BBC Gardeners’ World presenter Monty Don has spoken out about his battle with depression and how he found solace in one particular flower – despite not having a particular fondness for it
Monty realised how roses had helped lift him out of his depression(Image: undefined via Getty Images)
TV icon Monty Don has revealed how his experience with severe depression that plagued his 20s and revealed the one flower that helped him through those “dark days.”
In a conversation with BBC Gardeners’ World Magazine, he detailed how he developed an affection for roses despite initially having little interest in them. Monty admitted that he’d “always admired the flowers in the kind of knee-jerk way that most of us love sunsets or the song of a blackbird.”
However, over time, Gardeners’ World presenter Monty cultivated a deeper appreciation for roses, immersing himself in catalogues filled with names that “ran off his tongue like a floral charm.”
Sarah’s thoughtful gesture helped Monty through a ‘dark time'(Image: undefined via Getty Images)
During this period, Monty was managing a thriving jewellery business, but the financial crisis of the 1980s left him in a precarious situation, with a significant impact on his mental health. His wife Sarah was deeply worried about him, and their children began to ask: “Why is daddy always crying?”
Monty recounted how he did “very little” for nearly a year: “They were dark days,” he remembered. “But my wife would pick small bunches of roses from the pots I’d not yet planted out and place them in vases before me,” reports Yorkshire Live.
He named some of the most memorable flowers, including: “Tuscany Superb, Charles de Mills, Alba Semiplena, Celestial, Chapeau de Napoleon, and Rose de Rescht.
“Those exquisite flowers lightened my deep darkness,” Monty recalled.
Monty planted out a Rose de Rescht(Image: undefined via Getty Images)
Monty has nurtured many blooms in his garden at Longmeadow, with some surviving over a quarter of a century: “Since then, I’ve acquired perhaps a couple of hundred different roses – I’ve never counted – and I love them all,” he shared.
He expressed his fondness for the “simplicity and purity” of roses and acknowledged their role in helping him overcome depression.
At 69, Monty revealed that he has always battled Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) and finds solace in warmer climates during winter for some much-needed “winter sun.”
Monty went through some tough times(Image: undefined via Getty Images)
During an intimate chat on The Love of Gardens podcast with Kirsty Wark, Monty discussed how he manages his mental health and the healing power of horticulture.
He disclosed: “I’m well documented of having struggled with depression all my life and I found that being outside, working particularly with the soil, rather than any particular plant group, for me works incredibly well at helping deal with that.”
He also suggested that gardening can be an excellent remedy for mental health issues, stating: “It’s the healing process, I don’t say it’s a passive for anybody, you found out what works for you, it may well be in conjunction with medication.”
Monty has offered insights into the “two sides” of mental health and the positive impact of gardening on personal wellbeing, commenting: “That’s a side of mental health and, again, there are two sides of mental health.
“There’s mental illness that could be made maybe better through gardening, and there’s mental wellbeing which everybody can feel and it recharges those batteries.”
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