Jackie-O [Part 1]: The Addiction That Almost Ended Her

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You have to be quite calculated.

You know.

You might go out to dinner and then you're like, Okay, how many pills do I need? Where do I hide them? If someone says, oh, can I borrow your lipstick and they open your bag, you immediately panic, thinking, shit, are they going to see these pills in there?

From MoMA Mia, you're listening to No Filter. I'm mea friedman and it is pretty unusual for me to interview the same person twice within the space of a year.

I don't think it's ever happened before.

But the last time I sat down with Jackie O, one half of the most successful radio duo in Australian history, she had a secret not just from me, but from almost everyone in her life. Her friends, her colleagues, the men she'd begun dating after her divorce from the father of her daughter Kitty, even from her co host Kyle Sandalance. Nobody knew that Jackie O was addicted to pills and alcohol and had been for years. The story they thought they knew is.

That she'd lost a whole lot of weight.

Because she was on a zeenpic or because she'd had surgery. That's what the gossip site said, and that's how the room is wet. But everyone missed the real story, which was so much bigger and deeper and more sad than you would expect from someone who, from the outside anyways, seemed so successful and so powerful and so glamorous. When I last spoke to Jackie, it was a great conversation.

I think it was just a normal Sunday morning.

Which was what for you at that time.

So Gemma had been around the night before with another friend of ours, Kim, and so we'd been drinking and having, you know, a great girl's night, and I think I would have finished up around two am, and then I think around the time that I have no idea what time I got up the next day actually, and it was just probably me, you know, eating, drinking, watching TV. And then I got a phone call from the person who was supplying me with the painkillers, the only person who has ever done that.

I've never been able to access them before like that.

And that person called me to say that they couldn't do it anymore because they had been busted.

I was.

I took the call outside and I just remember thinking, oh my god, this is it.

This is the moment I feared. What am I going to do?

You know, all these thoughts run through your head of like oh shit, now what like, you know, how am I going to get out of this? How am I going to taper off this kind of amount that I'm taking of medication?

How long had you been taking it for?

Well, I would say it was the beginning of COVID was when it got really bad. So it originally started about fifteen years prior, when I had been prescribed a really strong painkiller and don't which people know in Australia is like oxy content in the strongest painkiller.

I think that, you kid, it's no, you can't get it over counter. It's it's usually you get prescribed it after an operation or you for endometriotis.

Yeah, so I had it for the endometriosis.

They'd given me other painkillers that weren't very effective, and it was really severe pain at the time. And yeah, it's it's very difficult to get end down rightly, so in this country, and so that's where it started. And then I think because you couldn't even access something like that, you couldn't just even go doctor shopping for it, because doctors are extremely aware that there are people out there like me who are abusing it, and so.

Can you explain doctor shopping. One of the things I found most interesting in your book was getting inside addiction, and one of the things that came across so much was how time consuming it is.

Time consuming so time like.

There's the money, there's all of those things, but it like, what was the process of getting the amount of drugs that you needed before you found this person who could supply it.

Well, See, the thing is I got the intake increased because of the person I ran into and because I had access to it freely, it then increased tenfold very quickly. So originally when I was prescribed the end domee, I really wasn't taking it to it. It was it was just one extra here and there when I was.

A lot to treat pain, to just take the edge.

Of Obviously it was originally to treat the pain, and then it became like, oh, i'm having a really shit day, I might take one of those because they give me a really nice feeling. And so doctor shopping for something like that is really awful. I can't even begin to tell you. The whole thing feels just dirty, and you're you know, you're lying. You know you're doing something wrong, and you're not stopping yourself from doing it.

So you're famous.

How do you doctor shop when you're Jackie O and you're that recognizable in waiting rooms? Yeahs by receptionists.

Yeah, well, you go far and wide. That's the thing.

You try not to go to a doctor's surgery in the same suburb too, in the same because who knows if those people know each other, and we'll say, oh, Jackie O came into the doctor surgery today, and the other one goes, yeah, me too. You know, alarm bells would go off. So it's incredibly devious behavior.

And what did you have to say to the doctors?

Would I would tell the truth?

But you know, it was it was as though I'd also said that story to the other doctor, so I was getting twice the amount I needed. So it wasn't that I was lying about the pain. I was telling them about the end of metriosis.

And yeah, a.

Lot of the time, every now and again a doctor would go, I don't feel comfortable prescribing this.

And did you feel so ashamed when that happened?

