Candice Warner has opened up about the shocking impact of her infamous pub toilet tryst with football star Sonny Bill Williams, admitting she ‘contemplated suicide’ after the scandal.
The former Ironwoman, 40, was in headlines for weeks when she was photographed in a bathroom hook-up with ex-Bulldogs star Sonny, 39, during a night out at Sydney’s beach-side Clovelly Hotel back in 2007.
While Sonny came away from the incident unscathed, Candice was hit with a barrage of ‘slut-shaming’ and backlash which left her wanting to end it all, she told the Mental As Anyone podcast on Monday.
‘I definitely contemplated suicide many times. I remember driving to The Gap and pulling over and just thinking there’s no way out. I felt like there was no escape,’ she said.
The Gap, where the wife of top cricketer David Warner found herself in her lowest moment, is a notorious ocean cliff at South Head in the Eastern Suburbs of Sydney.
‘I was ashamed. I was embarrassed. I was publicly humiliated. I think being the female in that situation in such a public place and it all being played out in the media, I was sort of, I suppose, slut shamed.’
Candice Warner, 40, has opened up about the shocking impact of her infamous pub toilet tryst with football star Sonny Bill Williams, 39, admitting she ‘contemplated suicide’ after the scandal
But despite fearing these would be her last moments and she may never find a way out, Candice confessed she had a phone call in that moment which saved her life.
‘I called my brother. He sort of talked me, not talked me out of it, but he just definitely said, “I’m coming to get you, you know, don’t do anything stupid,”‘ she said.
Candice, who shares daughters Ivy, 10, Indi, eight, and Isla, five, with David, has been open in recent years about the public humiliation she suffered following her pub bathroom tryst with Sonny when she was just 22-years-old.
She opened up about the fallout during an appearance on I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here! last year.
‘I make one silly mistake as a young girl and that was it. I remember just the hurt and pain that I caused my family because of comments that were made about me in the media,’ she said at the time.
‘That was probably the hardest period of my life in just how relentless it was. It was just constant.’
In a direct piece to camera, Candice spoke about how serious the bullying became.
‘When I was a lot younger, there was a lot of, I guess, scrutiny on me and name calling and online bullying towards me over a mistake that I made,’ she said.
The former Ironwoman was in headlines for weeks when she was photographed in a bathroom hook-up with ex-Bulldogs star Sonny during a night out at Sydney ‘s beach-side Clovelly Hotel back in 2007
‘Then I moved to Perth. My family needed a break from people approaching them and saying, “What’s your daughter up to? I’ve read this, I’ve heard that.”
‘I wasn’t perfect but I definitely wasn’t the person that I was made out to be.’
Candice said the upside of the incident was it prepared her to help her cricket star husband David, 38, through the Sandpapergate ball-tampering scandal.
‘I try to look at everything in a positive light and I feel like in 2018 when my husband went through what he went through with cricket, I knew I had the tools for us as a family to get through it,’ she said.
‘I knew I was able to guide him because I had been through it.’
Speaking to Daily Mail Australia at her book launch in 2023, Candice said she hasn’t heard a thing from Sonny since the incident as they’ve both ‘moved on with their lives’.
‘No, I haven’t heard from him and I didn’t expect to, he’s moved on with his life and I’ve moved on with mine,’ she said.
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Candice was hit with a barrage of ‘slut-shaming’ and backlash which left her wanting to end it all, she told the Mental As Anyone podcast on Monday. Pictured with husband David Warner and their children Ivy, 10, Indi, eight, and Isla, five
