Tom Daley feared his "time was up" after being hospitalised with COVID-19 in January.
Dustin Lance Black and Tom Daley
The 27-year-old Olympic diver - who won his first Gold for Team GB at the synchronised diving event at the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games this summer - has revealed he secretly battled the respiratory disease earlier this year and spent 10 hours in the hospital.
Tom was petrified of his husband, Dustin Lance Black, 47, catching coronavirus from him, as he has suffered with his lungs in the past, while they worried about what would happen to their three-year-old son Robbie if they both got poorly.
In an extract from his new tome, 'Coming Up for Air: What I learned from Sport', obtained by The Times newspaper, he recalled: “My lungs felt pressurised, as if they had sacks of rice around them. I needed to get to that test centre and find out.
“I walked there very, very slowly, diligently avoiding everyone I could.
“When I returned home, I felt like I'd been run over by a steamroller. Within eight hours, I received the message that I was positive.
“Lance then started feeling sick. He was terrified of Covid, due to suffering with his lungs in the past.
“We were really worried about what would happen if we were both ill and couldn't look after Robbie. I started to feel better for a few days, but then my cough got worse again.
“My head felt like I had a vice tightening around it and my oxygen levels were dropping.”
Fortunately, Tom made a full recovery but admitted his life flashed before his eyes.
He added: “I understood how quickly things could potentially go downhill.
“I had flashes of fear about whether I would be put on a ventilator, and my time being up. I was really terrified.
“They did blood tests and a chest X-ray. There were loads of blotches on my lungs.
“I was in hospital for about 10 hours to monitor my stats, and they gave me some oxygen to boost the levels. Once they stabilised, they sent me home.
"Three days after my trip to hospital, I started to make progress. As each day went by, I felt much better.
“The overwhelming feeling was a sense of relief that it was finally over.”
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