Oonagh Cousins (Natural Sciences (Biological) 2014) has opted to prioritise her long-term physical and mental health by retiring from rowing after struggling with Long Covid.
The effects lingered and she has spoken about the challenges of debilitating illness and surrounding perceptions.
After an 18-month absence, Oonagh returned to rowing in September 2021 and to the British programme a year later. However, repeated illness has prompted retirement.
“The decision was easy in the end,” Oonagh says.
“At every stage I put my health first and I only went back when I thought I was fully better. From September (2022) to Christmas clearly my body was telling me it couldn’t do it.
“I was starting to feel very unwell again and I was also picking up all the colds and flus going round and I thought ‘that’s enough’.
“It’s different to how the illness felt at the beginning. It’s now more the long-term effects of having Long Covid.
“My feeling is I’ve just depleted myself. Having Long Covid and trying to train to Olympic level… I don’t think it’s possible to do those two things in succession.”
Oonagh has raised awareness of Long Covid and similar conditions.
“As an athlete, I was given credibility that other people with chronic fatigue-type illnesses are not,” she adds.
“So I felt that it was important to use my position to try and raise understanding of these types of illnesses.
“We don’t have the right language for explaining what this feels like. People asked how do you tell the difference between tiredness from training and Long Covid? That question demonstrated to me how poorly understood this symptom is.
“Fatigue as a word is closely related to tiredness. But what I experienced was an intense sickness. A chronic malaise.
“People don’t get how long it goes on for. It’s hard to comprehend you can have an illness for a year and a half, and more in some cases.
“It makes having the illness harder than it needs to be. If there was a greater awareness of it, more people would recover and have a higher quality of life.”
The illness not only affects physical health, but mental health. Oonagh saw an explanation about spoon theory in the Washington Post, which helped her to explain and manage chronic illness. Each spoon represents a finite unit of energy; people with chronic illnesses have to ration them just to get through the day.
Oonagh adds: “It stops you seeing hope for the future, which is quite dark. What I came to understand is your body knows it’s not capable of daily life, so it stops you wanting to do daily life. That’s the same as depression.
“Having an illness which takes away your brain’s ability to work is a crazy experience. You’re trapped inside your own body that’s not working and you can’t interact with the world the way you’d like to.
“Recognising that is powerful. I knew it wasn’t me and I could get better. It’s really important to talk about it. It’s a conversation which requires detail and subtlety and it’s difficult to have.
“As I rested over the 18 month period and my physical health improved, my personality came back. My parents commented on that a few times.”
Oonagh’s friend from Caius, Ella Barnard (Philosophy 2013), contracted Covid-19 at the same time and endured months of ill-health. They were able to support each other throughout the shared experience, outlined on the British Rowing website.
“We were indispensable to each other and my journey would’ve been so different had I not had her to go through it with me,” Oonagh says.
“Talking to someone is huge.”
Oonagh recognises she was fortunate – retaining her athlete’s wage, having medical support and being given the space to rest. It was another reason she wanted to use her profile to discuss the basic challenges of chronic illness.
While understandably very disappointed about missing the Olympics, she also had a sense of perspective.
“People are getting this all over the world and being pushed aside and not believed,” adds Oonagh, who is studying for an MA in Development Studies at SOAS in London.
“Previously I did identify with being a Cambridge student or GB rower. What Long Covid did was it forced me to no longer identify with what I did or achieved, because you can’t do anything. I had to find a way to find a sense of self from within.”