I really did.

Yeah, it was That was the worst part is the shame that comes with it.

How do you in that conversation, It's like, oh, okay.

Yeah, you just exactly. You just go okay, and they go, I'll prescribe you this instead.

And one time because you became worried that there would be some central record. Yeah, so you knew you couldn't give a false name, so you gave a false birthdate.

When did that go wrong?

I was just writing down whatever birthdate came to my mind. When they give you the form to go and sit down and write out your details. A couple of numbers, Yeah, pick a couple of numbers. Any numbers doesn't matter. Actually it does matter when it's February. Because I wrote February thirty. I got busted. I went to the receptionist. She's typing it in. She goes, wait, so your birthday is February thirty and I no, she didn't even say February.

She went the thirtieth of the second. So I didn't admit and I was like yeah, and oh god, again the shame, the shame.

So oh.

That didn't last very long, the doctor shopping, because I actually just thought, this is, this is you got to stop like you're you're going to get in trouble here, you know, and you're also going to where does it end?

You know? It will it will?

You'll want more and more if you keep taking more than you should. So thankfully, I think due to that lack of access, it stopped me from having a full blown addiction back then, and so it didn't really this oh well that was let me think I would have been about it would have been maybe late twenties, early thirties, I think when the end on one happened. And again I wouldn't have called that an addiction. I think that

I had access to it and used it as a coping mech.

Quite a few years later, and it's years in between. Were you doctor shopping all of that time?

No? No, no, no, So you did stop? I did. Yeah.

It was almost like that was so much effort and so much embarrassment came with that, and humiliation because even sometimes when you were prescribed it, you could tell the doctor was.

Almost looking at you like you were I used to think to.

Myself, God, he's looking at me like I'm a junkie, you know, And I thought, but you are a junkie right now in this situation, you are pretty much like I just thought. You know, it was too humiliating, and I thankfully stop that because I can't. Doctor shopping is incredibly time consuming.

Is that when you started drinking more?

No? Not even no, I didn't. Actually I never really had a problem with drinking. I think, I would say, you know, I guess it depends how you define a problem with drinking. So I never really liked alcohol at all. Kitty was born, and then suddenly it was a lot was happening with my mad marriage and then a child on top of that, and then we obviously refused any help. We didn't get anyone on board, so it was just Leah and I, which is fine, you know, it's absolutely manageable.

Once I started writing down my relationship to.

Alcohol, I thought, well, if I haven't had one day for the last ten eleven years without a glass of wine, then maybe there is a problem there. I mean, you don't have to be getting drunk every night and waking up and drinking alcohol first thing in the morning to have a problem with alcohol. And I think that's how I always identified it's.

Like alcoholic adjacent, Yeah it is, or using it as a crutch.

It's a dependency on it.

Yeah, for sure, when you got that phone call and you think about how long had that person been in your life who was supplying you with the pills?

Pretty much was soon as I ran into them is when it started. So twenty nineteen I think that was. And how would it work? Would you like text them?

Because I imagine they were not doing the right thing and you were not doing the right thing, So how did you actually do it? Because the risk of being caught for both of you and the stakes for.

High Yeah, I didn't think about that. It's almost like I didn't even want to think about that part.

It's actual because it wasn't like you weren't scoring heroine then you weren't. I think it was like these were just over the counter painkillers exactly.

I thought, well, these are legal, so therefore it's not that big a deal.

That's what I told myself.

And did you feel shame when you spoke to this person and you kept saying, I need like did you get them by the box? Did you go and pick them up from their house?

Like, no, I would, I would meet them, and it was actually, yeah, so they I would meet them. I don't want to give away who this person is, but it's not. It's not like this kind of dodgy drug deal in the middle. I'm not, you know, sitting in their car and exchanging It wasn't quite like that.

But no, but it was like that. It just didn't feel like that exactly.

Yeah. It wasn't like, you know, necessarily drug dealer type. It was a situation. It was a different situation.

When you think about that person, how do you feel about them?

That's a good question actually, because I know my friend Gemma is angry with that person, but I am not because I put them in that situation and I know they gave me an extraordinarily large amount of medication.

But I can't turn around at the end of it all and go, well, you shouldn't have done that. I don't know.

I just I don't know what I was lying to them as well. I mean, I wasn't saying it was all for me. I was saying, oh, yeah, I've got some people at work who need you know, still knocks as well because we all work crazy hours.

Okay, so I was lying to them all.

