My life after Robbie

Quoted from: http://icnewcastle.icnetwork.co.uk/

'Since dating Robbie Williams, it's been a rollercoaster of a year for Lisa Brash. She opens her heart to Chief Features Writer Beth Neil about her battle with depression, her children and why today life has never been sweeter. Lisa Brash is a gobby girl. It's true - she says so herself. It wouldn't take five pints of lager, a few double vodkas and a whisky chaser to raise Brashy's spirits. She's already a whirlwind of energy, talks at the speed of a freight train and gets straight to the point. Brash by name, brash by nature.
'I'm always getting told I speak too fast,' she apologises. 'I'm learning to slow down but I just love talking. I'd talk all night in my sleep if I could. 'It was this down-to-earth and bubbly nature which first caught the eye of Robbie Williams last October. The pop showman was enjoying a few drinks at the Malmaison on Newcastle's Quayside after watching his big mate Jonathan Wilkes star in Sky One's The Match at St James' Park. Lisa, now 32, dressed in an old pair of jeans and swigging a pint of lager, was at the same bash. Robbie, who has voiced his desire to settle down with an everyday, girl-next-door type, spotted her across the bar, sidled up and the pair started chatting. 'When he introduced himself I was like: 'OH MY GOD!' ' says the South Shields mum-of-two. 'But he's such a natural person, he puts people at ease straight away. He has a gift. We talked for ages and there was a real connection there. We were on the same wavelength. 'It was the start of one of the most intense relationships Lisa reckons she'll ever experience. But the meeting also signalled the beginning of a media frenzy which left her deeply depressed and caused her children, Jeffrey Junior (JJ), 13, and seven-year-old Harley, to be bullied at school. The press went crazy over Robbie's latest girl. It was a cracking story. She wasn't a model, she wasn't an actress. She was a probation officer and a single mum from an ordinary house in an ordinary street. But it's nearly destroyed Lisa. She has spent 2005 slowly rebuilding her life and recovering from the breakdown of the relationship with the man she says broke her heart. 'It's been Hell,' she says. 'There have been days when I haven't been able to get out of my jim jams to leave the house, I've been so down. Maybe I was naive but I never expected any of this to happen. Since the nationals got hold of the story my life has never been the same. I know there are good journalists and bad journalists but there are some national papers I will never speak to again. The people who know me know how difficult it's been for me and the kids. It's not easy having your heart broken, but it's even tougher going through it in the public eye.' The week after Lisa went down to stay at Robbie's London apartment, a national tabloid splashed with the kiss and tell story. No salacious detail spared, readers were treated to Robbie's bedroom antics, his seduction technique and his pillow talk. Robbie was understandably furious and Lisa was left devastated. But she insists she never sold her story. 'I was stitched up,' she explains. 'My kids were petrified by what was happening. We had reporters hammering on the door, paparazzi jumping out of bushes. So I decided to get us out of the country for a holiday in Florida. While we were out there I was befriended by a couple who said they were lawyers in New York. They told me they couldn't have children but if they could they'd hope they were like mine. I warmed to them. I ended up talking to them about everything that had been going on. It turned out they were undercover reporters who had followed me on the plane out there. They had recorded everything I said and the next thing I know it was all over a Sunday tabloid. They had pictures of me in my bikini. I felt awful at the thought of my offenders back home ogling their probation officer.' Even when she returned to the UK, Lisa was still being pestered by the media. She was advised to come out and tell her story once and for all to kill off the lingering interest. 'I didn't want to go to a national paper because of the way I'd been treated,' she says. 'So I spoke to a magazine. But they didn't put anything in about how I'd been duped. I was gutted. Then another tabloid ran a story which I had asked them not to. The whole thing was escalating out of control.' Lisa eventually decided to go on the Trisha show and set the record straight. Her head was all over the place and her memories of the time are hazy. 'By this time my life was a complete mess,' she says. 