Monty Don makes gardening decision with wife Sarah due to personal issue

Gardening maestro Monty Don, the familiar face of BBC's Gardeners' World, has shared insights into his gardening habits, revealing that he prefers to garden on his own rather than with his wife Sarah at their Longmeadow home. The 69-year-old presenter cherishes the “peace and solace” that solitary gardening brings him, which he finds calming for his mind.

“It's the peace and solace, actually, that helps quiet my mind,” he disclosed. Monty, who suffers from seasonal affective disorder (SAD), a condition affecting one in 20 people across the UK that leads to struggling during months with reduced daylight, found that returning to the garden was essential after experiencing a particularly challenging October and November.

Speaking on the Gardeners' World podcast, he explained: “I now have a pattern whereby I try and spend one day a week on my own in the garden, which is obviously usually a weekend, one of the two weekend days.” Monty sees this as a personal “treat” and added, “But when I say share, I don't necessarily mean gardening with other people, which actually, personally, I don't like very much."

He went on to describe the dynamic with his wife: “Even my wife and I, who have always gardened together, we hardly ever physically garden together, we just were in the garden at the same time.” Monty elaborated on the concept of sharing within gardening: “I was thinking more in terms of if you had to garden, no one saw what you did, no one shared the fruits or whether they were literal fruits, or a few flowers, or whatever," reports the Liverpool Echo.

The green-fingered expert has been happily married to his wife Sarah since 1983, and together they have three adult children - Adam, Tom, and Freya. Monty has openly discussed his mental health struggles and credits Sarah as the driving force behind his decision to seek help for depression.

In an open-hearted chat with Kate Thornton on the White Wine Question Time podcast, Monty shared: "It's a lot to do with the greyness, the lack of light and the general sense of the world just pressing in on you and no energy."

He also described a pivotal moment when Sarah challenged him about his mental state: "Sarah said to me, 'Look, I just can't take any longer your moods and your black depression, you've got to do something about it because if you don't, I can't live with you – I'll take the children and I'll go'."

Following this crucial intervention, Monty sought professional help and started on anti-depressants. Eventually, he stopped taking the medication and discovered relief through the use of a light box to help manage the seasonal changes.