Suzie Fletcher is the leather and saddle expert on The Repair Shop (Image: BBC)
Suzie Fletcher has admitted that she had a “breakdown” after filming the first series of the popular show.
c, who is the show’s leather and saddle expert, lived in the for 22 years and met her husband, Rob, when she was in her thirties, three months after moving across the pond.
The couple were married for 15 years until Rob suddenly died of pancreatic in 2013, which reportedly came as a shock as they didn’t realise he was ill.
In the epilogue to her 2023 memoir, ‘The Sun Over The Mountains’, Suzie explained how she’d finally left her farm in 2017 and returned to the UK.
However, she revealed that she gave away “so much”, with photographs and letters “shredded” and mementoes “thrown away”.
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Suzie Fletcher lived in the United States for 22 years (Image: Adam Gerrard/OK! Magazine)
Suzie wrote: “I was travelling light but my heart was heavy. It’s funny how we say someone has ‘baggage’ – I definitely did.”
She continued: “I don’t think I realised just how laden down I’d become until I had a breakdown sometime after filming the first series of The Repair Shop. Even after experiencing moments of panic in the US, I didn’t know what was happening.
“My body had been flooded with cortisol and adrenaline for so long that I had to retrain myself how to breathe and keep calm. It’s taken time to rationalise what I’ve been through and even longer to repair the damage.”
She explained that once ended, she was “suddenly confronted” with everything she’d been through but also felt like she was “suspended” in uncertainty.
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Suzie even considered returning to the US as the UK felt “so unfamiliar” and she felt “fragile”. She also said she was missing her animals and felt “completely lost and rootless”.
However, she said it came as a “relief” when production team made contact with her to ask if she’d like to star in another season of the show.
Suzie’s feelings of “fright and flight” diminished once she said yes and over time, which included establishing a new routine and being around friends and family, she started to heal.
She added that she gave Rob “all of my heart” and she feels “pleased” that she was able to help him through his “final months of life”, saying it was a “privilege to be with him until the end”.