'I had never wanted to sell myself out but it looked like that's exactly what I'd done. I was so low and taking anti-depressants. I felt awful, absolutely terrible. My children were getting bullied at school and I knew it was my fault. The kids would get JJ in a headlock and say: 'Tell yer mam's rich boyfriend to give me a million pounds'. Or they'd tell him I was a prostitute who slept with popstars for money. I went to meetings at the school because it got to the point where JJ had to spend his break times sitting in a classroom by himself. My mobile phone had been tapped into and the papers had got hold of text messages. They sent a bunch of flowers with a microphone buried in the bouquet. I spotted it almost straight away and took the flowers down to my nana and grandad's grave. 'Sit and listen to them talk instead,' I thought. I decided to do Trisha to try and put an end to everything. To say, 'this is what's happened, it's all over now, please leave me alone'. 'But it was that television appearance which alerted the producers at bid tv to Lisa's charm. With her earthy rawness, slim figure and pretty face, they thought she might be what they were looking for. They got in touch and after screen tests and training, just a few months later, she's presenting on the channel full time and being watched by three million viewers a month. It's meant a move away from the North East down to London, but although it was her biggest decision yet, Lisa doesn't see it as such a huge sacrifice. As things were, life in South Shields was still miserable for her and the children. The cruel jibes in the street have never abated and Lisa found it impossible to carry on with her job in the probation service. 'It's been a tough decision but I think it's the right one,' she says. 'South Shields is a very small town and I couldn't go anywhere without getting comments about Rob thrown at me. I don't know if it was a jealousy thing, but it was nasty.' Plus the job I loved became a nightmare. I was proud of being a probation officer but things would never have been normal again. My offenders would always know me as 'Robbie Williams' ex-bird.' That's all they wanted to speak about. It wasn't fair on my offenders and it wasn't fair on my colleagues. And in the end I realised it was best for me and the kids to make a fresh start somewhere else.' Just to prove how deadly serious she is, Lisa has put the family home back in Shields on the market. 'I've done it now,' she says through gritted teeth. 'I decided to sell up so in a few months time if I was feeling a bit homesick I didn't have the option to quit everything and come home. It hasn't been sold yet so if anyone's interested... I'm determined to make a go of this. Everything happens for a reason and every cloud has a silver lining. It's an amazing opportunity and I'm not going to waste it. And if I become very successful then I'd like to use my position to do charity work for drugs awareness. 'She stops herself mid-flow. 'Oh God! Listen to me. Charidee! How very cheesy. Honestly, what am I like? But it's true. I'll never forget my links with the probation service. Mind, I'm terrified the nationals will jump on me and go on about making money on the back of Rob. But Rob's not the one who has to stand and talk at the camera for three hours.' She might be excited about the future, but Lisa admits it was a wrench leaving behind family and friends. Her parents hosted a big leaving do for her at the Marsden Rattler last weekend and when Lisa got up to make a speech, the whole place was in tears. 'It was very emotional,' she says. 'You'd have thought I'd won an Oscar the way I went on! I thanked my mam and dad for everything they'd done and said how desperately I was going to miss them. My parents have been my rock for the last 10 months and I don't have a clue how I would've got through it all without them.' For the next few weeks Harley and JJ will stay with Lisa's mum and dad while she settles into life down South. Both children start at schools in the capital in September. 'Harley thinks she's going to be living next door to Ant and Dec so she's happy,' laughs Lisa. 'Well, I suppose they're in Chiswick and we're renting a flat in Richmond so we're kind of neighbours. She's a proper little drama queen, just like her mam, so I'm going to try and get her into a good drama school later. 'Lisa's reluctant to say whether she and Robbie are still in touch, but she does confirm that she's currently single. 'There are no hard feelings,' she says. 'I know how to get in contact with him if I need to. I think he's an amazing guy and I have so much respect for him. I'm very lucky we had the time together we did. If we'd been left alone by the media it could have been something really special. Definitely. But there's no man in my life at the minute. I'm just pining for my kids. I don't have any friends down here yet so I'm completely on my own. But it won't take me long to meet people. I'm a gobby Northerner, how hard can it be?'