Approaching his late 50s, Dean Valentine was a healthy grandfather who looked forward to life ahead with his growing family.
Happily married with four children and two grandchildren, Mr Valentine – who is married to child star Alison Bettles from Grange Hill – enjoyed golfing and going on holiday with friends.
That was until December 2021, when he had the Pfizer Covid vaccine and soon found himself suffering ‘devastating’ and ‘bizarre’ symptoms – such as intense dizziness, full body tremors and a permanent headache.
Now 59, the father claims he has spent around £100,000 trying everything to find a cure – from private healthcare to health retreats and juicing for a week straight.
Mr Valentine told MailOnline: ‘If I was 100 per cent of a man, I’m now 10 per cent of a man. I’m heartbroken.
‘It has destroyed me. I am devastated that I’m in this situation.’
The father added: ‘This is my one and only life. I’ve got the most beautiful family, I’d be the envy of so many people due to [them], and I can’t enjoy them. It’s absolutely heartbreaking.’
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Mr Valentine, from Essex, said his symptoms started within a couple of days of taking the vaccine, when he experienced a ‘bizarre’ taste in his mouth.
He then continued to receive other strange symptoms, he said, such as the feeling of a pair of glasses being on his head.
‘I remember saying to Alison, ‘I’ve got the craziest sensation, my glasses are on my head!’ I reach up to take the glasses off my head, and they’re not there,’ he said.
The father claimed the ‘bombshell’ happened in April 2022, while he was on holiday with friends and began to feel extremely unwell.
‘I got up to go to the loo and Alison could sense I was standing up. I said to Alison ‘I don’t feel right – something’s wrong’,’ he said.
‘I turned over in the night in bed, it was dark, and I thought I’d sunk into the pillow – my head sunk into the pillow. I thought blimey, that felt bizarre. It was really concerning.
‘I turned over the other way and it happened again.’
He added: ‘We got on with our day, went to the beach, went for some lunch with friends, I came back from the restaurant and I sat on the beach. The sun in the sky was spinning around, like a vertigo sensation. It was petrifying.’
Mr Valentine said he is ‘certain’ his symptoms have been caused by the vaccine after seeing professors and specialists who have all said the same thing.
He now endures intense dizziness, a ’24/7′ headache, full body vibrations, kidney and back pain, abdominal cramps, and a ‘physical anxiousness’ within him.
‘I have a bizarre anxious feeling through my body – we call it a physical anxiousness. It is brutal,’ he said.
‘I’ve had all the tests done and they can’t find anything, which is quite the norm with people who are suffering.
‘I’m just not the person I was. I force myself to get on with it.
‘I’m a shadow of the man I was. It’s brutal.’
Mr Valentine said he is not interested in compensation but would like to see a medical pathway created for people affected by the Covid vaccines.
‘I don’t want any money. I would publicly say keep your money. What I do want to fight for is to have a medical pathway for people who are suffering. I am that bad, I do not know how this ends,’ he said.
‘I’m not against anyone having the vaccine, but what I am against is that the people who have had the vaccine in good faith, can’t just be left on the scrap heap.’
Mr Valentine said he has raised more than £25,000 through charity events over the last two years to help people struggling with symptoms like his.
He is happily married to Alison Bettles – now Alison Valentine – who played Fay Lucas in BBC’s Grange Hill for six series.
The pair met in a local pub when Alison was 21, the father said, and they had four children together who are now fully grown.
‘It’s tough on them as well. It’s so tough on them,’ Mr Valentine said on how the illness impacts his family.
While Covid vaccines have unquestionably prevented millions of deaths, studies in recent years have linked them to chronic conditions affecting an undetermined number of people worldwide.
Earlier this year, it was reported that experts at Yale University discovered an alarming syndrome linked to the mRNA Covid vaccines.
The previously unknown condition – dubbed ‘post-vaccination syndrome’ – appears to cause brain fog, dizziness, tinnitus and exercise intolerance.
The findings, from a well-respected institution, suggest more research on post-vaccination syndrome is needed, independent experts said.
The next phase of the research will be to ascertain how widespread the condition is and who is most at risk.
Thousands of people have said that Covid vaccines injured them since the shots were rolled out in 2021.
A spokesperson for Pfizer UK said it is prohibited from giving healthcare advice to individual patients.
They said in a statement: ‘Patient safety is paramount and we take any reports of adverse events very seriously. Adverse event reports do not imply causality, and in the context of vaccination such events may be unrelated to administration of the vaccine.
‘Hundreds of millions of doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine have been administered globally and the benefit-risk profile of the vaccine remains positive for all authorised indications and age groups.
‘As with every medicine and vaccine, including the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine, Pfizer has robust processes to meet its regulatory responsibilities to closely monitor, report and analyse all adverse events, and collect relevant information to assess any new potential safety risks that may be associated with the COVID-19 vaccine.
‘In addition to our pharmacovigilance efforts and compliance with regulatory requirements related to quality and safety, we also work with regulatory authorities around the world as they independently monitor the safety profile of our vaccine.
‘Patients who receive the COVID-19 vaccine should talk to their doctor, pharmacist or nurse if they have any concerns or experience any side effects. This includes any possible side effects not listed in the package leaflet. Side effects can be reported directly via the Yellow Card Scheme at https://yellowcard.mhra.gov.uk.’
