Gabrielle Achilleos
The Other Side of Monaco: The Brave Face Behind the Glamour
Financial struggle, hidden loneliness and the courage to ask for help
Write your text here...
Write your text here...
"When the chips are down financially,
or there's something going on in your family,
people tend to put on a brave face."
""When someone sits in my chair after chemo, I'm not restoring beauty. I'm restoring confidence and self-love.".
"I walked Manhattan with a photograph asking strangers if they had a space that looked like my vision board."
From an unconventional childhood to the Riviera
Gabrielle grew up in an entrepreneurial family where following the conventional path was never particularly important. Her parents built a food manufacturing business from scratch, and her mother's philosophy was simple: if something makes you happy, do it.
At 17, Gabrielle moved to the South of France with her parents, who had bought an old stone house to renovate. The reality was rather less glamorous than the Riviera dream: a caravan, no running water, a well, chickens and a huge Irish wolfhound.
It was an unconventional beginning to a life that would continue to involve risk, reinvention and the courage to make her own choices.
Building a life, and losing it
Gabrielle created a successful business, watched it collapse during the 2009 financial crisis, made everyone redundant and eventually walked away from both the business and her relationship with €400 and a suitcase of clothes.
Starting again wasn't new to Gabrielle. But the later financial struggle in Monaco was different: this time, it wasn't simply about a business failing. It was about living with financial insecurity in a place where wealth is so visible and where admitting that you are struggling can feel almost impossible.
What happens when everyone thinks you're doing fine?
Monaco is synonymous with wealth, glamour and success. But behind the polished image, life can look very different.
Gabrielle calls it “Barefoot in Tinseltown”, the reality behind the polished image of Monaco. She knows it from experience.
Born in Grasse and raised between France and the UK, Gabrielle has built businesses, run a charity, worked multiple jobs and eventually found her way into integrative health coaching. But one of the most important chapters of her story began when financial pressure forced her to confront something that is rarely talked about in Monaco: what happens when you can't afford the life everyone around you appears to be living.
In this episode, Gabrielle speaks openly about financial struggle, isolation, shame and the pressure to put on a brave face, and about what happened when she finally allowed herself to ask for help.
Her message is ultimately one of reassurance:
you are not alone, and struggling doesn't mean you have failed.
Photos and visuals courtesy of Delphine Breyne. All rights reserved
Write your text here...
Delphine Breyne is a French beauty entrepreneur and restorative beauty expert based in New York City. After more than 25 years in the beauty and fashion industry, including a successful career as an international fashion model, she made the life-changing decision to leave France and start again in New York.
Learning not to do it alone
Gabrielle's story isn't simply:
financial struggle → new career
It is:
financial struggle → isolation → vulnerability → asking for help → rebuilding confidence → finding purpose.
She talks about learning to control what she could, letting go of what she couldn't, building an emotional toolkit and allowing people to support her. You don't have to have everything figured out before you reach out.
" There are a lot of women in Monaco who are struggling below the surface, both emotionally and financially.”
The brave face
From the outside, Monaco can look like a place where everyone has money, connections and an enviable lifestyle.
Gabrielle experienced what happens when that image collides with reality.
When her husband lost his job and subsequently struggled with his mental health, financial pressure became increasingly difficult. During COVID, Gabrielle found herself juggling multiple jobs while continuing to support their charity.
On top of having to find ways to earn money, Gabrielle had to deal with shame, isolation and feeling that she couldn't tell people what was really happening.
She gradually learned to be more vulnerable, to accept help and to let go of the idea that she had to manage everything herself.
From that experience came a message she now feels strongly about sharing with other women: you don't have to struggle behind closed doors just because everyone around you appears to be doing fine.
" As the glass jar got fuller, my confidence started to grow.”
The glass jar
Gabrielle began putting the money she earned into a large glass jar.
It was something tangible she could see growing when so much else felt uncertain. The jar became proof that she could earn, contribute and rebuild her independence.
