I bounced back from losing EVERYTHING

For Stacey Sargison, life threw up one challenge after another, and it was down to her to turn things around

- MISHAAL KHAN

Life at 36 was not how I’d imagined or planned, but that’s the thing about life – it has a habit of throwing you curveballs, and in my case they were thrown my way all at once. In April 2020, I’d reached what I thought was breaking point. I was £40,000 in debt and had gained a lot of weight, not to mention that the world had been hit by a pandemic and I was stuck in Sydney, Australia, unable to fly home to the UK. Then, to top it all off, I received my divorce papers to sign, which meant my marriage of two years was officially over. If ever there was a time to feel sorry for myself, it was then, and I didn’t know if I’d ever be able to claw myself out of the darkness engulfing me.

Just three years earlier, my life had seemed almost perfect. A life coach, I travelled the world, helping women confront the things that were holding them back. I even held sell-out events at The Ritz, and had previously worked in the film industry with celebrities including Patsy Palmer and Tom Cruise. Meanwhile, my husband focused on his career as an IT consultant, traveling just as frequently, and although we were happy at first, our busy working lives meant we rarely spent quality time together, and it began to take its toll on our relationship.