IN RECOVERY - The Ark House Podcast - S2 EP 9 BONUS - CELEBRITIES SO FAR

Welcome to IN RECOVERY - THE ARK HOUSE PODCAST, your essential companion guide to recovery and well-being. 

IN RECOVERY - THE ARK HOUSE PODCAST is thrilled to be named one of the Best Podcasts by The Sunday Times (June 2026) and is riding high in the charts, as we continue our second season.  We are so grateful to everyone for their support. If you are listening on Apple - we would love you to leave us a review.

IN RECOVERY is a companion guide for those on their addiction recovery journey. We also want to offer advice and support for those still suffering and offer solutions for those who just want to know more. This is a well-being podcast produced and presented by people with lived experience who want to carry the message of recovery.

In this BONUS EPISODE we bring you some highlights of the celebrities who have shared their recovery stories with us so far in Season Two. 

If you are new to listening this will give you a taster of what to expect. If you are one of our recovery family already, its a chance to reflect on the stories that have made IN RECOVERY the podcast that is helping people around the world. 

ULRIKA JONSSON (Gladiators, Shooting Stars)

JOHN ROBINS (Comedian, Author and Podcaster)

ORE ODUBA (TV presenter, Stage Star and Winner of Strictly Come Dancing)

DAVID SCHALL (The Inbetweeners, The Office)

CHRIS KIRKLAND (Former Goalkeeper)

Season Two continues with a brand new episode on the 3rd August

PLEASE LEAVE US A REVIEW if you enjoyed this episode and the series. 

SAM AND RICHARD - THE HOSTS

Are both in recovery themselves and so have lived experience of alcoholism and addiction. 

If you or a loved one need help from addiction, please know there is help. Reach out and speak to Ark House today....

PHONE 01723 371869

EMAIL info@arkhouserehab.co.uk

ADDRESS 15 Valley Road, Scarborough, Y011 2LY

WEBSITE www.arkhouserehab.co.uk

FACEBOOK  @arkhouserehabltd

INSTAGRAM @in_recovery_podcast

Transcript

SPEAKER_07 0:00

In the couple of movie In the Cumberland.

SPEAKER_03 0:13

Welcome to a special extra episode of In Recovery.

SPEAKER_06 0:16

The Am Camps podcast where we look at some more human lights. Every week on In Recovery, we speak to some of the UK's biggest fellas who have battled addiction and have kinda given up their time to share their stories. In the hope it will help others.

SPEAKER_03 0:36

And that's where we stand.

SPEAKER_06 0:38

Here are the people who've chatted to us under the recovery spot. It brings us all to that same place, don't it, of isolation. You know, wherever I was just by myself, just having what I needed to get through that particular day. You know, on the outside, we had a job, we had a car, we had a house, we had kids. Perceived on the outside it was all okay.

SPEAKER_04 1:03

I was highly, highly functioning. My house was impeccable. My son was not wanting for food or things. I was on it. And I quite enjoyed the lies too. Or white lies, I don't know, they're probably big fat lies, but because it's kind of like creating a different world, a life, and well, that facilitated the drinking. I didn't recognize myself, but like you said, I really enjoyed it.

SPEAKER_06 1:31

Somebody taught me and said to me about secrets keep you sick.

SPEAKER_04 1:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 1:35

And that was a big thing for me because I think I dug myself that many holes that I could never see a way out anymore. You know, I I I got to a point where suicide looked really good for me. You know, it it seemed like, well, that's my way out.

SPEAKER_04 1:52

Hearing you talk there about wanting to end your life, I never made an attempt, but I I was deep, deep inside, I was hoping the drink would take me. That's the only way I can articulate it. As I was hoping that one day it would just be so bad that I wouldn't wake up. I was sitting down on the sofa and a friend of mine who was at that time, she was four years sober. It wasn't me that sent her a text message. Something sent her a text message. And I just said, I can't do this anymore. And she said, Oh my god, what's happened? Not thinking about the drink. She didn't think I was anywhere near sort of that. And I said, I just can't be doing it. She goes, Right, hop on a meeting, hop on a meeting now. And I hopped on this meeting and I cried my way through it. But she had obviously said to me, like, listen for the similarities, and there was so much in there, and from what people, all walks of life, all different ages, and I had so much identification with different people, and of course, they were so friendly and welcoming that I felt like I felt safe.

SPEAKER_06 3:04

You speak very emotionally about the comedian Lou Saunders, and she told me that I was an alcoholic, and she told me I needed to get help.

