Yeah, because you know like it’s… Long Covid has been the only thing I’ve really thought about for the last six months because it just impacts every single part of my life, whether it’s the fatigue, or whether it’s not being able to taste anything and not feeling motivated to eat, not feeling like I have the energy to out with my friends, you know it’s like the only thing I think about.

Yeah, that must be very, very difficult. So which of the symptoms would you say you've found most difficult? You've talked a bit about your taste and smell, what about your mind fog, can you describe what that’s like?

Yeah, so the… the chronic fatigue and the mind fog I would say has had the biggest impact on my day-to-day life because you know I can’t do the things that I used to be able to do. Like, I’ve had a lot of days off school because I just can’t… I can’t do it, and I’ve been struggling in school a bit more because of the mind fog and not… and not being able to focus in class, so it’s… and then obviously like not being able to go out with my friends, not being able to go to like netball club and stuff like that, and those things really help you know my mental health and help me feel really good, and then it obviously has an impact on my mental health and it’s like a spiral of just not feeling great.

Yeah, so I think generally it… the hard thing was that it was kind of like a spiral and that… you know, the chronic fatigue meant I couldn't do as much, which meant I couldn't do the things that I really enjoyed to do, and then it kind of just felt like… like I just wasn’t enjoying life anymore because I couldn't do the things that really… that really brought me joy, and that I was struggling in school, and I didn’t have the energy to go out with my friends, and it was just like you know I didn’t really feel like I had anything to look forward to because I didn’t know when it was going to end.

You know, and I think that was really difficult, and then having to take days off school and feeling like I was missing out on things with my friends, and opportunities…you know, things like that were really difficult and really had an impact on my quality of life and and how I felt about myself because I didn’t feel like myself anymore, you know I didn’t know how to… I didn’t even know who I was anymore.

Oh, as I said earlier, me not being in school because of being off ill, it’s affected my social skills and also like changed lots of my friendships that I was in, and I’ve come back and I’ve like, I may have interacted with this person, but I’ve fallen out with this person. And it’s been very wavy kind of, it’s like I’ll either have days where I’m completely fine socially, or like, or I come into school and I just don’t want to talk to anyone, whatever reason.

Yeah, it was one or the other. He didn't think it could be both. And I think the when the GP referred her to the paediatrician, she said, she said the same thing ‘I’m referring her. I think she’s either got depression or Long Covid ‘cos I don’t think anyone really realised that it could be both. It could be connected and that you can depression with Long Covid.

And so, your therapist, do they understand that it’s part of your Long Covid experience?

Yes. She knows that I like, with I have anxiety and it definitely heightened because of Covid and Long Covid. But I’ve, I’ve always really had anxiety. So, she’s helped with that. But she knows that like the depression kind of face of it is kind of based around the Long Covid. So, we trying to fix it [laughs]. I don’t know if that’s kind of the right term, but—

And what sorts of approaches is she doing? Is she trying to give you some practical ways of managing or is it just helpful to talk things through?

It’s very helpful to talk things through. I’m very comfortable with her. She’s a very good therapist. She’s really nice. She, she’s kind of found my way of dealing with things.

With… when I was talking to you earlier about doing… her doing PE lessons at school and swimming lessons and things, when she has a struggle and needs to go and take her inhaler, or she needs a rest break and things like that, when she comes home, it’s almost caused like an anxiety that she never used to have, where she’s…like she’ll share that she’s embarrassed that she has to have the rest breaks, that she can’t be the same as her peers when once she was, where she was able… you know, like it’s that age where she’s noticing that there’s a difference, and…especially swimming, that she really struggled, she was great at swimming, like real water baby sort of thing, and then she can’t even get like halfway across the pool, where she used to be able to do four lengths.

So, it’s that embarrassment as well. Like, ‘people are looking at me, people… people are laughing at me,’ I don’t… and I don’t think they are, they… you know, I’m pres… and I’m hoping they’re not, but it’s that internal impact on her mental health wellbeing [inaudible] and so although she had the impact to her lungs and… and there’s this and there’s that, you… you can’t necess… you're not… and we’re not getting a treatment plan for any mental health issues or no one’s really looking into her wellbeing and how that’s been affected. So yeah, great, we’ve got a problem with the lungs, here some medication let’s see if it fixes it, but you know as the time goes on, the more and more I’m noticing the impact on her mental health and wellbeing, that’s becoming a bit more of a worry. So, I just think it’s important to kind of raise that as well because Long Covid may not necessarily cover those kind of things because it’s… it’s a… it’s slightly different, but they’re mental health difficulties that have come as a result of the impact of Long Covid, so I do think that… yeah, that those kind of things… I don’t know, you know when you look at Long Covid clinics and services and things like that, that should definitely be part of those kind of services for people.

I had to at that point say to Rosie, “Look, you know actually I haven’t quite, quite honest with you, you know, actually what, what we’ve done here is organise a, a performance for you to hopefully show that people love you and are rooting for you.” and so basically her, her, three of her friends from the dance school and then Lauren from Riverdance, basically performed a number of, of different steps for-, and that was great, and it really cheered her up and they played a couple of video messages.

I don’t know if this will mean anything to you, but I managed to get a video message from Michael Flatley who was the, was the original lead of Riverdance, and the woman who was his partner, Jean Butler, again, like real, proper, international superstars and Jean Butler, in particular, is someone who Rosie really has always looked up to because she’s a phenomenal, phenomenal, powerful dancer, really terrific and if… you know, well, Lauren described her as the First Lady of Irish dance, you know? So, so, that was great to get this kind of, and they, they did personal messages, you know, wishing her well and saying, you know-, and so that gave, that gave Rosie a real boost. And she was absolutely, I mean, we, we kept it, we were very tight with it, we kept to, like, 45 minutes, you know, that’s all it was.

She was absolutely busted afterwards, but happy, really happy; it was the first time we’d seen her smile, she just, she just cried and said, “Thank you Daddy,” you know, and I felt like I’d actually, actually managed to do something to help her for., you know, for a while. So, I think a combination of that and probably the antidepressants starting to kick in a bit made a bit of a difference in her mood, you know?