Slight different with the many packets of neuropan plus and painkillers that you needed though.

Yeah, yeah, it was just because that's stuff you have to go to a doctor and get prescribed it, and you know that used to be an over the counter situation and you know they could access it and they were like, yeah, okay, no wors you know, I.

Don't know do you have contact with them anymore?

No?

No, no, ever since that day? I think it was. That was it, you know, was done.

The next fine call you made after that.

One was to who Gemma my best friend?

What did you say to her?

So? Why? Well?

I thought I needed someone who I knew could A help me and b wouldn't judge me and was close to me that I could trust. And Jemma knew everything about me except that you know, she was the one I would always talk to about any problem I had in life and vice versa.

Interestingly, in the book, you talk about your assistant who's been with you for ten years, Brett, who sounds amazing. Yeah, and she knows everything about you, yes, including this. She's the one person or the other person besides the person who was supplying you with it.

Who did know.

And she would sometimes leave notes around the house. I know because she would see all the empty blister packs and she would witnessed you, you know, day and night, and she'd watched you deteriorate along with other pe.

Why didn't you.

Call her first?

I don't feel I want to burden her with something like that. I think with Britta and I, she is like a big We always laugh. She's my big sister because she's the protector, and she's the one that's always trying to will in those days help me and I. But she always has kept it professional. You know. She's always very careful not to cross the line where we become best friends, and she's she's always mindful of that

That must have been a big deal for her to write those letters.

Oh absolutely, How did you feel when you saw them, because that was the first time you'd had a mirror held up to you.

Yeah.

Oh, I think when you're in and when you're in the middle of an addiction and someone does that to you, you don't sit there and go, oh my god, I feel so ashamed. I feel so this. Oh I really should get help. I can't believe she you just immediately don't think about that. Let's not think about that. It's just you just don't want denial, big denial.

Yeah.

After this short break, we hear from Gemma, who was on the other end of that phone call, and we find.

Out what she did next.

So you called Gemma because she's the closest person to you, and also she knows how to get shit done and sort shit out. Yeah, which brings me to you, jem and that weekend for you the night before when you'd been over at Jack's house. Yeap, what did you notice about her? And what had you noticed over what period of time leading up to that?

I probably didn't notice much the night before, And in fact, we was saying this the other day. It was quite funny because I left earlier that night, which in nine sight, thank god I did, because I needed my wits about me the next day, it turned out. But I think I left it like nine or ten that that night before, and to be honest with you, there was nothing different that night as opposed to any other night that we

Kind of a reason.

Or I'd noticed that we'd go out for dinner and maybe we'd only had one or two glasses of wine and I'm obviously still fine, and Jack would seem like she was drunk, and I'd think, again, well, she.

You know, she doesn't get a lot of sleep.

So there was always this kind of I had this justification in a way in my head, and I was. I was at her all the time, like I was saying, something's not right, and I think we should take you to the doctor.

Well, during that time, I think about six weeks, maybe even eight weeks prior I genuinely had gotten sick, had COVID.

Then I think it was like a lung or chest infection.

I just don't know what it was. But it was constant coughing, being lethargic. And so I was sick for this very long period of time, which I know was for you.

Yeah, I should be getting better.

Yeah, because nothing was changing, I thought something's not right here. But yeah, I guess I noticed small things, but it never ever occurred to me.

That it would be it was.

But also I was with Jack all the time, and she was very very good at hiding it, like there was no signs add It's a crafty.

Aren't they?

One hundred percent? Yeah?

How hard is that?

Well?

How calculated do you have to be?

You have to be quite calculated.

You have to you know, you might go out to dinner and then you're like, Okay, how many pills do I need?

Where do I hide them?

If someone says, oh, can I borrow your lipstick and they open your bag. You immediately panic, thinking, shit, are they going to see these pills in there? You know, so you have to hide them in the little back pocket and then put tissues on top of it in case someone goes to that back pocket and goes, oh, I've lost my button?

Can I put it in your back pocket?

Then you have to take the pills and you have to go to the bathroom and you know, figure out if somebody in here are they going to look at me at the basin with the water you just and then just covering up of the actual the effect. Though, that isn't hard because what happened was initially when in twenty nineteen when I had started taking a still Knox

Then?

