Latest / 360 with Katie Woolf / Katie Woolf spoke with Comedian Fiona O'Loughlin

Transcript

Katie Woolf spoke with Comedian Fiona O'Loughlin · 360 with Katie Woolf

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: And our next guest is one of Australia's best known
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: and loved comedians.
• 0:04
  Speaker 2: She was seen on our television.
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: Screens in the middle of the Jungle winning I'm a Celebrity,
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: Get me out of here.
• 0:10
  Speaker 2: And some of you may not be.
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: Aware, but she's also a former Territorian, living in Alice Springs.
• 0:15
  Speaker 2: For many years.
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: FI owner of Lachlan joins me on the line. Good
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: morning FI owner.
• 0:21
  Speaker 3: Hello, Yes, I was twenty seven years in Alice.
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: Oh that is a local? It does? It certainly makes
• 0:31
  Speaker 2: you a local? I reckon FI owner and the mania
• 0:35
  Speaker 2: using what's so sorry?
• 0:38
  Speaker 3: He's been there twenty five years. There used to be
• 0:40
  Speaker 3: a ball in our springs, but you could only go
• 0:42
  Speaker 3: if you'd lived in the town twenty five years. So
• 0:46
  Speaker 3: I I love it.
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: Well, many of us like to claim you as a territori,
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: and I mean you basically are.
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: Do you miss the territory?
• 0:57
  Speaker 3: I do. I miss that. I missed the Winker, I
• 1:00
  Speaker 3: missed the Centralian winter so badly. I love it.
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: Such a wonderful place. No, I bet you don't.
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: And well, Fiona, where are you living at the moment
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: and how's Lockdown been for you?
• 1:14
  Speaker 3: I'm living in Adelaide. I moved last November. This February
• 1:20
  Speaker 3: I moved and just before I didn't hurt anything of coronavirus.
• 1:24
  Speaker 3: But I happened to think I'm really living in Melbourne.
• 1:27
  Speaker 3: I must be. I've got to move to Oil, closer
• 1:29
  Speaker 3: to my family. Thank God. So I've spent Lockdown. I
• 1:33
  Speaker 3: loved it. I've taken it on as a lifestyle choice.
• 1:35
  Speaker 3: Now at Lockdown, I loved it.
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: You're one of the few who's enjoyed it. But look,
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: we've been pretty safe here in the territory. I think
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: we've got people moving here because you don't have to
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: live in Lockdown in the Northern Territory.
• 1:53
  Speaker 3: Isn't it wonderful? Everyone should move there for at least
• 1:57
  Speaker 3: five years in their life.
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: Seriously, well for you on.
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: Lots of people will obviously know you and love your comedy.
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: They'll also know you obviously from I'm a celebrity, Get
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: me out of here.
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: But many people might not be aware that you've.
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: Been battling alcoholism for many years and you've laid it
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: all there for your upcoming autobiography. Was it a difficult
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: process reliving some of those darker moments? No?
• 2:25
  Speaker 3: Really, I mean I don't think I'd say difficult. It
• 2:30
  Speaker 3: was every emotion you could have. But it was a
• 2:33
  Speaker 3: very joyous project. Your first time that I've worked with
• 2:37
  Speaker 3: another writer, because the title of the book is yeah,
• 2:42
  Speaker 3: true from an unreliable witness, and she just about We
• 2:47
  Speaker 3: had to because there's so much I didn't remember or
• 2:50
  Speaker 3: you know, a lot of reck, you know, to collect
• 2:54
  Speaker 3: and checking on dates and time. That was the trickiest.
• 2:59
  Speaker 3: But heaven to write it because I had a bigger purpose,
• 3:02
  Speaker 3: you know. I wrote it for my family, but I
• 3:04
  Speaker 3: also was always thinking of the constant relapser like me.
• 3:13
  Speaker 3: It's a huge part of the problem of alcoholism. It's
• 3:18
  Speaker 3: one of the nastier symptoms and it compounds you grief
• 3:23
  Speaker 3: in your Oh. It's just a terrible disease, and that
• 3:26
  Speaker 3: we're so lucky there is a way out. It's just
• 3:29
  Speaker 3: really tricky finding your way out. I got it. It's
• 3:33
  Speaker 3: like I got lost for fifteen years and I finally
• 3:35
  Speaker 3: found my way out, and I'm just I'm desperate to
• 3:39
  Speaker 3: go find out people and they come over here. It's
• 3:42
  Speaker 3: great this side.
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: Well and Fiona, a couple of years ago, you were
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: hearing Darwin and you and I spoke at a lunch
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: that I help organize for.
• 3:51
  Speaker 2: The It's a Bloods Things Foundation.
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: And you've been so open about your battle and you
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: continue to be. It does sound as though it's all