Finding a new professional path
During lockdown, Gabrielle began looking seriously at what she could do with the skills and experience she already had. Discovering the Institute for Integrative Nutrition felt like something clicking into place.
Food, emotional wellbeing, stress, movement, sleep and helping people all came together.
More than just professional development, her training was part of her own rebuilding.
From survival to purpose
Today, Gabrielle's work as an integrative health coach focuses on emotional eating, nutrition and holistic stress management. Health coaching isn't a random career pivot. It grew out of everything she had lived through.
Her own experience taught her how closely financial pressure and emotional wellbeing can become intertwined, and why people sometimes need practical and emotional support rather than another glossy promise of perfection. Her work with women and her community-building have the same underlying purpose: to create spaces where people can be honest, feel supported and move forward.
" I started cooking for people as a way of saying thank you..”
Giving Back - Chances 4 children
Helping others has been a constant throughout Gabrielle's life, long before health coaching became her profession.
For more than a decade, Gabrielle and her husband Russell have supported vulnerable children in Uganda through Chances 4 Children.
What began with a simple response to an appeal for help grew into a long-term commitment to supporting children through education and creating opportunities for a different future.
For Gabrielle, the charity, her health coaching and her work bringing women together all come from the same place: a desire to help people feel supported and find their way forward.
The Monaco people don't see
Gabrielle's experience has also shaped the communities she creates around her.
She knows how easy it can be for women who relocate to Monaco to lose part of their own identity, particularly when a partner's career is the reason for the move. And she knows how difficult it can be to admit that life isn't quite as effortless as it looks.
Her answer has been to create spaces where women can meet without the pressure to impress, pretend or keep up appearances. As they don't need another networking opportunity or another wellness solution but someone they can be honest with.
What the Riviera means now
Gabrielle has experienced the glamorous side of Monaco: yacht parties, Formula One and the social world surrounding the Principality.
She no longer feels she has to participate in it to belong. Her relationship with the Riviera has changed. The glamour can still be fun, but it no longer defines what a good life looks like.
Today, the things she values most are connection, friendship, nature, wellbeing and the freedom to choose what matters to her.
Living the Dream doesn't mean pretending everything is perfect.
Gabrielle's story challenges the idea that living the dream means having a perfect life.
It can mean admitting that you're struggling when everyone else seems to be doing fine. It can mean asking for help. It can mean finding your people, rebuilding your confidence one small step at a time and discovering that vulnerability can be a strength.
It can also mean realising that the life you were trying so hard to preserve isn't necessarily the life you want anymore.
For Gabrielle, success today looks less like appearances and more like agency, wellbeing, connection and purpose.
And perhaps her most important message is the simplest:
You don't have to put on the brave face all the time.
" You have to take control of what you can control and let go of what you can't."
" I realised I needed to list my skills and figure out how to make a living.”
About Gabrielle Achilleos:
Gabrielle Achilleos is an integrative health coach, community builder and charity founder based in Monaco.
Through her health and wellbeing work, she supports clients around emotional eating, nutrition and holistic stress management. She is also involved in creating supportive communities for international women living and working in Monaco and the surrounding region.
Gabrielle co-founded Chances 4 Children, supporting vulnerable children in Uganda, and continues to combine her professional work with her commitment to helping others.
Website: Gabrielle's Zest 4 Life
Instagram: @gabrielle_zest_4_
A full transcript of Cecile's conversation with Gabrielle Achilleos is available here.
Write your text here...
More Women Who Bet Everything on Themselves
Delphine's episode is a bonus episode, and the first on Living the Dream featuring a guest who moved away from France rather than toward it. If her story of determination and reinvention resonates with you, you may also enjoy Catherine's journey from nurse to global entrepreneur based in Cannes, Flavia's work as a career and transition strategist, and Vicky's path to financial independence on the French Riviera.
SEASON TWO: WOMEN WHO REINVENTED THEIR CAREERS ON THE FRENCH RIVIERA, IS COMING SOON.
Write your text here...
Insights, Stories, and Updates
© 2026 Living the Dream Podcast. All rights reserved.
Living the Dream® is a registered trademark