They’ve struggled with stress and sleep deprivation on The Block.
This week, a drama over ceiling clips pushes Kerrie and Spence too far. The couple take off their microphones and leave.
“We were deciding if this was really for us, because there was nothing wrong with the clips,” Kerrie, 48, explains. “We were both so sleep-deprived – especially Spence. It was the straw that broke the camel’s back.”
Spence, 46, agrees that it wasn’t just about being told to replace 170 ceiling clips. The pressure had been building for a long time.
The couple revealed the pressure of the show had been building for a long time.
“Kerrie gets to go out and shop and I’m stuck in the apartment all day. It’s a dark room and you’re breathing in all the crap that’s flying around in the air and you’ve got everyone coming up to you every two seconds.”
“With all the stresses going on, I just needed to get out.”
Being a prestige builder, Spence has put himself under a lot of pressure to deliver high-quality rooms. But with all the constraints of The Block, he’s struggled to do that.
“It wasn’t nice to see him upset,” Kerrie says. “Because he’s such a perfectionist, it just went against everything, all his work methods.”
The stressed-out couple couldn’t take much more.
During filming, the couple missed a lot of things about their life in South Australia’s Barossa Valley, including their independence.
“You have no control,” Spence says of being on The Block. “You’re like prisoners in there!”
They also missed their beloved dogs, Chilli – who’d been having treatment for cancer – and Ted.
Viewers have already seen Spence getting emotional. But he says he’s not afraid to show his emotions – and that people on social media shouldn’t be so “judgy judgy”.
“I think it’s appalling that I was ‘the sooky guy’ on social media from a few people,” he says.
“It was like, ‘What era are we living in now where men can’t show their emotions?’ Mental health comes into that as well.”
Want to read more about The Block? Pick up a copy of this week’s issue of TV WEEK. On sale now!
