Cheryl Burke’s ‘DWTS’ Blog: Drew’s Emotional Week (Exclusive)

“Dancing with the Stars” professional dancer – and two-time mirrorball champion – Cheryl Burke joins AccessHollywood.com as our behind-the-scenes celebrity blogger for Season 18 of ABC’s “Dancing with the Stars.”

Here is Cheryl’s latest post as she and celebrity partner Drew Carey head into Week 3 of the competition…

This week is ‘Most Memorable Year’ and this is always the time in the competition where you really get to know your celebrity and so does everyone else. Some stories are sensitive and emotional, some stories are celebrating a happy moment in that person’s life. For Drew, the most memorable year was 2005, when he had his son Connor, so you’re definitely going to see a more sensitive and vulnerable side of Drew.

PHOTOS: ‘Dancing With The Stars’ Ballroom Beauty Cheryl Burke

The last couple weeks you saw us do the jive and foxtrot, so as you guys know, he’s a performer, he’s a showman, but I think this week is a really important week for him because it means something more. It’s dedicated to his son.

We’re dancing the waltz, which is a different pace for us. We’re used to the faster dances. Dancing slower is actually a lot harder than dancing fast, so we’ve been facing a few challenges and I’ve been pushing him extra hard this week because I know his potential and we really want to try and improve and hopefully get better scores. So it’s definitely been a week of taking it more seriously. We’re still having fun, obviously, but it’s more of an emotional week. We’re thinking about his son and also making it as good as possible because the waltz is a very technical dance.

Last week on the jive, he performed great. He missed a couple steps here and there, which he was a little upset about, but it happens. It’s only Week 2. I think right now, because of those little mistakes, we’re just trying to amp up the rehearsal , so we’re rehearsing longer hours. He’s not doing ‘Price Is Right’ this week, so we were able to just really get in the full five hours every single day, so it’s been very mentally and physically exhausting for both of us, but I hope that we’ll be able to show a different side of Drew. Connor, his son, will be in the audience and we incorporated him into our dance, so it’ll be a really cute moment I think.

— Cheryl Burke

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