Kate Garraway has said that she was informed by a doctor that if her husband Derek Draper has not improved two years on from getting Covid “there is very little chance of him making any meaningful recovery”.
The I’m A Celebrity and GMB star’s life turned upside down last year when her 53-year-old partner was left in a coma fighting for his life after the pandemic hit.
Kate, 54, said that Derek’s neurologist, who she refers to as Dr W, told her that “time and waiting are your friends” because he “had never seen anything like this before so can’t personally chart the recovery”.
But when she pressed the expert on how much time he was talking about, she was shocked by his answer.
(Image: ITV)
In her new book, The Power Of Hope, she said: “I had already waited so long. ‘How long before you know more? Not how long will it take for him to recover, because you don’t know if he can even recover, but how long before you might know more?’
“It was a confusing question, but I knew what I meant and he seemed to as well.”
(Image: ITV)
She went on: “After another long pause, he looked straight at me, then away. ‘Well, Kate’ – the first time he had used my name – ‘I think it’s fair to say if he is still like this after two years we will know there is very little chance of him making any meaningful recovery.’
“TWO YEARS!” I screamed inside my head.
“Up until now I had been living by the minute, hours on the phone monitoring infection levels and statistics, trying to get a handle on where Derek was, wondering every time I went to sleep if he would still be alive in the morning.
“How could I go on like this for another two years? Worse still, how could Derek be trapped like this for two years? The timescale winded me and I’m sure I must have slumped a bit in the chair.”
(Image: ITV)
Kate added that another doctor who was present, an intensive-care specialist, laid out the challenge ahead that she faced.
He said Derek had moved from the acute phase to the chronic phase and told her that “the long, slow recovery is sometimes just as hard to bear”.
He said: “Derek is still very sick, at serious risk of dying. But even if he can live, and begin to recover from the huge damage Covid has wreaked throughout his body, it’s not going to be quick.
“Progress is now going to be measured not in minutes, hours or days but in weeks, months and years.
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“And you are going to have to bear that journey never knowing if he might ever be the person he was before, knowing he might never truly come back to you. You just have to give us time and be strong.”
Kate added: “I sensed they were trying to wrap things up. But I couldn’t take in what they were saying. I wanted space to take it in. I didn’t want to wrap up on this level of bleakness.”
Source: Celebrities - dailystar.co.uk
