Jackie ‘O’ Henderson has revealed the only sign that pointed to his secret addiction to drugs and alcohol.
The radio host, 49, detailed her battle with addiction and her stint in secret rehab for the first time on Thursday’s The Kyle and Jackie O Show in an emotional segment.
She told how she fell into a deep addiction after the breakdown of her marriage in 2018 to British photographer Lee Henderson and again during the Covid-19 lockdown.
At the height of her addiction, Jackie took between 10 and 12 Stilnox/Zolpidem and 24 Panadeine Forte sleeping pills a day and took them with alcohol, which doctors say is very dangerous.
However, she kept her battle with addiction a secret from her loved ones, saying she had Covid for a long time when she took an extended leave of absence from work in November 2022 to check into the Betty Ford Clinic in California.
Now Jackie has revealed the only sign that pointed to his struggles after his family and friends became concerned about his isolation and excessive alcohol consumption.
Talking to him Sydney Morning HeraldHe said his friends began to notice his forgetfulness and often reminded him, “Jackie, we talked about that last night, remember?”
This led her to write down their phone conversations in real time on Post-it notes and then remind him what they had talked about in an attempt to hide her struggles.
Jackie ‘O’ Henderson (pictured on Thursday) has revealed the only sign pointing to her secret addiction to drugs and alcohol.
Her personal assistant, Brittany Woodford, also began noticing empty medication blister packs and felt conflicted with her duty to Jackie’s well-being and her role as an employee.
“It was very hard to sit like that, watching someone you love suffer,” Brittany, 35, explained. “But there is a line: she is like my sister, but also my boss.”
He said he eventually decided to start leaving kind letters for Jackie to find urging her to seek help, but his efforts were in vain at the time.
Meanwhile, her best friend Gemma O’Neill, who eventually convinced Jackie to go to rehab, said her friend began to completely isolate herself.
“For a while I thought I had developed agoraphobia,” he told the Sydney Morning Herald.
“Honestly, that’s what I was leaning towards, because the reality was so far from what I could have ever imagined.”
Although she was unaware of her drug addiction, her mother Julie Last also expressed concern about Jackie’s drinking, but said her daughter became defensive and yelled at her.
Jackie kept her battle with addiction a secret, saying she had long-term Covid when she took an extended leave of absence from work in November 2022 to check into the Betty Ford Clinic in California (pictured with Kyle just weeks earlier in October 2022).
Eventually, Jackie told her best friend Gemma about her struggles, which led to them secretly flying out of Australia to go to the Betty Ford Clinic in California.
Jackie said Betty Ford told her not to change “anything” about her use before she arrived as it could be “dangerous”, so she was still taking pills on the day she flew to the US.
Known for treating Hollywood stars, including Keith Urbano, Robert Downey Jr.. and Lindsay LohanBetty Ford charges between $45,000 and $90,000 AUD for a one-month stay, depending on the program.
Detailing the depths of her addiction in an emotional segment of her self-titled radio show on Tuesday, Jackie revealed that her struggles began more than 15 years ago.
At that time, she was prescribed a strong opioid pain reliever for endometriosis, a disease in which tissue similar to the lining of the uterus grows outside the uterus, causing severe pain.
“I was prescribed that and at that point I found myself taking more than I needed and I recognized that this could be a problem, so I stopped at that point,” he said.
At the height of her addiction, Jackie said her friends began to notice her forgetfulness, prompting her to write sticky notes to remind her of conversations they had had.
Eventually, Jackie told her best friend Gemma about her struggles, which then led to them secretly flying out of Australia to go to the Betty Ford Clinic in California.
However, Jackie went back on the medication after her 2018 split from British photographer Lee, with whom she shares her 13-year-old daughter Kitty.
“I came back to it as a way to seek happy pleasure, and it was a way to escape and it was very wrong,” he confessed.
Jackie said she started taking a little codeine “here and there” and a Stilnox at night with a glass of wine, which she described as a “blackout” situation.
“You can still be awake and have no idea what’s going on,” Jackie shared.
“It’s like you’re functioning but you have no memory.”
However, what really “fueled” Jackie’s distressing addiction was isolation at home during the Covid-19 pandemic, when she said she was “struggling” and felt “very sad”.
“The dosage started increasing more and more and became extreme and I was averaging 24 Panadeine Forte a day and then averaging 10 to 12 Stilnox,” he shared.
Known for treating Hollywood stars such as Keith Urban, Robert Downey Jr. and Lindsay Lohan, Betty Ford charges between A$45,000 and A$90,000 for a one-month stay.
“Someone was looking out for me because I don’t know how I woke up most days with that kind of dose.”
Jackie signed up for a 28-day stay at the Betty Ford Clinic in November 2022, but none of her colleagues, not even her co-host Kyle Sandilands, knew the reason for her absence.
Reading an excerpt from the prologue to her memoir, she shared, “The entire team wishes me well, I’m sure they’re curious about my temporary leave of absence, but none of them really know why I’m taking a step back.”
“But it has to be that way.”
Apologizing to his listeners, he tearfully admitted that he “lied” by “omission” when he publicly shared on his radio show that he was battling long Covid at the time.
“I want to apologize to our listeners and to everyone in my life that I haven’t been forthcoming about this, I just needed to focus on that part first, that recovery for the first year in particular,” he said.