Like, if you're not feeling anything anymore and it's not giving you anything, why are you taking it? And I think I just kept living in hope that it would give me some sort of high. And the other thing was that I didn't want to. I just didn't know how to really come off it, because I knew on the days I didn't have Kitty, I was taking that

So the next day that was interesting because then when things did transfire, all these secrecy like elements would come out so and it would all make sense. It'd be like, oh, so is that why every time we'd go out you was always adamant that your handbag, like no one could touch your handbag or yeah, you'd always go to the bathroom every time the food was put down.

And I was always perplexing, like.

Like reverse bulimia.

Because I was bollim when I was in my early twenties and I'm thinking about all that strategized and be like, Okay, so where will I be, where's the bathroom, who's going to be in there?

What can I do? I need to do like all the steps that you need to do to cover it up.

And it's like no one would have guessed when you go to the bathroom always before the food comes, because you've.

Got to have it. If I've done it after, people might have gone hang on a second.

And that's the thing. If anyone gets in the way of your plan. Yes, like the yeah, just ruin my whole night, Like you know, it's.

I still have anxiety dreams about having binged and being not able to throw up. I still have those anxiety dreams now because it's such a it's so ingrained. Yeah, yeah, and it's it's well, it's like any it's like an addictions and it's having to learn and having to learn what it's about because it's not about.

The food or the alcohol or the pills or whatever, it's about why you're using it.

What's interesting to me is reading your book and the conversations is that no one had any idea, like like it was the last thing. And I'm interested in what that says about you and what everyone thinks about you. And it made me think that everyone must think that you're very dependable, responsible, grounded, like all of those things that you wouldn't connect with addiction.

Yeah.

I think the main reason is that because I don't do any kind of party drugs and really never have, and I think I'm probably one of the only people and I'm not even just talking about the entertainment or I'm talking just in Sydney's Eastern suburbs for a start. I reckon I'm one of the very rare people who have never even tried coke.

Yeah, oh I have tried.

But I feel that way too, Like you can swim in that circle and it's like you realize you're the only one left at the table when everybody else has gone to the bathroom.

Yeah, really everyone on there, I know, I know, and so I think everyone always put me in that basket of Oh, she just doesn't do drugs at all, And so I think that was if anyone even had a miniscule thought of that, they'd be like, oh, no, she would never be doing that because she doesn't do This is also.

Part of it that people don't think of prescription medication as being addictive or something that people get addicted to, like.

I think I know that.

I was so confused about it when I heard Matthew Perry had gotten addicted to painkillers.

I remember that. I remember thinking, who gets addicted to painkillers? But I just thought they were by that too. Yeah, I think why how you know it was so bad?

It was also hearing that you take sleeping It's like what everyone always asks you is how do you get up in the morning.

So early be so tired?

It's like, why would you be taking sleeping pills?

Good question, Yeah, if you.

Would be addicted to anything. Yeah, And probably that's why the people around you didn't pick it either, because it's quite easy to you know, we can all pick the signs of someone who's who's on appers and who's high, but when someone's just a bit tired or a bit and as you say, when you're just taking it to be normal.

Yeah, I think that was what I was perplexed by that day when they're all, you know, unraveled, because I remember sitting and going.

I can I just say when I went into rehab, I was the only person that was addicted to Everyone went because it's ambient over there, and they're like ambient.

Like why people get addicted to stimulants?

Yeah, I do.

It was like I mean when I told them in rehab that it was what I was taking. So they call it Thailand Ole three over there, and obviously people are in there mostly for meth fentanyl, alcohol. They're like the three big ones, and I was the only one in there for Thailand. They literally looked at me like Ossie, white girl, she's addicted to Thailand.

Oh, this is so lame.

It's so suburban.

It's so suburban. That's often what.

People say about the things that women get addicted to is because women have caring responsibilities, whether it's for children or partners or parents, whatever, they're more likely to get addicted to things that enable them to function, So things like gambling, things like food, things like prescription medications.

It's something you can still function, but it's not you know, you don't feel like you're going off the rails hardcore with your addiction, which is really really is not the case. And I think that that's my point in the book. When I first got in there, I felt that way too. It's like, hang on.

I've got the least scary.

Addiction in here, and everyone's looking at me like really, like you're in rehab for that. But yeah, absolutely, Like the problem I have is the same as the person next to me, he's doing Heroin. We both have the same problem, which is we're using that as a way.

To escape something else, and we need to address what that is.

You're sitting here now talking very calmly about it.

What was that.

Phone call like from your point of view, Jim? When she called you, you were in the car driving out to the country. Yeah, on a lovely sunday.

