A former senior aide to Boris Johnson has said her role was often like "being his nanny" - and claimed she was sacked by the Prime Minister after be likened to an "ugly old lamp".
Cleo Watson, who was recruited as head of Priorities and Campaigns by Dominic Cummings, has lifted the lid on the chaos in Downing Street in the early days of the Covid crisis.
Ms Watson, who is currently writing a novel about "sex and skulduggery" in Westminster, compared Mr Johnson to "a great unruly golden retriever" in an article claiming "karma" had been returned to him recently.
She claimed a "puppy-gate" had to be installed to stop him mixing with staff when he was supposed to be isolating - and said the PM took naps during the day as he recovered from coronavirus, which has previously been denied.
She also alleged that she frequently had to scold Mr Johnson for making gags about "Kung Flu" and saying "Aye! Corona" in the days before his own brush with death.
The former Downing Street insider said she was relieved of her duties in November 2020 in a brutal exchange in the Cabinet Room which "may have been familiar to many of his girlfriends".
She said Downing Street careers end "sooner or later" - but said Mr Johnson has "had karma returned with interest recently".
Mr Cummings - who the PM had gone out of his way to defend after he made a trip to Durham while lockdown rules were in place - quit in November 2020 as relations with his boss soured.
In an article in Tattler, Ms Watson said the Prime Minister told her she had to leave two weeks later because she reminded him too much of him.
She claimed Mr Johnson told her: "I can't look at you any more because it reminds me of Dom.
"It’s like a marriage has ended, we’ve divided up our things and I’ve kept an ugly old lamp.
"But every time I look at that lamp, it reminds me of the person I was with. You’re that lamp."
In a sly dig at her former employer, she said he "presumably knows better than most how it feels when a marriage breaks up".
She said the PM gave a "painful, off-the-cuff speech to a bewildered clutch of advisers" before she left - but denied a leaving do was thrown for her.
Ms Watson is set to be played by actress Greta Bellamacina in forthcoming Sky drama This England, which will see Kenneth Branagh portray Mr Johnson.
Set during the pandemic, the former aide said she hopes it reflects the "horrific out-of-body experience" as the crisis unfolded, and the bravery of Mr Johnson's now-wife Carrie during his serious illness with coronavirus.
She said she had been astonished by photos of Branagh on-set, saying the posture, hair, "beaky nose" and "basset-hound-like cheeks" are "uncanny".
In spite of the bleakness surrounding Downing Street at the start of the Covid crisis, Ms Watson said there were lighter moments.
She claimed that the PM was "subject to a fair amount of house-training", and said that barriers had to be put up while he was supposed to be isolating.
She described this as a "prime ministerial puppy gate", and said while he was covering he would regularly have "temper tantrums", asking those around him: "Why does everything happen to meeeeeee?"
In one midsummer meeting at Chequers, he was exasperated that pet dog Dilyn had pooed on the floor, Ms Watson wrote - prompting her to tell the PM: "Well you'd better pick it up then."
Ms Watson also claimed that television sets in Downing Street would often reset to a default channel showing programmes about animals if they were left too long.
As a result it was common to see the Prime Minister "straining his eyes to make out a basketful of kittens playing with a ball of twine", she wrote.
Ms Watson had worked alongside Mr Cummings on the Vote Leave campaign, and left shortly after him in November 2020.
No 10 said it would not be commenting on the claims made in the article.
