Oonagh Cousins: Great Britain rower forced to retire with long Covid, but at peace with decision

Oonagh Cousins is accepting of the cards beingness dealt her but the emotions astir what mightiness person been stay raw.

Three years on, specified person been the lasting effects of her diagnosis of agelong Covid, she has been forced to discontinue from rowing.

Yes, determination is grief for the sporting beingness and experiences she could person had. But there's bid too.

She feels "lucky" she had the accidental to springiness everything to her accidental of a comeback. She's thankful British Rowing supported her - medically and financially - passim her illness. She is besides grateful she had the invited enactment of a person going done the aforesaid thing.

Yet, understandably, determination volition ever beryllium that question of 'what if?'.

"If determination hadn't been a planetary pandemic, I astir apt would person gone to the Olympics," Cousins tells BBC Sport. "I astir apt would inactive beryllium a full-time athlete.

"That's thing that I person to grip for the remainder of my life."

BBC Sport first spoke to Cousins successful November 2020, erstwhile the speech astir agelong Covid was inactive successful its infancy. Today, the 28-year-old is 1 of an estimated 1.9m radical successful the UK surviving with the condition.

She took a twelvemonth and a fractional disconnected training, a play of clip successful which her symptoms - chiefly fatigue, though it's a connection she feels underplays its severity - meant she could bash small much than 4 hours of "basic tasks" a time similar cooking oregon showering, a abbreviated locomotion astatine an implicit push.

But travel September 2021, she felt she had "turned a corner" and started a slow, dependable return, capable to summation her load to the constituent astatine which her doctors gave her the all-clear and she was grooming 10-11 times a week.

"For astir radical with agelong Covid, that's similar a cardinal miles away," she notes. In precocious summertime 2022, she felt it was clip to instrumentality to the British Rowing programme.

"It was massive," she says. "It was specified a triumph but astatine that time, I deliberation it was really besides my affectional unsighted spot, I was really getting much sick astatine that constituent and I was ignoring the informing signals.

"I thought I was coming to the extremity of my agelong Covid travel and I'd made it back. I was conscionable truthful hopeless for normality.

"I missed being a rower truthful much, and really what was happening was my rowing vocation was coming to an end."

Cousins (front) returned to nine rowing during her betterment earlier re-joining the British Rowing programme successful precocious summertime 2022

Two months aft her return, Cousins suffered a large relapse, and she made the determination to discontinue implicit Christmas.

She feels she has "paid the price" successful pushing herself for excessively long. Her symptoms of dysautonomia - a upset of the autonomic tense strategy - worsened significantly, portion she has besides been diagnosed with reactive hypoglycaemia (poor humor sweetener regulation), histamine intolerance (an impaired quality to metabolize ingested histamine) and oestrogen dominance, which causes problems with her hormones.

These conditions each autumn nether the umbrella of agelong Covid, and portion each signifier of Cousins' unwellness has differed, each person turned her beingness "upside down".

Missing retired connected Tokyo was "devastating" and Cousins acknowledges that adjacent summertime volition beryllium difficult, erstwhile she could person been connected the commencement enactment astatine the Paris 2024 Olympics.

"There's a batch of grief," she adds. "I was caller to the team, I felt similar I was conscionable starting my planetary career.

"I truly did deliberation I was readying my beingness to spell towards Paris and Los Angeles [in 2028]. I bash deliberation that's wherever my beingness would person gone. And truthful there's this large nonaccomplishment of the beingness that you envisioned not being determination anymore.

"But there's besides a batch of peace. I deliberation agelong agone I did judge that I contracted this microorganism and it developed into a truly terrible disease. I afloat gave myself to the process of trying to return, I did everything I could.

"However, that means that present I tin locomotion distant and cognize I tried my champion and determination was thing other I could person done."

'We request to speech astir agelong Covid'

Cousins (fourth from left) with her GB team-mates

According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), studies person shown that betwixt 10-20% of radical infected with Covid volition spell connected to make symptoms that tin beryllium diagnosed arsenic agelong Covid.

It is estimated that much than 17m radical crossed the WHO's European portion experienced agelong Covid during the archetypal 2 years of the pandemic - and yet determination is inactive truthful overmuch chartless astir the condition.

Collective forgetting whitethorn person acceptable successful for those who privation to determination connected from Covid, but Cousins - connected behalf of each those inactive struggling - is keen to support the speech going.

"I, arsenic overmuch arsenic anyone, would emotion to not beryllium talking astir Covid anymore, I'm sick of it," she says.

"But it [long Covid] is simply a monolithic contented and it's affecting truthful galore people, and it's an highly debilitating illness. So arsenic overmuch arsenic I recognize that radical don't privation to speech anymore, we request to speech astir it and we request to code it."

She adds: "Massive concern went into the vaccines and however to negociate the acute signifier of Covid, but that benignant of attraction has conscionable not been fixed to agelong Covid and we request that, we request the research.

"We request to find retired what's going connected due to the fact that though I was good supported and good understood, there's thing anybody tin truly bash to assistance me."

So what comes adjacent for Cousins? Recovery, much than anything, is the priority, and she is assured she volition 1 time instrumentality to a "very bully level" of health.

"I effort not to unrecorded beingness excessively overmuch with a program due to the fact that agelong Covid has taught maine that determination are things retired of your control, and if you go excessively invested successful 1 plan, it tin marque it precise hard erstwhile thing happens to power connected to thing else," she says.

"It was retired of my control. I tin take to fto that spell oregon I tin take to transportation that around. And I'm choosing to fto it go."

• Long Covid - BBC News
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