‘I’m only 26 and long Covid has left me with a blind spot’
TALENTED MAKE UP ARTIST SAYS HER LIFE HAS ‘CHANGED FOREVER’
A TALENTED make-up and body paint artist has bravely shared her agonising battle with Covid, revealing the virus has left her with permanent nerve damage in both eyes and a blind spot in one.
Eight months on, Samantha Helen, 26, told how she had to learn to walk again, and adjust to her ‘new eyesight,’ after she suffered swelling on the brain caused by Covid.
The ‘mini’ blind spot in her left eye, she says, is ‘like a black orb.’
Samantha’s cosmetic work has won huge acclaim.
She creates intricate designs and owns her own face and body art supplies company, as well as touring the country to teach and give demonstrations and classes.
But in a hugely emotive Facebook video post, she said her life has now ‘changed forever.’
Samantha, who lives with a friend in a flat in Manchester city centre, said she hoped sharing her experiences would help others and encourage people with long Covid to talk and support each other.
And she said she wanted to highlight just how neurological Covid can be.
“For me, I am most devastated because it’s my eyes that are the problem,” said Samantha, who described herself as previously fit and healthy having followed Covid regulations to the letter.
“I wish it was my lungs,” she went on in the now viral Facebook post.
“I wish it was anything other than my eyes, but it is.
“To be told at 26 you have nerve damage and you are probably going to get cataract and things, it’s a poopy pill to swallow.
“I want people to understand. This is very real. I’m only 26 and my life has now changed”.
Samantha was rushed to Manchester Royal Infirmary with Covid in September.
“My speech started to go a bit slurry and the right side of my body went really numb.”
She dialled 999 and paramedics believed it could be a stroke.
“It was so drummed into my head that Covid, not wasn’t real, but wasn’t this. I thought it was all to do with the lungs.”
Samantha was in hospital for almost two weeks. Doctors ruled out a stroke, but she said she began to develop a stutter and had an MRI.
“It came back with swelling on the brain,” she added.
“As you can imagine it was a shock. I was on my own. It was scary.”
Samantha was diagnosed with encephalitis - inflammation of the brain often caused by infection.
“It’s where a virus attacks your brain,” she said. “It’s like a concussion. They, the medics, hadn’t seen this case before. People are starting to see now that Covid is very neurological.
Samantha said the past eight months had been ‘hell.’
“I want people to understand - I’m 26 and this long Covid for me is so neurological,” she added.
“It has actually damaged my eyes. I have permanent nerve damage in both of my eyes from the swelling.
“I have a little blind spot in my left eye - it’s like a black orb.
“I can’t sit next to a window in bright light. I get permanent headaches. This is the first month I have been able to tie my hair up.
“I couldn’t even have a bobble in my hair because the pressure and migraines were so bad.”
Samantha said people with long Covid were ‘not making it up.’
“Even though we look perfectly fine, something isn’t right,” she said. “It’s really hard to explain to people how you feel.”
Samantha was back in hospital over Christmas - and told after her eventual discharge how her mum helped her to walk again.
“My independence has just been stripped. My mum is cutting my food up and tying my shoelaces.”
Samantha said she felt ‘no one understood,’ and that she recorded the video to encourage people to talk and support each other.
“I miss who I used to be,” she said. “There is a lot of stigma with young people and having Covid, as if we should feel embarrassed for getting it. I want to open up the conversation for young people.”