TV chef Gizzi Erskine reveals she got pregnant while on drugs aged 19 and was spiked with heroin by a burglar as she recalls her turbulent teen years

DAILYMAIL.COM • 1h ago

By LAURA FOX, ASSOCIATE SHOWBUSINESS EDITOR 11:55 06 Oct 2026, updated 11:58 06 Oct 2026

Gizzi Erskine has reflected on her turbulent teenage years, revealing she got pregnant while on drugs when she was 19 in a heartbreaking post.

The chef and TV personality, 47, shared a snap of herself during her younger years along with a caption detailing some of the horrific ordeals she faced, including being spiked with heroin by a burglar.

Gizzi found fame as a chef and presented two series of the Channel 4 show Cook Yourself Thin, and she now hosts Drop Down Menu with Matt Tebbutt, as well as her own podcast Messy Lunch.

She wrote: ‘Do I look my age? I was 19 here. I thought I was all grown up and wanted to do the grown up things…

‘I’m asking because I thought I was very in charge of myself. Here I was only just 19 and I had had several really bats*** things happen to me.

‘I had been spiked with heroin while someone robbed my mums house.

‘I had dated a man 12 years my senior (from an age where this was statutory rape) for a year and a half.

‘Someone else had gotten me pregnant after me taking ketamine and being in a K hole.

‘I am not saying I was not responsible for some part in these things, but this girl is still a baby. Look at her. These are not even the worse things to have happened to me.

‘Like many women this week I am combustible and honestly. I remember feeling like I was one of the lucky ones.’

Gizzi is the daughter of the 2nd Baron Erskine of Rerrick, Iain Maxwell Erskine, and the model and actress, Maria Josephine.

In an interview this year, she also spoke about her previous drug struggles, and admitted she went ‘off the rails’ for several years, turning her mother’s flat into a ‘squat’ while she went partying every night.

Gizzi, who has been diagnosed with ADHD, also reflected on struggling with her mental health, which led to her suffering two crises, in 2018 and 2022, and she sought treatment in Mexico, which involved a ‘huge’ amount of magic mushrooms.

She told The Sunday Times: ‘The ADHD meds kept me manic so I’ve been on cyclothymic medication for three years now and everything is going well for me. They calm the mania.’

‘Rock bottom was about three months before Mexico, and it was my fault because I got into so much debt.’

Gizzi said she no longer takes drugs, ‘but I drink alcohol and I take mushrooms. I think that’s called ‘LA clean’ and I feel amazing at the moment.

‘I’ve never felt like this and that comes down to going through the horrible experience of losing your house and all your money that I’d built over a 20-year career. It’s allowed me to start again.’

Gizzi started dating musician Matt Turner five years ago, and in February the couple announced they’d got engaged on Valentine’s Day.

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