Tracy Bartram on the toll of Breakfast radio: “I have no idea how I kept it up”

Tracy Bartram says she gave up the best job in Melbourne.

For years, she was part of the top rating Tracy and Matt in the Morning breakfast show on Fox FM.

Tracy opens up about addiction, the rigours of breakfast radio and why she ultimately had to give the gig away, in the latest episode of Di Gillett’s Power of Women podcast.

“I quit my job at Fox FM to get over alcoholism, because it takes a long time to clear your head,” Tracy says. “But I’m grateful, because I’ve got lived experience.”

Today, Tracy is 21 years sober.

On the surface, it may have looked like she was holding it all together. In reality, Tracy was working herself to exhaustion whilst simultaneously trying to mask the dysfunction and pain in her life.

Radio, she says, was a different ball game back then.

“I have no idea how I kept it up,” she says. “I was under so much pressure. It was at a time when there was no option … we didn’t have podcasts and we didn’t have that many radio stations.”

“It was the number one show. It was all live. It was a completely different animal.”

“I had a therapist, but I just pushed it all down with drinking.”

Tracy says as soon as she could, she’d open a bottle.

“I was a stay-at-home drunk. I didn’t go out, because I had to get up every day at half past four.”

“I didn’t really function. I was just putting on a brave face. But it was really, really hard.”

“Every time I went to an event, I got drunk, and I’d be called in to the General Manager, and she’d say ‘Did you say … ?’ And I’d say ‘Oh, it sounds like me. Sorry.’”

Brutal is how Tracy describes the ridiculously early wake up calls demanded by breakfast radio.

“In Chinese medicine, between three and five am … that’s ‘lung.’ That’s when you need to be resting,” she says. “You’re not supposed to be up at that time of the day.”

“I ended up with adrenal burnout. I was just living in fear the whole time. It was awful.”

Tracy talks of a boy’s club mentality higher up the chain and feeling looked down upon because she declined to go along to Friday night drinks.

“I said ‘When you have drinks at 9 o’clock in the morning on a Friday, when MY weekend starts, I’ll be there.”

“But don’t ask me to stay awake until five o’clock in the afternoon, when (I’m) already in a coma.’”

“I was exhausted from the pressure. People think it’s a very glamorous life. It’s really hard work, doing breakfast radio.”

As Tracy discusses with Di in the podcast, female mentors were in scarce supply, often because – if you were a woman – they were your competition.

It’s no surprise that young women today often find it hard to believe some of the things their predecessors had to put up with. As Di notes, the younger generation is smarter, more forthright – and they haven’t been dominated or held back by the patriarchal views of those who went before them.

“I miss the free tickets,” she says. “I do love radio, and I’m sure it’s different now, but at the time, the pressure to constantly top what we’ve already done … the male-centric energy of it was pretty hard.”

In 2024, is Australia lagging behind when it comes to older female representation in the media?

“How often do you see a woman over 50 on the telly in Australia?” Tracy asks.

“What I love about Britain and the United States is that women are valued. Whoopi Goldberg, God love her – she’s been on The View for decades, and all those women are senior women.”

Tracy says with age comes wisdom.

“We don’t suffer fools,” she says. “But it’s still very much a man’s world.”

 Today, at 65, Tracy says the twelve step program is the scaffolding of her life’s strategy. She also does a lot of therapy.

“For the hundreds of people who’ve given me their time and support, I have to give back to the newcomers. Because we’re all in this together.”

From drinking enough water to getting enough sleep, Tracy’s own self care is crucial.

“If something is bothering me, I talk about it. My framework is ‘self care first.’”

Paying it forward, Tracy’s advice is: Do the internal work.

“Start doing your therapy. Start looking at your own behaviour.”

“Look at the things that are biting you on the arse.”

*Main photo: Tony Gough. Photo with Heather Graham from tracybartram.com.au