A bottle of wine, 15 pints, a bag of cocaine and the Blackpool trip that changed everything

A banging headache, heart palpitations, complete mental turmoil. This is what an average Monday morning looked like for Mark Newsome.

The 32-year-old would spend the following days battling through his gruesome comedown until he felt “semi-normal”. By the time Friday rolled around, he’d do it all over again.

It was a vicious cycle he just couldn’t escape from. Mixing a bottle of wine, 15 pints of cider and a bag of cocaine, it was the only way Mark could drown out the noise in his mind.

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“What would hit my most was the shame,” Mark, who lives in the Shaw and Crompton area of Oldham, told the Manchester Evening News.

“I would feel so guilty about what I’d done. I’d feel shameful about my behaviour. The next day, it would feed into my paranoia thinking everyone hated me. That led me into a real state of depression.”

Mark first started drinking heavily every weekend while attending the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama in Cardiff.

But things took a turn for the worst when he left the school at the age of 24 – the competitive nature of the acting industry taking a toll on his mental health.

“I wasn’t getting the jobs I wanted and the reality of the industry hit me,” he said. “I went into a dark place. I didn’t know who I was at that point.”

Mark’s alcohol use spiralled out of control. Drinking to excess every weekend, sometimes on his own, he also began using cocaine.

His drug use meant he would experience crippling depression and anxiety, issues that led him down a dark path of poor mental health.

“I was drinking myself into oblivion and using coke,” he added. “I was just getting myself in a really bad way; a psychosis state.

“I felt so angry with everything. I couldn’t explain the feeling. I was drinking and using to self-medicate. I just wanted to get pissed straight away. I would start on a bottle of wine then go onto spirits and cider – lots of cider.

“I would start feeling spaced out and I knew coke would pick me up. That combination really worked well for me at the time. The coke gave me the confidence I needed to go and chat to everyone.

“The worst thing was the comedown. You would lose five days of just feeling like you’re in mental turmoil. With the anxiety and the heart palpitations, you feel like you’re dying.

“You’d feel semi-normal by Friday then it’s straight back on it again. It was a vicious cycle.”

Amid the haze of addiction, Mark reached such a low point he planned to take his own life in Blackpool in 2017.

But a chance phone call from his best friend Will saved him – later inspiring him to create a one-man play.

"Will rang me up and he was like ‘Mate what are you doing in Blackpool? It’s a s*** place to die,’” Mark recalled. “And I started laughing - and he was right! I thought, f*** it, what am I doing?"

Mark went on to create and star in a one-man show about his own experience, titled 'Blackpool, What A S*** Place To Die,' written by Phil Pearson. The show will be available to watch at the Octagon Theatre in Bolton later this month.

As Mark’s drink and drug use continued, he found himself in trouble with the police on several occasions.

“I got arrested for being drunk and disorderly and things like that,” he said. “I was getting arrested more and more. I was at a point where they told me if I carried on drinking I would get a custodial sentence.”

Mark, who was diagnosed with autism at the age of 29, says everything came to a head when he received a 'stern letter' from another actor that completely shifted his perspective.

“I got a stern letter from someone in the industry,” he said. “I realised it was starting to affect my career. I had to address a lot of different things. I had to go to therapy and alcohol support groups. It changed my outlook on everything.

“I thought, okay, it’s time to turn things around. If I don’t, I’m going to ruin my whole life, my career and maybe go to jail. It was a real point in my life where I made the decision to get clean fully.”

Mark finally became sober in 2020 and has since found a safe haven in acting. “That period, between 24 and 29, I didn’t know who I was or why I felt different,” he told the MEN. “That’s why I love performing and being an actor because I get to immerse myself in these different roles and hide away from myself.

“I was also coming to terms with being gay. It was a mixture of those things and feeling like an outsider, like I didn’t fit in with anyone. I found it hard to make friends.

“I felt like I was worthless and a waste of space. No one wanted anything to do with me and I felt like everyone was talking about me and I was getting a bit of a reputation.

“On those days, I felt suicidal. It was just a complete concoction of emotions. They were quite hard to manage. I didn’t realise they were leading to autistic meltdowns.”

Mark says his life has completely changed since turning to sobriety. “I feel so much better,” he added.” “I feel like a completely different person. I don’t recognise the person I was at that time.

“I look back and I think, woah, was that really me? Because now I’m being my true self. Now I’m the real me. It’s the person I’ve always wanted to be.

“Don’t get me wrong, I still have dark days and meltdowns, but I know how to manage them. I know my triggers and my life feels a lot brighter.

“I just want to give back and I’ve got some hope that through the darkness, you can come out of it and live a life you’ve always wanted to do.”

For more information on Blackpool, What A S*** Place To Die, visit the link by clicking here.