Robert Webb thinks his imagination warned him about his "dodgy ticker".
The 47-year-old comic was stunned last October when a routine medical showed he had a prolapsed mitral valve, putting him at risk of a heart attack and in need of immediate surgery, and he joked his new novel ‘Come Again’ – which follows a forty-something man who dies from an undiagnosed condition – predicted his health issues.
He told The Observer magazine: "I’d already finished editing ‘Come Again’, a novel I couldn’t help notice featured a forty-something male who has just died from an illness that had been lurking unseen for years.
"His widow, Kate, finds herself back in 1992 and meets him when he’s still an annoying young man. She thinks she’s there to warn him.
"I like the idea my imagination had been trying to tell me something about my dodgy ticker. Thanks, imagination. Try something less subtle next time, would you?"
The former ‘Peep Show’ actor was relieved to learn his problem was genetic, and not a result of having treated his body "like a skip" over the years.
He said: "Mitral valve failure arises from a birth defect, and I was glad this was not ‘my fault’.
"And if it had been, I would surely have been advised not to think in terms of blame, and after a show of reluctance I would have agreed.
"But it’s true to say that I had sauntered into middle age while still treating my body like a skip, and of all the people who might find a brush with mortality useful, I was higher up the list than you might think."
Robert – who has two daughters, Esme, 10, and Dory, eight, with wife Abigail Burdess – admitted the news of his heart condition gave him the "watershed" he needed to overhaul his lifestyle.
He continued: "Hijacked by addiction at some point in the late 00s, my addled brain was on permanent lookout for the right ‘watershed’: no more cigarettes after this birthday, no more wine after this breakfast etc. Well, I’d got my watershed all right. You can’t operate on a beating heart – they were literally about to turn me off and on again. Watershed that, ducky."
Like the character in his novel, Robert feels he’s received a "second chance" at life, particularly as he was able to have his operation before the coronavirus pandemic disrupted routine surgery.
He said: "Mainly I’m overtaken by gratitude. I was insanely lucky to get this over with before the virus struck, and my mended heart goes out to all those left waiting for treatment. I’m grateful for the Back medical and to all the doctors and nurses, the ones we applaud on our doorstep every week and perhaps always should have.
"I wrote a book about someone getting a second chance and I thought at the time it was a work of fiction. I feel re-blessed by my children. I thank what higher will brought me to a wife like Abbie."
Robert Webb ‘predicted’ heart scare
