Tracey Jewel sets the record straight about ‘Oprah Show’ appearance

THE former MAFS star proudly boasts about being a guest on one of the last episodes of The Oprah Show. But is she telling the truth?

MARRIED At First Sight star Tracey Jewel has finally set the record straight about her Oprah Show claim.

The reality star mentions in her bio on her website that she “appeared on The Oprah Winfrey Show” and this morning she repeated the claim during an interview with KIIS FM’s Kyle and Jackie O.

“When I wrote my first book they got me on her fifth final show,” Jewel told Kyle and Jackie O on air.

Some media outlets have questioned the validity of Jewel’s claims in the past and have suggested she was nothing more than an audience member who was shown on camera for just a few seconds.

It doesn’t help that there’s only a very short clip of that episode available online which shows Jewel responding to another guest’s comments and saying, “My daughter wouldn’t be here if I didn’t watch that show”. That’s it, just 11 words.

Tracey Jewel shown on camera during The Oprah Show.

So today we asked Tracey Jewel to explain once and for all what really happened when she appeared in an episode of Oprah’s hugely popular talk show.

“To be honest I’m a bit sick of all the speculation,” Jewel told news.com.au.

“What happened was Oprah was in Sydney, they [producers] came across my book [Goddess Within] somehow and they contacted me via email and I thought, ‘This is such a joke’. And then they called me and it was a producer of The Oprah Show and then within 72 hours I was on a plane to Chicago being interviewed as one of her guests on her Greatest Lessons show.”

Jewel explained that she was invited on to the Greatest Lessons episode alongside Brenda Slaby, an American woman whose personal tragedy Jewel had written about in her book.

“Her daughter passed away in the back of her car because she autopiloted and thought she dropped off her daughter to daycare and she didn’t and her toddler passed away,” Jewel told news.com.au.

“That woman, Brenda Slaby, was just the most hated woman in America and I wrote about that woman in my book. I came from a place of compassion for her because you know what, I think that could happen to anyone, and that’s why I was brought on the show because I am a compassionate person and I’m not afraid to have an opinion on things that sometimes are controversial.

“Oprah really wanted to shine a light on that, that everyone has a story to tell and that’s why it was one of her greatest lessons and I was really privileged to be a part of that.”

Dean and Tracey were originally matched on Married at First Sight. Picture: Josie Hayden

Jewel’s claim is backed up by The Oprah Show’s official website which features some of her quotes in a write-up of that particular episode.

“A mother in Australia was watching Brenda’s story on The Oprah Show, and she says it changed everything for her,” the recap says.

“‘I just felt complete compassion for her because it was a wake-up call for me because I was going down that path,’ Tracey says. ‘I was trying to live the life I had before [my daughter] Grace [was born]. Completely putting her last and making her fit in my life rather than me fitting in with hers’.”

After hearing Brenda’s story, Tracey decided to slow down and be more present in her life. One particular day, Tracey had just put her daughter down for a nap, when she heard her crying. She says she would have normally closed the door and ignored it, but because of Brenda’s story, she decided to go in.

“There I saw her with the curtain cord, and she’d managed to tangle it around her neck and her body. Thank God I went in. She could have strangled herself. It could have choked her,” she says. “Watching Brenda’s story saved her life, absolutely’.”

So there you have it, looks like Tracey Jewel isn’t telling pork pies after all.

The former Married At First Sight star is currently on a promotional tour for her new book, This Goddess Means Business. You can read James Weir’s review of the book here.

Originally published as Tracey Jewel sets the record straight about ‘Oprah Show’ appearance