Yes, I was, And so she sounded that quite hysterical and was almost hyperventilating. So I knew it was bad, whatever it was, And I pulled over because I thought I can't be driving, like I kind of braced myself.

I could tell the severity very quickly.

And someone died.

Maybe I did, actually, yeah, I thought something had happened, yeah, to someone that we own. And then she managed to get out the words because I was saying, just told me, whatever it is, just say it, just say it. And she managed to kind of spit out the words in between the sobs of I've done something really stupid. That's all she kept saying.

And I still was like, what does that mean?

I said what, And then she eventually got out the words of I've been taking pills. And that's all she said to me was I've been taking pills. And immediately everything was like the penny dropped for me.

I was like, so you.

Didn't think she meant I've been taking pills this morning or last night.

You knew straight away.

I figured it was like you know that domino effect. I just figured the whole sequence of everything out and it all made sense.

And then I think he said.

And the person I was getting them from has just been busted, and I don't know what to do. And I've never ever heard Jack in that state before, and so all I said was, I said, just just sit tight, I'll be there.

I'll be there in two hours.

And I turned around and I drove straight back where you go house. I was going down to the Southern Highlands south of Sydney, so I was pretty much close to where I was going, and so I turned around and.

Drove change of plans.

Yeah, yeah, but I.

Didn't know what the pills were or how many she was taking. I didn't know any of that. But I just had a gut feeling that it wasn't going to be like I'm taking one pill here and there. I just had this innate feeling that it was quite severe.

And so, you know, what did you do in the car on the way home, I mean, on the way back to Jack.

That's a good question. I've never asked that. Actually, well, no, you do know I called That's what I know. But I didn't know know that. Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah, so I actually didn't do it. Did it take you before you decided to call Betty? About an hour?

Some people are good in a crisis. I'm really good in a crisis, as long as the crisis isn't happening to me. Yeah, it really focuses my thoughts. I know exactly what to do.

Yeah, I'm a very sounds I killed that. Yeah, I've always been like that. I don't know why, but I have that too. And so I sat with it, and I just sat with my own thoughts for the first hour of driving, and I think I was also trying to piece some things together in my head. I was like, oh, she you know, she's probably been doing it. I was trying to, you know, figure out the timeline, I guess, and then I started to think, Okay, let's prepare for all situations here, because that's my nature.

I'm a planner.

And so I thought, if it is an addiction, and if it has been going on for a while, then the fact that she's told me, I need to act quickly. Like I knew there were certain things, and I've had some experience. I've been around other people that have had addiction and successfully overcome them, and so I knew that if it was that, I needed to be prepared and I need to act immediately. So I kind of started thinking, well,

First of all, I just thought.

That it would be a media circus and if she was genuinely unwell, as her friend, selfishly, I wanted her to get better, and so I thought, if it's in Australia, she won't be able to do that, just because the chances are too high that it'll get out. And I also thought she'd probably if it did get out, then she'd probably use it as an excuse to say I can't stay here anymore. And so I wanted to eliminate all options of her being able to not get successful treatment.

When I heard the audio of you sang it on the show about Betty Ford, I.

Was like, Betty fool, that's so retro. Yeah, I didn't even know it was kind of still around.

YEA Betty four Center was founded in nineteen eighty two by former First Lady Betty Ford. After admissions, you'll be escorted to the medical and detoxification.

Unit, in the medical unit.

You'll be evaluated by our team of positions and it will be determined when it's appropriate to move you over to one of the residential halls. Our medical staff is here twenty four to seven to make you as comfortable as possible.

Like, surely there are more modern ones, more fancy ones, more upgraded worries, And why did you choose that?

Because I had experience with other people going there, and I knew from the other people that had gone there that it wasn't a fancy one and that it wasn't a day spa situation.

It was doing the work.

It was a real program, And so I think it was just because I knew it, I thought, well, that's my default.

I'm just going to go there.

And so I called them when I was about thirty minutes out from arriving at Jack's, and I said to them, I have a friend who's just admitted this to me. I don't know the severity of the situation, but I wanted to know, do you have any spots available? And I also know it's quite hard to get spots in there, just because they have a wait list and you know, And the lady said to me, we have one spot available and it's available from this Sunday. And I said I'll take it. And so so it was a week out.

He's all my details.

How much does it cost?

I can't It's about like thirty eight forty yeah, for the month, for the month.

Yeah, so you got to Jack's house.

