Couple Monica and Mark share their journey through drug addiction

From the outside looking in, Monica and Mark looked like any other loving couple. But a dark secret plagued their relationship. Here they share their unique story.

Swedish-born Monica Sandercock was feeling disconnected from her husband Mark when she decided to become a life coach. By empowering herself, she gave him a safe space to share a dark secret …

I moved across the globe for love.

My husband Mark and I met in the early noughties when I was backpacking in Australia and had kept in touch by email.

I came to live in Adelaide, we got married, had a child and when I was on maternity leave – I had been an outreach worker – Mark ended up without a job.

Overnight we didn’t have an income.

We weren’t really connecting deeply. Mark would just go out to the shed and disappear.

He would laugh things off and would never really take things seriously. That’s how I knew him to be, but things had got more difficult. I had tried for so long to fix him …

I said to him, ‘Honey, I love you, but I’m not in love with you anymore.

We’ve got to do something about this’.

When Mark didn’t know what had to change, I started to seek out help for myself.

We did talk about that though, and Mark – who by that time had bought an electrical test and tag business – suggested I have my own business.

I sent away for some information (from The Coaching Institute) about being a mindset and relationship coach.

But I wasn’t ready. So I just parked it in my inbox and had this big envelope with stuff in it.

A few months later I opened it and I was like, ‘Oh, my God. Where has this been all my life?’

Things have never been the same since.

Monica and Mark Sandercock on their wedding day. Picture: Supplied

The couple at the start of their relationship, visiting Alice Springs. Picture: Supplied

I always thought I was stupid and that I couldn’t learn.

I wasn’t any good at school.

I was told by teachers ‘you’re the reason I want to give up teaching’.

I had very negative self talk about not being good enough.

When I learned that I could think differently, it was the biggest epiphany.

From then on it started to snowball. I changed some of my own ‘stories’, what I believed about myself and past events.

I became stronger and more confident, and all of a sudden I had goals and dreams. I felt I could handle anything.

But my husband wasn’t where I was at.

Even though Mark had encouraged me to become a coach, it was scary for him.

We were push-pull, in a kind of tug of war.

Then I gave him a ticket to (American coach) Tony Robbins’ Unleash the Power Within event in Sydney.

It was over three days and I just thought it would be fun for him to do – something different.

While Mark was there he messaged me and told me to go to the shed and throw this stuff away.

I’m thinking ‘it’s just, like, weed’ … but when Mark came home he said, ‘Honey, I have got something I need to share with you’.

Monica is now a qualified relationship coach. Picture: Supplied

Mark is also a life coach and the couple now work together. Picture: Supplied

He said ‘I’m a meth addict, I have been for many years. I use every day, multiple times.’

If I was any other version of me, who couldn’t back myself to know that I could handle it and get help for him, I would have done what most people would probably do.

I would have said ‘why haven’t you told me?’ and ‘how much money have you spent?’, but I just thanked him and hugged him.

I did ask myself ‘how was this happening under my roof, when I’ve been working with young people who take drugs, for years, thinking I know what it looks like?’.

But you can be very functioning with any form of addiction …drugs, gambling, porn or whatever.

I was relieved he had told me the truth, because I knew there was something going on.

I was thinking ‘finally, we can do something, we can change’ and that only brought us closer.

I said to him ‘This is the beginning … you changing over a weekend is not going to be sustainable’.

I really had to twist his arm, but we got him a coach. It was a friend of mine in Melbourne who I really trusted. A man.

I think it’s really important for men to work with another man to learn how to really step up as a man and know that they are being coached by someone who has walked in their shoes.

Mark has been clean since then and also became a coach. We have been running our business, Magnificent Mindset, for over 10 years and love spending time together.

Mark works with men helping them become better fathers, better husbands, better sons.

I work with women who need to learn to let go … step away from always taking charge and being in control, running around and doing everything for everyone.

I started this coaching journey for me. I wanted to give it my everything. Learning that I could think differently, respond differently, see things from a different perspective, give things a different meaning … changed my life.

Not being so harsh, judgmental, bitchy and scary. I had more compassion and empathy, and I think that’s what really led Mark to trust that I could handle the truth.

I needed to be able to give him the space to share. It had to come from me.

We are stronger because of it.