It’s been a roller-coaster year for former Shortland Street actress Ria Vandervis. Burned out and overwhelmed by anxiety, she transformed her life. She resigned from her TV role after more
than a decade, moved her young family to Auckland’s idyllic Waiheke Island and, most importantly, she put herself first.
Her plan was working. Her son Teddy, four, was thriving with their days spent in nature, and Ria says she felt the best she had in years without the oppressive weight of worry hanging over her.
Then things began to change.
“I got an itchy face and scalp, then I started getting headaches, which I never get,” the 41-year-old says. “Then I had really insane hot flushes, which are such a strange and yucky feeling.”
The symptoms were familiar – she’d watched her mum navigate early menopause – and so she booked a doctor’s appointment. After a series of tests, they confirmed, as Ria says, “I’m not behaving like a younger woman in the hormone department.”
For six months, she experienced the uncomfortable symptoms before they subsided. While she didn’t turn to hormone replacement therapy this time, she says that should they return, “I definitely wouldn’t hesitate to get on it.”
Thinking about expanding the family
While navigating the changes has been a process, Ria is at peace with it and acknowledges that it’s a normal life stage all women go through.
Meanwhile, smitten with her family of three, she’s still deciding whether Ted will have a sibling.
It was a heartbreaking six-year journey for Ria and her husband Chris Ashton, 41, to welcome their son into the world.
After years of struggling to conceive, they were overjoyed when Ria finally fell pregnant in 2018. But their jubilation was short-lived when she suffered a devastating miscarriage.
Finally, in 2021, their dream of becoming parents came true thanks to Ria’s sister Lottie, who gave them the greatest gift by donating her eggs.
The process means that the couple has more frozen embryos, so when deciding whether to have another child, it’s not a race against her biological clock.
“Post-menopausal women can carry children – there’s a woman on Waiheke who had a baby at 64 – but I’m not 100 percent sure at the moment,” Ria muses.
“I’ve had a lot on this year, and I’ve taken the pressure off to make that decision and give us some breathing space.
“I would love Ted to have a sibling because my siblings are the best thing in my life, but I also recognise that time is marching on. It’s a big decision.”
Life after Shortland Street
For now, she is soaking in every moment of her post-Shorty life. When Ria talks with the Weekly, she is on the site of a new renovation project – her first not on her own home – before she knocks off at lunchtime to pick Ted up from kindy.
It is a far cry from the 5am wake-up calls and 12-hour workdays of her life as Dr Harper Whitley in Ferndale.
“There were days when I wouldn’t see Ted at all because I was gone before he woke up,” she tells. “Now we hang out all afternoon and there’s lots of beach time.”
Ted’s hilarious TV reviews
Now that Ted is older, Ria loves sharing her work with him, though it has had mixed results. While he strongly disliked seeing her fighting monsters in her stint in Power Rangers Operation Overdrive, he
is a big fan of her antics on the new season of Celebrity Treasure Island, where she is competing for the New Zealand Cancer Research Trust.
“When I said, ‘I’m going to be on TV tonight,’ he was like, ‘No, not Power Rangers!’” she laughs.
“But he’s really enjoying Treasure Island. Every time I’m on screen, he’s whooping and hollering.”
Facing her fears on Treasure Island
While the diet of rice and beans doesn’t faze her, Ria’s biggest fear was getting along with a bunch of strangers. So she was delighted to see a familiar face on her team – her TV husband Ben Barrington.
“I saw him at the airport and it was a relief,” she smiles.
“He is someone that I’m so comfortable with, knows me so well and will hopefully have my back.”
Though she initially worried their connection would put a target on them, she laughs, “As it turns out, lots of the people were so young that I don’t think they even knew who we were!”
While Ria sees this as her last TV appearance for a while, she would make one exception.
“I’m renovating heaps, which I love, so I need someone to make me a DIY show!”
Celebrity Treasure Island screens Monday – Wednesday at 7.30pm on TVNZ 2 and TVNZ +.