Yeah, what did you discover? What state was she in?

She was not in a great state. I never driving. Not your best day, Yeah, definitely not.

I never really like reliving it because every time we do it makes it really upset.

But I'll do my best.

I think it was just very It just broke my heart to see her like that. To see anyone like that is very confronting because she just was so lost and so empty and broken. And I think because she finally said it, she was letting.

All the emotion out, I imagine, and so she was very It was like she was almost like.

A child in that moment, Like it felt like she was a child that was desperate to be rescued, and she was you know, struggling to breathe. We had to do a few breathing exercises, and she was having panic, like panic attacks and things. So but it was also her you know, rock bottom moment, so to speak, because had she not got the earlier phone call, we wouldn't have been in that position. And so I was able to get pretty much everything out of her straight away,

I never once.

All I did was I wanted her to feel I wanted her to feel my compassion, and I wanted her to feel nurtured, and I wanted her to feel safe. And that was the primary thing for me, was to make her know she was in a safe space and that I was going to make sure she was okay. And I think because hopefully she felt that she was able to really let everything out.

Yeahhack, the two hours between when you called jem and when she arrived at your house, what were they like for you? What did you do in those two hours?

I feel like that was a bit of a blur, to be honest.

I think it was part shock, part relief, part terrified. I think it was all those three things. You know, when you let the steam out finally of the pressure cooker, it's like, oh wow, okay, it's out there. So there was that, and that was There was relief in that for sure, but it was also what does this mean?

Now? What does this mean for me? Where do I What is jem I going to say? What am I gonna have to do?

I actually didn't think she'd say rehab, So I don't know why I didn't think that, but I thought, oh, no, we're fine.

I've got enough to taper off. We're all good.

After the short break, Gemma makes a plan in the way that only best friends can, and Jackie has to share the truth with her ex husband Lee and her work husband Kyle.

Stay with us, We'll be right back.

So your plan, because you had about two weeks of stash to taper off, and you knew it was going to be tricky. Yeah, but your hand had been forced. So that was your plan.

That was my plan?

Yeap? What did Jim think of that plan?

Terrible?

Because she said to me rightly, so no, no, no, that won't work. And I said, yeah, will, I said, because I have no one to get this stuff off, so I have no choice now, and she goes, no, you will find a way to get it. And I know that you will unless you fix the actual.

Problem or replace it with someone that's something else.

That's right, Yes, And I would have.

Because you understood addiction, yehas you?

I didn't.

Did you think of yourself as an addict yet or that?

Yeah? No, I knew obviously I was an addict. What did you? Oh? Yeah, I didn't think you did based on that. Sorry, yeah, I didn't.

I knew I was an addict, but I didn't understand what an addict was, right. So I when I say I didn't understand what an addict was, I just meant I had become addicted to something, but I could easily just taper off and stop. And I didn't understand that addiction is so much more than that.

Yeah, right, Like in some people, I'm addicted to coffee and I'm addicted to work.

It's like it's a different thing. Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Addicts can be really hard to reason with.

And something that we haven't really touched on is the duality of your friendship between friends but also your Jack's manager, agent, manager.

Both, yeah, personally all of it.

Yeah, yeah, which is kind of means Jack's the boss of you and kind of means you're the boss of Jack.

Yes.

How did you navigate that in the conversations that you had to have on that day when you were saying you're going to rehab and Jack's like, no, not, I don't need to.

Well, it was always the lens of a friend, and we always put our friendship first. Like we've worked together for many, many years in different capacities, so that's not unusual for us. But our friendship's always come first.

But a friend can't force another friend to do something. Whereas you had everything in your hand, because you obviously knew if you have an accident, if you get busted, Yeah, you know, there's a lot at stake here apart from your actual health safety.

Well, I'll just can I because so Gemma had only just become my manager, not long into it, like we had just decided on that it's a fast art. Yeah, wasn't it to talk about throwing her into the deep end. But in the past when things like this have come up, certainly never anything like what happened then, but little things. Gemma is really good in keeping me on I guess advice, and I've always taken her advice very seriously, And I.

Think it goes back to our friendship.

Really started to bond tightly when she became EP of the show. So she would always say to me, I think it's a good idea if you do this, I think this is great. I think you know, this will sound really good on air, and I know it's uncomfortable, and so I've always really valued her advice. And I think that day when you said about the rehab, I can't speak for you, but I never felt for a second you had any managerial or career hat on at.