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: that you've been fighting on and off for a long time,
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: and it is important to you to talk about it
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: and to really try and and stay on track and
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: help others to do the same.
• 4:10
  Speaker 3: Exactly because we all feel so when you're in the
• 4:13
  Speaker 3: midst of it, when you're inside of it, like the
• 4:16
  Speaker 3: active alcoholism, it's so uniquely lonely and so uniquely shameful
• 4:25
  Speaker 3: that that's why so many people, you know, a lot
• 4:28
  Speaker 3: of alcoholics die of shame. It's so tricky, this shame
• 4:32
  Speaker 3: and stigma. I mean, I know we're really annoying people,
• 4:34
  Speaker 3: our just real full flight. But once an alcoholic has said, okay,
• 4:40
  Speaker 3: I know I'm trying. I want to you know, I
• 4:44
  Speaker 3: want sobriety as well. You know, we've got to treat
• 4:48
  Speaker 3: people with addiction as we would anybody else with any
• 4:52
  Speaker 3: other disease, you know, because it can take your life
• 4:56
  Speaker 3: and then to have the guilt and shame on that awful, awful,
• 4:59
  Speaker 3: awful way to live.
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: Now, you made headlines this week and have been.
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: Basically, you made a lot of headlines this week beIN
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: her and it was all about the hand sanitizer, and
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: you'd admitted that you had drunk some of that hand
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: sanitizer in the jungle.
• 5:19
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it was a relapse in the jungle. And I
• 5:22
  Speaker 3: remember lying there freaking out one night, and you mind,
• 5:28
  Speaker 3: the mind of an alcoholic is that worst enemy, you know,
• 5:32
  Speaker 3: And my mind had said I knew that there was
• 5:38
  Speaker 3: that option because I heard about it in a rehab
• 5:41
  Speaker 3: how you can drink hands sanotime, but like going to jail,
• 5:44
  Speaker 3: and you might not all thought the tricks you don't need. Yeah,
• 5:48
  Speaker 3: and once you made the decision to do it, you
• 5:50
  Speaker 3: might as well already have done it, you know, because
• 5:52
  Speaker 3: you send off these endorphins out of your mind and
• 5:56
  Speaker 3: you know it. Yeah, you're already relauted before you even
• 6:02
  Speaker 3: keep the drink, if you know what I mean.
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: Yeah, Well, you know, see, I know what I love
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: about you, and and obviously you know I know from
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: when you were here a couple of years ago for
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: our lunch that.
• 6:14
  Speaker 2: You're so open and honest.
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: And I think that it's such an important thing for
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: people to hear because we know that in Australia. There
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: are a lot of people that are going through alcoholism,
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: and I just think it's really brave the way that
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: you speak about it and the way that you lay
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: it all out on the table.
• 6:28
  Speaker 3: Oh, thank you so much. Well, I'm very lucky because
• 6:32
  Speaker 3: you know what is what? Why would I be quiet?
• 6:34
  Speaker 3: You know what's to be quiet about. I'm not ashamed
• 6:37
  Speaker 3: of the disease, horrified at my behavior. That's not ashamed
• 6:41
  Speaker 3: of the disease. And unfortunately these behaviors are another symptom.
• 6:46
  Speaker 3: Of course, drunkenness is a symptom of alcoholism, and it's
• 6:50
  Speaker 3: very tiring, particularly for your loved ones. But yeah, I'm
• 6:56
  Speaker 3: not going to stop talking about it until I wish
• 7:00
  Speaker 3: it was something sexier. I had.
• 7:07
  Speaker 2: No happy with that.
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: Well, there's going to be people listening this morning who
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: are so glad that you know that you are speaking out.
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: And obviously your autobiography I love the title, Truths from
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: an Unreliable Witness Finding Laughter in the Darkest of Places
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: released on October twenty seven, so it can.
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: Be found online or at any good bookstore. I'm imagining,
• 7:31
  Speaker 2: yes right now.
• 7:32
  Speaker 3: They hit bookstores on Tuesday. Tuesday's just gone.
• 7:38
  Speaker 2: Yep, wonderful stuff. For Fiona ro Lachlin.
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: It's always a pleasure talking to you. Thank you so
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: much for taking the time to chat with us this morning.
• 7:47
  Speaker 3: Well, thank you very much. I really appreciate it. See
• 7:50
  Speaker 3: you darnly and.
• 7:52
  Speaker 2: Thank you fion O Lachlan there.
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: Well, I think you'd have to say territorian, former territorian,
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: but we will can continue to claim Fioda razel Moone