It is time for me to save my life.
Dramatic? Maybe.
It is hardly the moment of clarity that shocks alcoholics or gamblers into surrendering to a higher power.
But it is a realisation that if I’m not to become a coronavirus statistic I need to lose weight.
Especially with a new survey revealing nearly half the country has put on around 1lb a week during lockdown.
Covid-19 is killing more men than women, according to the World Health Organisation. Those with a wider waistline even more so.
It is also killing twice as many black men and women than white.
Factor in my age – forty-(cough) – and I’m probably in the position of unspoken pressure that many black and Asian public sector workers find themselves.
As a football reporter I need to go back out to work. The Premier League is set to restart next month. But I’m concerned – I can’t lie.
I know that the feeling will be: If everyone else is back, why can’t you be? Yet how can I not be apprehensive after two months of widespread death in BAME households?
Or after seeing my younger sister suffer from the Covid-19 symptoms?
I can’t stay at home forever. I know that. But I can ensure, medically, that I am not vulnerable to a disease which kills by attacking lung tissue. If, like me, you weigh more than you should then your lungs will be constricted already, simply through force of compression.
And if you tend to be chronically out of breath anyway, then good luck.
To be fair, I’ve lost a stone already. The turning point came when Boris Johnson went into intensive care.
At the time they reckoned he weighed 17st 7lb – too much considering he stood at 5ft 9in. He believes cycling to work, keeping him relatively fit, saved his life.
It spooked me, at 6ft 2in, into a family summit at which we decided to address our eating and our mealtimes. Energetic kids are always a plus when your mindset is right.
Even on those mornings when I stand on the scales and – for all the hunger and aching limbs from the day before – find I’ve only lost half a pound or stayed the same, it is still worth it.
Now there are three strict meals a day, plenty of water and nothing after 6pm. A sneaky Twix has been replaced by exercise with the kids.
Even if you take away the coronavirus, my head in the sand still leaves me at risk of heart disease, stroke, high blood pressure and diabetes.
I’d be a fool not to make the lifestyle change that the numbers are telling me to make.
