When Gemma got a call from a sobbing Jackie O, she knew she had to act fast.

Gemma O'Neill was almost at the end of a two-hour drive to the NSW Southern Highlands when she received a tearful call from her friend, radio host Jackie O Henderson. 

She'd been at Jackie O's Sydney home for dinner the night before, and all had seemed fine. But as soon as Gemma heard her voice that morning, she pulled over and braced herself.

"She sounded quite hysterical, and was almost hyperventilating," Gemma told Mamamia's No Filter podcast.

"She managed to spit out the words in between the sobs: 'I've done something really stupid.' That's all she kept saying… I said, 'What? What?' And then she eventually got out the words, 'I've been taking pills.' And immediately the penny dropped."

Gemma, who also works as Jackie O's manager, immediately swung her car around and headed back to Sydney, formulating a plan along the way. About 30 minutes from Jackie O's home, she made a phone call of her own — to a rehabilitation centre on the other side of the world.

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"I needed someone I could trust": Jackie O's road to recovery.

Looking back, Jackie O, 49, can see her addiction has roots more than a decade old. It was then that she was first prescribed the powerful painkiller oxycodone to help her cope with the symptoms of endometriosis. 

"It was originally to treat the pain, and then it became like, 'Oh, I'm having a really shit day. I might take one of those because they give me a really nice feeling,'" Jackie O told Mamamia. "I wouldn't have called that an addiction; I think that was an abuse."

Come 2019, Jackie O, who is one-half of KIIS FM's hugely popular morning program, The Kyle and Jackie O Show, was being supplied black-market painkillers and sleeping pills. The ease of access, combined with the stress and sadness of her marriage breakdown the previous year, proved fertile ground for addiction. 

That desperate phone call to Gemma came in November 2022 when Jackie O's dealer phoned to say that they had been busted and could no longer supply her with the drugs. By then, she was consuming more than 30 pills a day.

According to the Australian Institute for Health and Welfare, an estimated 5.3 per cent of Australians aged 14 and over used prescription drugs for non-medical reasons in the last 12 months. And prescription medicines, including opioid-based painkillers and benzodiazepines, cause more overdose deaths in Australia than illegal drugs like heroin or methamphetamine.

Watch: A very open conversation between Gemma O'Neill and Jackie O. Post continues after video.

Jackie O knows her drug use could have become lethal. She now credits Gemma with helping her save her own life. Gemma's emotional and practical support ensured Jackie O received the treatment necessary to curb her addiction and return to good health.

"I needed someone who I knew could A) help me, and B) wouldn't judge me and was close to me that I could trust," Jackie O said. "Gemma knew everything about me — except that."

Gemma had suspected something was wrong. She'd noticed how incredibly exhausted her friend seemed, how she appeared unusually drunk after just a glass or two of wine. But she put it down to Jackie O's intense work schedule, plus lingering symptoms from a recent COVID-19 infection.

"There was a niggling feeling that something wasn't right, and I think that's why I got so upset when I found out [about the addiction], because I was angry at myself that I hadn't figured it out," she said.

Almost no one had. Jackie O managed to keep her drug use secret from colleagues, friends and loved ones. And with Gemma's help, she managed to keep her recovery secret, too. 

Gemma booked her into a 28-day program at the renowned Betty Ford Center near Palm Springs, California. She hoped the overseas location would reduce the risk of leaks to Australian tabloids.

"I thought if it did get out, then [Jackie O] would probably use it as an excuse to say, 'I can't stay here anymore.' And so I wanted to eliminate all options of her being not able to get successful treatment," Gemma said.

And so, Gemma sent her two young children to her ex-husband for a week, she cancelled work commitments and made excuses to friends and family. 

"I've been around other people that have had addiction and successfully overcome them, and so I knew that I needed to be prepared and I need to act immediately," she said.

She coordinated leave with Jackie O's employer, without saying why. Fortunately, they agreed, no questions asked. (Jackie O is valued talent, after all. She and her co-host Kyle Sandilands last year inked a 10-year deal, rumoured to be worth more than $200 million.)

Getting Jackie O to California undetected involved a Friday-night flight, inconspicuous clothes (a baseball cap, tracksuit, reading glasses, and face mask), and instructions to keep her head down and avoid eye contact.

All the while, Gemma closely monitored Jackie O's drug intake. The Betty Ford Center had stressed the importance that her dosage should not change prior to treatment. They warned her about addicts who overdose having one last hurrah, and those who taper off in the hope of avoiding treatment resulting in a potentially dangerous withdrawal. 

Speaking on The Kyle and Jackie O Show last month, Gemma sobbed as she recounted diligently reminding her friend to take the drugs that were poisoning her body.

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Gemma's devotion and Jackie O's ultimate success in managing her addiction — she recently celebrated two years of sobriety — are testimony to the importance of strong support networks for an addicted person's recovery process.

"It has been hard because, for two years, we've been in this bubble together. And so I've always had the fear of, 'What if she makes that choice [to use again]?' But I would make it clear, I said, 'If you do go back, you can tell me.' I never wanted her to feel like she couldn't tell me the truth," Gemma said.

"But it has been a lesson for me in letting go, in a way, because I can't make that choice for Jack. She has to make that choice every day."

And she does.

"Addiction is always lying in wait, and it's always hoping you'll come back to it," Jackie O said. "It really wants you to return, and so it will trick you into thinking you're fine... I am so grateful for the life I have right now that, in my head, it would never be worth it [to use again], but you do have to monitor yourself constantly and make sure that dialogue doesn't shift."

The upside of being in that secret bubble has been witnessing Jackie O pop it, to share her struggle in the hope it may help someone else fight their addiction. It forms a small part of her new memoir, Jackie O: The Whole Truth. Proceeds from the book go straight to Odessy House — a withdrawal and rehabilitation service in NSW.

"I see how much her life has changed, and I see how committed she has been to her recovery, and I'm so proud of her," Gemma said. "That's always what makes me emotional because I think of what I saw her as and what she's chosen to do. It's remarkable."

Read more on Jackie O here:

Feature Image: @jackieo_official Instagram.

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