An Australian doctor has weighed in after radio host Jackie ‘O’ Henderson admitted to a secret drug and alcohol addiction this week.
The radio host, 49, spoke for the first time about her years-long battle with drugs which saw her secretly go to rehab at The Betty Ford Clinic in November in 2022.
During a tearful on-air admission, Jackie said at the height of her addiction, she took around 10-12 Stilnox/Ambien sleeping pills and 24 Panadeine Forte painkillers a day.
She confessed she would take the tablets with alcohol, despite users being warned not to drink alcohol on the drugs can have dangerous consequences.
Now, Dr Zac Turner – who specialises in preventive health and wellness – has given his professional opinion and told how the medications can be ‘very addictive’.
Speaking to News Corp, he said that while Jackie’s case might sound ‘extreme’, her usage would have increased because she had built up a tolerance ‘over a few years’.
‘With those medications, if you don’t use them properly, you build up a tolerance. And they’re quite addictive,’ Dr Turner – who is not Jackie’s physician – told news.com.au.
‘I’ve had lots of patients who’ve really struggled with these types of addictions, who didn’t start out ”doing anything wrong”, at first it’s ”I need to sleep, I’ll have this tablet”.
‘People often think that whether you’ve knocked yourself out from alcohol or pills, you’re still asleep – but doing that, you actually reduce the restful, restorative parts of sleep.’
Dr Turner said Jackie might have turned to the sleep medication due to her long career of early morning starts, saying people make ‘riskier’ choices when sleep deprived.
While Dr Turner was full of praise for Jackie tackling her addiction, he also urged her to continue to work with healthcare professionals to counter potential long-term effects.
‘You need to do a lot to help boost your synaptic health, your vascular health, helping all these functions recover,’ he added.
She told how she kept her addiction struggles a secret for more than two years, even from Kyle and her KIIS FM colleagues.
Jackie revealed how she had checked into the Betty Ford Clinic in California in November 2022, when she took an extended break from The Kyle and Jackie O Show.
At the time, Kyle told their listeners Jackie was taking a break to ‘focus on her health’ after contracting Covid.
Instead, she was secretly flown out of Australia to be treated for 28 days at the world famous rehab facility for an addiction to painkillers, sleeping pills and alcohol.
Known for treating Hollywood stars including Keith Urban, Robert Downey Jr. and Lindsay Lohan, Betty Ford charges anywhere from $45,000 to $90,000 AUD for a month-long stay, depending on the program.
Ahead of the release of her tell-all memoir The Whole Truth, Jackie broke down in tears as she spoke for the first time about the harrowing extent of her addiction.
‘I was scared to tell people and say this out loud, I know people will look at me differently and love me,’ she told listeners.
‘I was in a really, really dark place.’
‘That’s what the addiction to your brain, it changes your way of thinking, it doesn’t want you to get help, it’s so powerful,’ she continued through tears.
‘It takes a rock bottom moment to cut yourself off.’
She said her struggles first began more than 15 years ago when she was prescribed a strong opioid painkiller for endometriosis – a disease in which tissue similar to the lining of the uterus grows outside the uterus, causing severe pain.
Despite their on-air partnership lasting for 25 years, Jackie’s long-standing co-host Kyle Sandilands was kept in the dark about her addiction battle.
‘I got prescribed that and I found myself at the time taking it more than I needed and I recognised that this might be a bit of a problem, so I stopped at the time,’ she said.
However, Jackie then went back to the medication after her 2018 split from UK photographer Lee, who she shares her daughter Kitty, 13, with.
Jackie said she started taking a few codeine ‘here and there’ and one Stilnox at night with a glass of wine, which she described as a ‘blackout’ situation.
What then really ‘kickstarted’ Jackie’s harrowing addiction was isolating at home during the Covid-19 pandemic, when she said she was ‘struggling’ and felt ‘so sad’.
As Jackie made her heartfelt admission, a shocked Kyle revealed he had ‘no idea’ about his co-host’s secret.
‘You’re just so anti-drug, that’s the shock of it, you have never been the party girl, you were never that,’ he said.
Speaking sincerely, Kyle added that he was ’embarrassed’ that he did not see any signs of Jackie’s addiction.
‘I didn’t know you were a big drinker, I know you like a wine every now and then. I feel embarrassed that I sit here every day of my life and had no clue,’ he said.
‘I’m in shock, I’m in shock and feeling like a s**t friend for not realising,’ he added.
