When Bernadette Gee’s bakery and café business Magnolia Kitchen went into liquidation in late 2022, it wasn’t just the end of her company – it was the closing of a life chapter that she’d poured every ounce of herself into for more than a decade.
“I was Magnolia Kitchen – I didn’t know how to not be that,” the 42-year-old admits.
“It was my identity, so it was too hard to make the decision to close it myself. In the end, it had to be taken away from me. It was traumatic.”
Building Magnolia Kitchen
Bernadette started the brand in 2012 and opened her boutique cake shop in 2016, the Monday after she and husband Harley returned from their honeymoon. Over the next decade, she juggled life with Harley, their daughter Charlotte, now 23, and sons James, 12, and Edward, 10, with growing the company to supplying more than 230 stores across New Zealand with her famous fudges, marshmallows and baking kits.
But behind the glossy café, bestselling cookbooks and large social media following, the business and Bernadette had reached their limit.
From sweetness to struggle
Then Covid happened, leaving Bernadette’s family in debt that they’re still paying off.
“It was horrible,” she shares.
“My staff lost jobs; my family lost security. The guilt for me is enormous. But looking back, it needed to happen. The downfall doesn’t erase the incredible things Magnolia Kitchen achieved.”
The toll on her health
After the Auckland business collapsed, Bernadette took to her bed and decided her family would be better off without her.
“I tried to convince Harley to divorce me, move in with his family and just let me disappear. I wasn’t suicidal, but I wanted to remove myself from their lives because I thought I was only bringing darkness.”
The physical pain worsened too. She experienced chronic hip pain, sleep was elusive and her skin itched so badly, she felt like scratching herself raw. She also put on 20kg and went from a size 10 to 16.
When life became unmanageable
“I couldn’t function,” she recalls.
“The mood stabilisers I was on didn’t touch the sides. I felt like I’d had a brain transplant. I’d always been a positive person, but suddenly I had this negative narrative. I removed myself from my friends and basically became housebound.”
The turning point came when an Instagram follower suggested her symptoms may be related to perimenopause.
A lightbulb moment
“That was my lightbulb,” she tells.
“I realised, ‘I’m not crazy. I’m not broken.’ There was a reason for what I was going through.”
In January 2024, Bernadette started hormone replacement therapy (HRT) and it changed how she felt. By July, she had a job and was baking again for the first time in two years. By December last year, she’d lost 18kg.
“I looked in the mirror and finally saw myself again.”
A new diagnosis
She also received a diagnosis for ADHD and decided to take medication – a decision that’s been a game-changer. She says the diagnosis has helped her understand her neurodivergent children better.
“Now we’re a ‘get help’ family. We talk, we advocate and we make sure the kids know their brains aren’t broken, just wired differently. It’s powerful to break that cycle of shame.”
Yet just as she was getting life back on track by starting to work at a café, in April this year, Bernadette, who also has multiple sclerosis, got breast cancer.
She tells, “The recommended treatment was a single mastectomy, but I was immediately adamant about getting a double mastectomy. I wanted to reduce the future stress and anxiety – and my surgeons backed me.
Facing cancer with clarity
Bernadette considers herself lucky that it was caught early and she required no chemo or radiotherapy. She’s also pushed to get back on HRT treatment, despite it being unconventional after the diagnosis of breast cancer.
She explains, “My perimenopause symptoms were immediately back without it – I’m up 8kg and back to not being able to function – so it’s a calculated risk. But my doctor is supporting me and we’ll
do escalated testing.”
Her mission to empower
Bernadette could have kept all of this quiet. But she hasn’t.
“I worry I might look like an attention seeker, but my ‘why’ is women’s health. Encouraging women to advocate for themselves – that’s my purpose now. I don’t know where I’d be if I hadn’t asked my doctor to look into perimenopause, ADHD or early screening for breast cancer – and I want others to know they can do the same if something doesn’t feel right to them. “Also, never underestimate the power of hearing someone else say out loud the thing you thought you were suffering through alone.”
Finding peace in the everyday
These days, Bernadette embroiders, crochets and draws, taking commissions while recovering from surgery.
“I’m learning that I don’t need to do 100 things any more,” she enthuses.
“If I can get out of bed and get some sunlight on my face for the day, that’s enough. Everything else is a bonus.”
