‘THE TRUTH ABOUT MY MELTDOWN!’
The reality star tells Woman’s Day about the near-miss that tipped him over the edge
The pressure of The Block finally hit seeminglytough contestant Ronnie this week, with the reality star spotted on set appearing to be on the verge of tears.
“The thing that really got to me was the fact that I could have killed someone,” Ronnie tells Woman’s Day of the reno slip-up, which saw three-anda-half tonnes of gyprock fall off a wall onto the site.
“If I had hurt someone, I never would have been able to forgive myself. It was tough. But that’s a day on The Block for you – you don’t know what to expect when you wake up!”
Ronnie was diagnosed with ADHD in 2018 and says he didn’t take his Ritalin medication, which contributed to the incident.
“I was having trouble getting my medication transferred from Perth to Melbourne,” Ronnie tells Woman’s Day. “There were three or four days where I missed my medication. On The Block you have to be firing on all cylinders.”
FEELING EMOTIONAL
While Ronnie regrets the incident, he says he was “not at all” embarrassed by his on-camera breakdown.
“I am an emotional character. I’ve never really showed it before,” he reveals.
“I deal with stress quite differently to other people
and that day it got the better of me.”
The 45-year-old father-ofthree says his massive mistake “was so out of character, it shocked a lot of the crew”, but it was the pressure from the producers that really saw him snap.
“When it happened there were six cameras there and I tried to eat my lunch by myself but the producers were just constantly there,” he says.
“I know they’re only doing their job, that’s fine, but then it got to a point where I told them, ‘Guys, you can see I’m very emotional, just give me a minute.’ They didn’t and I proceeded to go into the toilet.”
While viewers witnessed the serial renovator then break down, he insists all the blood, sweat and tears have been worth it.
“I’m confident that we’ve produced an amazing house,”
Ronnie tells Woman’s Day. “Fingers crossed – we’re going for the win. You don’t go there to get second or third.”
As for he and wife Georgia’s biggest competition on auction day, which is slated for November, Ronnie says it isn’t who he expected it to be.
“If you’d asked me in the first couple of days, I would have said Mitch and Mark, but it’s actually Kirsty and Jess,” he tells. “They are hard workers and they were listening to the judges. Those guys are the quiet achievers.”
‘It was so out of character, it shocked a lot of the crew’
RULE BREAKERS
Meanwhile, Ronnie claims fellow Blockheads Luke and Josh aren’t taking the competition as seriously.
“They were pushing the boundaries from day one. They’re breaking a hell of a lot of rules,” says the professional renovator. “And then when [Luke’s] fiancee came... partners can sleep over if you ask all the other contestants if it’s OK – they didn’t do that.
“And she obviously helped out with styling in that room. If you have a look at the two previous rooms they styled, it’s like chalk and cheese.”