Naked Attraction host Anna Richardson has opened up about a terrifying episode where she thought she was suffering a stroke at King’s Cross Station.
The Channel 4 star is shedding light on the issue of dementia, sharing her personal connection due to her father Jim’s struggle with vascular dementia.
Jim Richardson, 83 and a former canon pastor at Sherborne Abbey in Dorset, has been living with the illness for over ten years, leaving Anna to describe producing a documentary about her family’s trials as “the hardest thing I’ve ever done”.
In a candid chat with The Times, Anna revealed that after the scare at the station, she took herself to get checked out by a doctor, fearing it might be early signs of dementia.
Anna shared: “I’ve suddenly started to panic about forgetting words. I’m also getting migraines, which I think are menopause related. A couple of months ago, I was in King’s Cross station and my head was so bad that I felt unsteady on my feet. I couldn’t speak or focus, and I thought I was having a stroke. I was so freaked out that I went to a neurologist for brain scans. You think, have I got dementia? “
At 54-years-old, Richardson has voiced her frustrations about the insufficient “help, support and understanding” offered around dementia, highlighting it as “the biggest health and social care crisis we’re facing”.
In a conversation with The Times, Anna expressed that the issue lies in our perception of dementia as an inevitable part of ageing, rather than a condition we can protect ourselves from starting in midlife.
She stated: “The bottom line is that we think it’s an old people’s disease, and we don’t give a shit about old people in this country. It is an absolute crisis and it’s getting bigger. It can affect everybody.”
“I’m always thinking I should be doing more, and Dad wants me to do more. So it’s guilt mixed with frustration mixed with anxiety, and that is constant.”
Anna has also recently been candid about her career transitions and personal challenges she has encountered, including health issues and coming to terms with her sexuality. She has opened up about her fertility struggles, sharing her experiences of a miscarriage and an ectopic pregnancy, and being told in her 30s that she was infertile.
In a discussion with Closer magazine, she revealed: “It was a real shock. I came to terms with it, but then you go through the menopause and your periods stop, there’s this kind of realisation that you can’t have kids anyway.”