Last week I was absent from this page. I can count on one hand the number of times that has happened in all the years I’ve had the honour of writing for the Mirror (apart from holidays, of course).
The most recent time, a few weeks ago, was when I took to my bed for a couple of weeks to try and rid myself of a very nasty bedfellow that had laid me out.
Covid-19 did eventually leave me, thankfully, but it definitely hasn’t gone. It’s still taunting me – a me that is not the same as the me I was before it came.
The “Real Me me” was fearless – not enough to gladly jump out of a plane for the hell of it and end up in the I’m A Celebrity Jungle, mind you (I have been asked many times!), but brave enough to present “live” television and take on most work challenges without a heart flutter, most days for most of my career.
I have lost THAT me, the me who was always eager to take on the day, and its travel, work and home-related commitments and challenges, with relish.
I used to wake up with a bounce, looking forward to, and generally loving, every minute of every day, often capped off by cosy date nights (with my husband! Who else?) in a local bar or restaurant.
Recently, I seem to have been replaced by a person I’m not familiar with. I don’t like this jittery, over-the-top anxious woman. Nor the panicky cipher who can’t see things for looking.
Nor the one who goes food shopping and totally forgets what she needs to buy, then panics and leaves. Nor the tearful, insecure mum, whose personality change has prompted frequent knowing looks between her two sons.
Or the one who last week pulled out of two work engagements because she couldn’t stand the thought of the panic that attempting to carry them out would bring on.
Sadly, I am far from alone in experiencing this horrible Covid hangover. I’m just one of an army of people still battling the ghastly thing. I think about my friend Derek Draper – still on a ventilator – each and every day.
I have got off lightly compared to him and others who have been harmed for life, some with long-term lung damage, others with awful, debilitating chronic fatigue and long-term brain damage.
I know (hope?) my symptoms will fade with time. I am desperate for them to hop on the bus to viral extinction.
In the meantime, I’m having weekly hypnotherapy sessions and using a high-concentration CBD oil to calm my frazzled nerves.
Just hoping they’ll bring me back to who I was again. And very much wishing the same for others, who’ve had the misfortune to be touched by this cruel, vile virus.