SPEAKER_01 3:13

This is why you need alcoholics to help alcoholics because they know what it's like to be an alcoholic, and Lou's been sober, I think, for nearly eight years now. I think in the past people would have maybe called me out on my behaviour, whereas I think what Lou said to me is that your problem is not that your relationship ended. Your problem is not that you're not getting what you want out of your career. Your problem is not that you're anxious or depressed. Your problem is the alcohol because that's the one thing that has been present in your life through all of these things. And you're an alcoholic and you need to get help. You can fit that on the back of a stamp. So I'd never heard it quite articulated like that, or if I had, I'd never heard it put so gently. And yeah, I owe I owe Lou a great deal, and I owe hundreds of alcoholics my whole life. Incredible thing to tap into. Like 90 years of of uh helping people for no other reason than that it helps you.

SPEAKER_07 4:21

Erica!

SPEAKER_05 4:24

All of those successes still happened in the backdrop of fear, unhealed trauma. I was striving and achieving a lot of the things that I wanted to do, but much of it in order to block a hole that I didn't even know existed.

SPEAKER_06 4:39

You know, I I had this ability and this drive to become really, really successful in what I did. On the flip side of that, internally I was dying because I couldn't show outward what I was actually feeling. You know, I didn't want anybody to know that I was a cocaine addict. I I wanted to see people to perceive me as being really, really successful. Yes. And within all that, I would sit at home on a night, you know, and I was a really, really sick individual who, you know, had the shame. Yes. And I guess today, with you and your addiction that you that you have to come out in the public eye must have been a very, very brave thing to do because not a lot of people talk about porn addiction.

SPEAKER_05 5:21

Yeah, it had to be said. It had to be said, Richard. I think despite a lot more openness, I think there's a lot more loneliness and a lot more isolation. You know, we can be as connected as anything, but actually our world can become smaller if we like we can go days without actually interacting with any body human. The world of the landscape has changed, and one of the greatest harms of is that the digital world has even in the last five years has been a sort of tsunami of change. We have just sort of let warped into a whole new existence. I guess where I saw the intervention that was completely necessary was I have two children. One of them is eight years old, a year younger than I was when I was first exposed to pornography, and uh the availability of pornography of 30 years ago to what it is today is completely unrecognizable. I was like, this is gonna be their normal if we don't uh admit that there is a heinous issue.

SPEAKER_00 6:35

So I I basically swapped one addiction for another, and you know, it wasn't just sex, it was love as well. You know, I'd I'd focus on someone and you know and go, that's it, this that's gonna be my big life, you know, project, and that's me sorted, and and you know, and it's it took a long time for me to get that through my thick head, actually, that that you shouldn't act on your feelings, you know, feelings are not facts. So all the time I was getting involved in these high octane relationships and getting off on the high of it, you know, and I think I finally learned that lesson now. It took me to uh you know have a wrecked marriage before I figured that out. So what I do with relationships now is what I did when I first went into AA, which was, you know, you kind of what can you give, not what can you take, what can you give in a relationship? You know, and I for I think as long as I'm thinking in those terms, I'm on safer ground. In the end, it took therapy to make me realise the kind of, I don't know, schism in my psyche or what whatever you want to call it. You know, it was actually really helpful to think about my relationship with my mother and all of that stuff. It sounds like an absolute cliche, but it's all about feeling like you need love and and you're sort of going about getting it in the wrong way. In fact, they tell you in Sla, if you feel really strongly attracted to someone, stay away from them. Because that's not a relationship, that's addiction. And uh and that was difficult. I just sort of thought, I owe it to myself actually, to be the person that I know I am, not this addicted person who hurts people, you know.

SPEAKER_07 8:25

Erica.

SPEAKER_02 8:28

But with everything that's happened, obviously with the addiction and the and the mental health stuff, I've you know, I thought, yeah, it's the right time to do it now, and it's the best thing we've ever done. The response has been amazing, the feedback's been great, and yeah, and it and it also is a constant reminder for me as well, not go back to those days. But I'm just yeah, somebody that just like a lot of people fell down the wrong path and got addicted very quickly. People are trying to do more now to help people, particularly around the you know, the mental health side, the well-being and and the addiction side of stuff. Looking at what you lot are doing now. If you didn't do this, I'm sure you're helping so many people. So, yeah, I've always said that if people always talk a good game, but it's the ones that actually do something about it that are the ones that are worth the weight in gold. People always say gonna do this, gonna do that, and they never do it, they'll still talk. Um, but if you're gonna if you want to do something and try and help people and make a change, do it. Yeah, it's great to see what you're doing, and there's there's loads more like that. Everyone always starts off the same, doesn't it? You want to help everyone and change the world, but it's impossible. Yeah. But if if you can just do as much as you can to try and help, like say the saying is only how one it is, it's true. If you can stop one person from dying, from overdosing, from committing suicide, then if you or your loved ones are suffering with addiction issues, then please know you're not alone.

SPEAKER_06 9:38

Reach out to us at Arc House Rehab today.