Famous for her champagne lifestyle Michelle Oakes was the envy of Essex with a fab house, riding stables and a glistening swimming pool after her fella won £1 million. But now, all the riches are gone…
Famous for her champagne lifestyle ‘Lotto wife’ Michelle Oakes was the envy of Essex with a fab house, riding stables and a glistening swimming pool after her fella won £1 million. Five times married Michelle felt she’d hit the jackpot again when she made headlines after falling for the builder who helped create the luxury home she left when her Lotto marriage ended.
But that love story has also ended in disaster and her that her “rags to riches… to rags again” love life has left her living in a static caravan. With failed marriages to two soldiers, a forklift driver, a doorman and a builder behind her, Michelle is now free and single – seeing her newfound happiness as another upturn in her fortunes, even if the money has gone. On the eve of her 60th birthday, she’s lost the four stone she piled on comfort eating through her unhappy marriages and has vowed never to tie the knot again.
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Happiness for Michelle is snuggling up with Labradoodles Betty and Kofi and cat Bruce in the cozy caravan she jokes is smaller than the stable she had built next to her old swimming pool.
She says: “On paper, I’ve lost everything. But I am the happiest I’ve ever been.” The mum-of-three’s first husband was forklift driver Simon Corne in 1991, when she was just 23. The pair had sons Matt, 37, and Charlie, 33, but split four years after their big day, saying they were both too young to settle down.
Next came taxi driver and doorman Gary Brand, who scooped a £1million Lotto win in 1996, a year into their relationship. She says: “Gary became a millionaire after being part of a syndicate that hit the jackpot. “Our lives changed overnight and we were so happy just living the dream.
“We had our 1902 cottage converted into a beautiful big house built with a swimming pool in the garden. Gary put in stables for my horses and a dressing room for me next to our bedroom. We had a triple garage for our fleet of flashy cars, including my lilac BMW, and electric gates out the front. Life was incredible. He was such a kind man.
“When we got married in 1997, I quaffed pink champagne and we spent the next couple of years travelling the world, taking incredible holidays to New York, Disney World, visiting all of the Greek Islands and flying out to Ibiza at least three times a year. Gary was a great man and loved spoiling me with beautiful jewellery and fancy cars, but after a couple of years the relationship went stale, as we wanted different things.
“He was focussed on growing his business and we ended up divorcing in 1999. It was amicable and I walked away with a £37,500 settlement and a large solicitor’s bill – so I sold the diamonds and moved on!”
By 2000 Michelle had met and married soldier Terry Clarke, but a year after their 2002 divorce, she said ‘I do’ to another soldier, Richie Oakes, and they had son Mason, now aged 22. But by 2009, they, too, had divorced. And in 2014 Michelle was back in the news after it emerged that she’d got together with the lovestruck builder who had worked on her dream Lotto home, after meeting by chance on dating website Plenty of Fish.
The pair dubbed their romance a “fairytale,” as Ian admitted he had fallen in love with Michelle while digging out her pool in the 1990s, and was left shaken when she unwittingly messaged him after seeing his profile on the dating site.
Days later they met in their local pub and Ian was still so smitten, despite Michelle not recognising him, that he proposed in a text message when she arrived home hours later. The happy couple enjoyed a white wedding in 2016 and even renovated a three-bedroom home together. But, sadly, after six years and what Michelle describes as a “Eureka moment,” she asked for a divorce.
She says: “Ian and I had a nice life together. I was running Michelle’s Baps, serving roadside burgers and looking after my lovely mum Betty too, who was suffering with dementia. “But when she died my world turned upside down. I was mid-menopause and deeply unhappy.
“I never felt loved by my dad and realised I’d been chasing it all my life, but I needed to learn to make myself happy rather than relying on a man, so Ian and I separated. I was floored by grief, as Mum had always been my best friend, but in the years I’d looked after her I had learnt so much about dementia I didn’t want it going to waste, so I sold up my burger van and retrained as a carer.
“I also realised I’d let myself go as, at 5ft 7in tall and weighing 13st 8lbs, I knew that the biggest hangover from the high life was sitting on my waistline. I’d lived life on champagne and takeaways and it had cost me my health.
“I stopped snacking and cut down on the fizz, managing to drop down to my current weight of 9st 4lbs and a size 10.” With her pre-60 transformation almost complete and her new £20,000-a-year career. Michelle decided it was time to settle down and find her own forever home in Clacton-on-Sea, Essex. She says: “I saw the caravan going for £52,000 and snapped it up. It was perfect for me and the animals and moving in was one of the happiest days of my life.
“You’re not allowed to spend 365 days a year at the holiday park, but I’m lucky that I have a room at my best friend Steve’s, so if I ever feel lonely I go there. But after a hard day’s work caring for the elderly, I’m usually happy to get back to my own four walls.
“I miss the exotic holidays and yes, admittedly, money is tight. But I’m a grafter and help Steve on his burger van to pay for my one holiday a year to Egypt. My favourite lipstick costs £2 and I get all my clothes from the TikTok shop or Primark.”
Now Michelle loves nothing more than snuggling up in the caravan after a hard day’s work, but admits she does sometimes find herself giggling that her entire 36ftx12ft home is the same size as her old front room. She says: “I know people must think it’s weird and they must think I’ve had such a downturn in fortune – it’s like rags to riches…and back to rags – but I really don’t see it like that.
“Money doesn’t actually mean anything if you’re not happy within yourself and having a man doesn’t either. I have to say I’m slightly embarrassed to have been married and divorced five times. “That said, I don’t regret any of my decisions, because life has been a rollercoaster and definitely a fun one, although it is a little sad that I got to nearly 60 before realising what truly makes me happy.
“I look at the tattoos I’ve had done on my arms to remind myself never to forget the important things in life again. One reads, ‘‘Even on my darkest day, I will stand tall and find sunshine”. The other says, ‘Never let your past define your future’. “I live by those mottos. For some, life might be about diamonds. But, for me, I am genuinely happiest sitting on my deck with the dogs leading a simple life.
“Admittedly, I might still like getting my nails done and treating myself to a glass of pink champagne from time to time – that’s one thing I haven’t quite given up splashing out on, that and the occasional lottery ticket!”
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