Love Island star Jacques O’Neill has revealed he’s changed careers, and has now become a carer. Jacques was in the 2022 villa, and got a lot of backlash about his behaviour on the show.
Jacques quit Love Island after a heated argument with Adam Collard. Then, he appeared on an Instagram live with Luca Bish, during which he laughed about Paige, who he had been coupled up with, and mocked fellow Islanders. During the show he was also called out for “bullying”, and mocking Tasha Ghouri.
However now, he has said he’s turned his life around. Jacques is now a care-giver for a boy called Denum, who he has said he now views as a brother. He’s said this “saved him” from “rock bottom”.
Jacques explained: “Everything only started to change when this boy came in to my life, Denum, now my best friend and little brother who I love so much.” According to The Sun, after meeting Denum, Jacques decided to take on more clients with disabilities.
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On Instagram, he added: “I started caring for these lads four times a week, they gave me a reason to show up again. They saved me.”
Not long after Love Island 2022, Jacques reflected on the show and said he “couldn’t cope” in the villa and that “doing Love Island was the worst decision of my life.”
“I was ready to break down,” he said. “I was feeling so mentally drained, I just wanted to go home and get myself right. It broke me and I was already broken. I was crying my eyes out. I couldn’t cope. I was literally feeling awful. It was the worst I’d ever felt in my life.”
But now, in further Instagram posts, Jacques has explained how life is different these days. “I’m Jacques 26 and I’m starting my life again. This is the part of my story you never saw,” he said in one post.
“Since I was a kid, rugby was all I ever knew. It was all I ever wanted to do. I didn’t care about much more other than rugby. Discipline. Hard work. Respect. That was my whole identity as a man. As my career just started to get going…Injuries started, one after another, knee, hamstring, back, I felt like I couldn’t catch a break and each one took a piece of me that | didn’t realise at the time.
“When Love Island called, I said ‘yes’… but for all the wrong reasons. I wasn’t ready for it, mentally, emotionally. Maturity, I was just a lost boy who was so angry at the world. But instead of working on myself, I got caught up in everything what came after the show, what I also wasn’t ready for, on Instagram it looked like I was living the dream, the car, the apartment.
“The travelling… hanging out with people who I thought I’d never even be in the same room as, working with brands that I wore since a kid it was all a bit crazy. In reality, I felt more lost and empty than ever, this wasn’t the real me, I actually ended up hating myself so much I had to drink to get myself through week by week but that came with consequences.”
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He added he was “embarrassed of myself” and “knew I needed to change, I couldn’t carry on living my life like this anymore.”
Jacques later said: Becoming a carer gave me something I’d been missing: purpose. I had to be a better person for them. So I started to rebuilt myself, my discipline, my mindset, my body. This chapter isn’t about proving anything. It’s about not going back. It’s about becoming the man my younger self would be proud of.
“From starting to care for them lads, I rebuilt my body, my mind, and my standards. I’m now a man that will never lose himself again. I’m resilient. This is who I am now. If you are rebuilding yourself too, this next chapter is for you.”
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