”

“It’s very difficult,” says Solomon. “You’re plodding along OK and then someone says something, and you think, ‘Oh my God, I’m doing it all wrong, I’m rubbish.’

“But if what you’re doing works for you, then it works for you,” she adds firmly. “I definitely have to try and keep that mentality. If it’s working for us and it makes us happy, then that’s all that matters.”

“I’m 11 years down the line with it at this point,” she notes. “I feel like you do build up some resilience, learn to take everybody’s advice with a pinch of salt and just go with your gut.”

Then again, she admits, being a parent brings with it shifting moments of guilt and confusion, and “it is hard to trust your instincts sometimes, because for me, personally, after I had my babies, I feel like my instincts are all over the place. I actually feel like I know less than I’ve ever known.

“When I had Rex, I genuinely forgot everything,” says Solomon lightly. “It was seven years since my last newborn baby, I just felt like I had no idea what I was doing, because my hormones and emotions were everywhere.” At that point, she says, she “welcomed every bit of advice I could get”.

And there are times when, as a parent, you absolutely do have to access the right advice at the right time. “When I had Zachary, I questioned whether there was something wrong with me, because I just didn’t feel the way that people described feeling after having a baby,” Solomon recalls.

“As I’ve had more children, I realised it’s definitely a part of my make-up to feel that way, and it’s just the hormones and my body changing. So this time around, I felt really prepared.”

Knowing she only “had to ask, and speak up about how I was feeling” was, she says, “a really valuable lesson”.

“There is support out there; there are people who will help you get through if you have a difficult time in the early days, or even prenatal,” she adds.

The Dagenham-born presenter does think we are gradually getting better at communicating around parenting though, without making people feel like total failures. “We’re all different, but we’ve all got something in common: we’re all carers and we should stick together and build each other up,” she says, adding that when you do receive supportive messages online, “you feel like you’re part of a sisterhood, and you’ve got each other’s backs.”