All at all. Yeah, I didn't at all.

And did you have jack that muscle memory of she makes good decisions?

Yes, absolutely, because anyone else could have said that to me, my mom. Yeah, you know, anyone could have said that, and I would have dismissed it and gone forget it, no way, no how. But with Jemma, I've always known that she does actually you know, I really do value what she says. And so I might have said I'm not going to rehab, that's ridiculous, and I reckon ten seconds later I was like okay.

Then it was very like, yeah, okay, I can't. It was probably a bit more than ten seconds. Yeah, it was, I'll tell you what. It went back and forth.

So I agreed, and then I pushed it back again and I said to wait, I don't think this is you know.

So there was definite resistance for a while. Yeah, but overall she has a.

One of the things that surprised me and I found so interesting. I mean, everything in this book I found so interesting, but the part about where they say at rehab, between booking and arriving, you have to keep taking exactly the same amount of whatever it is you're addicted to until you get there.

Can you explain that?

Jem Sure?

So, because in Jack's circumstance, she hadn't called herself. They still won't admit someone until the person says, yes, I am willing to come because it's voluntary exactly. And so I did all the initial stuff with them, but then I did have Jack had to then get on the phone with them and confirm that she was willing to

Massively overdose, have a go out.

They think, well, this is my last time to go hard, and that can be extremely dangerous and is also when there's often fatalities.

I was reading about someone recently who died on their way to rehab, and I didn't realize it was a celebrity. I didn't realize how why that was. I was like, surely by the time you've decided to go to rehab. Yeah, yeah, but yeah, your book helped me understand.

Yeah, And that hadn't occurred to me either me or so when they said it, I was like, oh, okay, they said, so that's a real concern to be aware of. And also they'll try and pretend that they're tapering.

Off and that they can do it, and then they'll go see I.

Don't need to go now, I've actually now taken like less and both options are actually very dangerous. So they said it's really important that she takes the same amount, and so I had to monitor that for that week, which was really strange.

I'm sure you needed to be very closely supervised and not left alone that week.

Yeah. I stayed with her the whole week. Yeah.

What about your life, jem Like, that's a big thing, because you were not just on your way to the you know, yeah, you're going and the way to your kids. You have two kids. Were you still married at that point? No, so you're a single mum. Yeah, you have two little kids and you literally you've got a life of career, a family. You had to put everything on hold, not just for that week, but to also fly over with

Yeah. Yeah, what a friend.

That's why I say everyone needs a friend like Gemma.

And I always say one day, I'm sure I'll ask for something.

In and I hope you do in this.

Scenario, no, I Yeah, I was very lucky that I have a good relationship, thankfully with my ex husband. We co parent really well together and we're still friends, and so I was able to say to him, which is also very rare, because you know, I spend so much time the kids are with me a lot. I was able to say to him, Hey, just I need you to take the kids for a week, And I'd say why, And I just am asking you as a favor, could

Happy too, so he did.

But I also knew that I only had a week because I actually then had to get back to the kids. And and I'm also one of those this is one of the things I'm working on on myself. We're all, you know, evolving into as we get older. But is that I am so dedicated to my kids, like most parents are, but mine's probably unhealthily so to the point where I never want to leave them.

I tell you love helicopter.

Yeah, I'm like a helicopter.

I just love being with them, and so when I'm not with them, I get terrible guilt but I you know, for that week, there was nothing obviously more important to

There were so many movings because you had to call your ex husband, but Jackie also had to call yours.

Yeah, and tell him what was that conversation?

Like it was kind of short, and.

I mean the thing with with my ex husband, Lee, I think you know, he could probably tell in a way that there was problems there, and I think for him, he was just very He was empathetic and understanding. He had no judgment, and he said, I think that's wonderful. I think it's so good that you're addressing it then, and you know, I will take care of Kitty and she, you know, because we had to figure out how do I because she likes to FaceTime. How am I going

I mean, we were.

Great together in our marriage, but he has never made anything difficult for me and vice versa.

Both.

Yeah, incredible, I won't say I mean lucky.

Yes, because the guys that you were married could have been assholes or could have become assholes after you divorced. And it takes two people to make a good relationship after a divorce. But what about the conversation you had to make to your other husband or your other part husband called Kyle?

Yeah, Kyle, it was It was just difficult because I didn't know if he was going to ask questions.

That's what I was worried about, because with Kyle, I didn't want to. I didn't want to lie to anyone.

