Davie Provan - ex-footballer with ME

Gecko

Gecko

Senior Member (Voting Rights)
There's a lot about football, which doesn't interest me, but he got ME in 1985. The article describes ME as "the disease that attacks the body’s immune and energy systems and leaves the patient drained."

He kept pushing himself, as most of us do, before finally getting diagnosed. Says he's a lot worse in winter.
 
Gecko said:
'All these years on, I still have a relapse if I do too much. I can’t go on a treadmill or go for a jog'


https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/...t-go-on-a-treadmill-or-go-for-a-jog-5gjb2h39n

Don't have access to full article, but title looks okay. Any thoughts from those who do subscribe?
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The fact of Davie Provan's illness was a big deal to those of us who had ME in the 1980s. He was a reference point. 'I've got ME.' 'What's that?' 'Have you heard of Davie Provan...'

I wondered what had happened to him.

From the article:

He contracted myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME), the disease that attacks the body’s immune and energy systems and leaves the patient drained. He lives with the condition today. “I was flying at the time,” he says. “We had just won the 1985 Scottish Cup [in which Provan scored with a spectacular free kick] but then it all hit me in November 1985 at Ibrox, on Mark McGhee’s Celtic debut.

“I had not felt good that morning when I got up, and I felt even worse on the coach going to Ibrox. Then the game started and I was trying to make runs and thinking, ‘Jesus, what is wrong with me?’ I felt like I had diving boots on. I couldn’t see properly, I had blurred vision. We were 2-0 down at half-time and I said to the manager, Davie Hay, ‘Gaffer, I’m sorry, but I’m feeling sick’.

“It took a long time to be diagnosed, and we know much more about the illness now. What I should have done back then was stop all my training and rest, but instead I kept training and training. I was damaging myself. The Celtic doctor had never heard of the illness and knew nothing about it.

“Nowadays you’d take blood samples from a player and conduct other scientific tests. But there was none of that back then. I tried to come back in the January or February of 1986 in a game against Motherwell, but it was no use. I knew I was seriously ill. I was finished.

Even today, all these years on, I still have a relapse if I do too much. I couldn’t go on a treadmill or go out for a jog. I can’t do any cardiovascular or heavy lifting. If you have ME you have to manage it. For me, it is a lot worse in the winter.”
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It's mainly about football.
 
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JohnTheJack said:
The fact of Davie Provan's illness was a big deal to those of us who had ME in the 1980s. He was a reference point. 'I've got ME.' 'What's that?' 'Have you heard of Davie Provan...'

I wondered what had happened to him.

From the article:




It's mainly about football.
Click to expand...

[ETA Thanks for the longer quote.]

He says these days there are blood tests?

[ETA: This keeps coming up and, as someone who gets good patches and therefore a crushing amount of doubt (usually on my way into a crash), I would like to know where this is a real thing and where it’s just incidental, to eliminate diff diagnoses.]
 
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Subtropical Island said:
[ETA Thanks for the longer quote.]

He says these days there are blood tests?

[ETA: This keeps coming up and, as someone who gets good patches and therefore a crushing amount of doubt (usually on my way into a crash), I would like to know where this is a real thing and where it’s just incidental, to eliminate diff diagnoses.]
Click to expand...

You're welcome.

Yes, but he's not saying there are blood tests for ME. If a football player at a top club complains of feeling unwell, then there would be a battery of tests done to pick up any signs of problems. No one would be expected simply to train through something or run it off.
If for example his illness started with a virus (as would seem likely and happened for many of us) then it would probably have been picked up and he would have been told to rest until the all signs of it had passed.
 
He won a holiday for Man of the Match in that cup final. I believe on the holiday he felt that he wasn't firing on all cylinders. A wee while before November.

Davie Provan is an example why the 'all in the head' theorists are so wrong. Strip it all back. They should be compelled to address why a person like him would pack it all in.

At that time he was flying. A top player in a top team in 1985. One of the best wingers in Britain.

Football is a different world in 2019, skill levels, hype. To put it in perspective, in the context of football today it would be like Raheem Stirling packing up overnight.
 
Some good things have come out of Covid. Bluer skies, clearer waters, families round the dinner table, a deeper appreciation of the NHS and also schoolteachers. Doubtless you’ll be able to think of 
others and today Davie Provan nominates one that’s close to his heart.

“There’s a whole lot more awareness of post-viral fatigue now so maybe that’s been a by-product of the pandemic,” says the Celtic wing legend. More awareness and more money. “I believe the Government has already promised £8 million for research. This is not a fatal illness and therefore it has suffered in the past through under-funding. But we’re now seeing so many people, after they initially recover from coronavirus, being hit by post-viral fatigue and understanding and help is badly needed.”

Provan, you will remember, was struck down in his prime by ME. One minute he was flying down the right flank, socks round his ankles in trademark style, the next he was sleeping for 16 hours at a time – knackered, spent, gone. With all respect to Stuart Murdoch, leader of indie rockers Belle and Sebastian, and the novelist Ali Smith, he remains Scotland’s best-known victim of the condition, playing his part in raising awareness. “I’ve seen so many horrible cases of young people left housebound, even bedbound – lives ruined,” he says.
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https://www.scotsman.com/sport/foot...ling-cope-when-me-ended-his-career-29-2956359
 
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