I didn't want to, And so I was able to stick to the truth somewhat in saying that I'm just not getting better and I need to take this time off otherwise. And it did seem odd because we were three weeks away from being on a long holiday anyway, So.

I knew that for him that.

Would be a little bit odd, like why can't she just hang in there for three weeks?

She always hangs in there, you know.

And I said, I have my COVID, my lung infection.

I'm not I just need it.

And you know, I said to him, I'm struggling, like I did tell him that, and he was like, yeah, okay, it's going to be ship, but I get it, and I'm you know, you do what you got to do and don't ask that many questions.

No, they don't do They They just take everything fast.

In another part of your book, when you start dating, not a lot of questions. Yeah, No, I do take things at face value, really, and we should take them at phase value. A lot of time maybe we asked him many questions before we get to the logistics. And I'm not going to talk about rehab itself, because you go into that so beautifully and interestingly in the book.

So in the there's very different stages of it. So in the beginning, when I had just separated and was new to it and using it as a coping mechanism, it was quite It was affecting me quite visibly, I think, and because my behavior was strange in that early stage. Now I was just going through a separation from not only my husband but also fifty percent of the time with my child, and so friends would come over, but they would also see that I was drinking like a goblet of wine.

So they just put it down to that.

Going through a divorce turning to a bit more alcohol than she should. But we've seen that play out many times, so it doesn't warrant an intervention by any means. But in those stages, I mean, I would the particularly the still knocks would just have a great effect, so you would take one. I would kind of wait until later in the day for that, because you know who wakes up and takes a still knox.

That didn't happen un till later.

And then once I had that still knox with the alcohol I'd already been drinking during the day, then you have this sort of blackout like and I don't mean blackout is and you're on the bed, collapsed and you sleep for you know, hours on end. You're functioning normally, but you can't remember anything you did the night before. And I remember waking up one morning and I got this message from this guy who I haven't even said this.

In the book.

I got a message from a guy and he said, oh, like, yeah, that sounds good, he said, but you know, you should be careful who you say something like that too.

And I was like, oh my god, what did I say to this guy? Would I say? And I scrolled back up to have a look.

And I think I'd said to him something like hey, because we'd been on a date or something. And I said to him, hey, do you want to be friends with benefits? I mean, fuck, I'm mortified at the thought of even asking a.

Guy that this guy was. This guy was I barely knew him. He was on TV and everyone knew this guy.

And I thought, I've just asked this guy to be friends with benefits and I would never have done that sober.

Yeah, And so I would see these things. The next day.

I'd almost wake up in fear of what did I do? And I would scroll through my phone for evidence.

I'd go, who did I text? What did I say?

Because you become like this, it's almost like you want to chat, and you want to You've got all this kind of the idea seems so good in your head at the time, but then when you're sober and you wake up the next day, you go, what on earth was I thinking? So it was very destructive outer character behavior and scary to think that you are doing things

What about the ulcer there also was that.

I mean like I had this ulso where it was because of neurofy and plus and so I had no idea that iyberprofen would cause that kind of damage.

And it was like.

Such vast quantities on an empty stomach without.

Absolutely they even say, I think when you normally take it, even on an empty stomach can be dangerous and you can get ulcers. So taking too much of iberprof and I wasn't even looking at the eyberprofen. I was just looking at the codeine. I wasn't even thinking about that. And little did I know that that had a severe side effect. So the consequences of all.

Of that ray didn't you? Yeah, yeah I did? I did, and it was really really big.

You talk about how you became, You retreated from the world. You didn't want to go out, you didn't want to see your friends. The only time you'd see your friends is if they came to you. It was also COVID, so you just became more and more, you know, cloistered away. But then even when restrictions lifted, you didn't want to leave your self imposed prison.

No, I was almost like, oh damn, the restrictions are lifted.

That means like everyone, yeah, everyone's getting out and socializing again, and I didn't want to, like because COVID just all the ingredients were there. It was the perfect recipe for a people, for a lot of people. Yeah you could,

That was something that was so interesting in your book.

You described I'd look at everybody else and I'd feel pity for them. It's like, I'm just having a much better time alone with my pills. Yeah, and then how after rehabit flipped and when you're like you just appreciated everything so much, jem I want to ask about the logistics of getting someone famous. And that wasn't the end of my conversation with Jackie and Jemma. There is still a lot of ground to cover, like how did Jemma manage to get jack out of the country without being