After brushing shoulders with death in 2022, River City star Iain Robertson has said that his doctors are now "sick fed up" of seeing him.
The telly favourite, who plays Stevie O'Hara in the Scottish soap, had fans concerned when he posted a picture of himself at Glasgow’s Queen Elizabeth Hospital, reports the Daily Record. Alongside the photo, Iain told his followers to "go see yer doctor".
Iain has now revealed that he had been trying to ignore two infected cysts on his backside for years, and blamed dizziness caused by the infection on his new varifocals.
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The actor, who is returning for a third series of Iain Robertson Rambles, said: "It was a threat to my life in the end.
“My poor doctor had never even met me. My old doctor had gone and I had never gone to the new one, so after the experience with hospital now they are sick fed up seeing me.
"I’m always there... ‘I’ve got this little thing in my eye. I’ve a bit of arthritis can you give me something for that?’
“I’m getting my money’s worth out the doctor now.”
The star shared that he'd been trying to deal with the cysts himself for years, as the pain came and went. But the month before he went to hospital, the infection had worsened.
He said: “When I eventually went to my doctors, they couldn’t believe I could still walk and told me I had to go to hospital straight away.
“When I got to the hospital, they told me my infection levels were through the roof and wasn’t I dizzy?
“I told them I’d just got new varifocals and I thought it was my glasses that had made me dizzy.”
The actor, who got his break as a 13-year-old playing Lex in 1996 Glasgow gang film Small Faces, admitted that he was reluctant to go to the doctors because of his mum.
The family of five siblings lived in a two room flat in Govan. Iain explained: “I’m from a generation where we weren’t allowed to go to the doctor or have a day off school unless you were dying.
“My mum would have to take a day off work and she had five weans to feed.
“She encouraged you to just keep going. I’ve always had that, ‘It’ll be OK. Just put a bit of Sudocrem on and you’ll be fine’.
“I really should have gone to the doctor a long time before I did. Part of the reason was embarrassment. They were on my bahooki.”
Speaking to the Daily Record via Zoom, Iain is now settled and feeling better. People will be pleased to hear this, as many fans can’t wait for the return of his walking show.
Last year, the second series saw him tackle two Scottish walks, Southern Upland Way and the Speyside Way. In the new season, which begins this week, will see him walk The Hebridean Way.
The four-episode series sees Iain and his then one-year-old collie Molly walk 201 miles across 10 islands, six causeways and use two ferries.
The pals who join him for parts of the route include his old Small Faces cast mate Kevin McKidd and Alex Norton from Two Doors Down. Alex doesn't participate in the walk, but instead takes an electric bike with Iain to visit the Calanais Standing Stones.
The show was filmed in April and May of 2022 and finished a day before his 41st birthday.
Three seasons deep into the show, Iain has realised that he's using it to make sense of his own Scottishness and heritage.
Growing up as a Catholic boy in Govan in the 80's, sectarianism also blighted his family life, living near Ranger's Ibrox Stadium.
He said: “While I grew up a city boy in Govan, I have a mix. My father’s parents are from the inner Hebrides – Skye and Eigg – and my father grew up in the Highlands but my mother’s people are Irish Catholics.
“Although I was raised a Catholic, my father’s people didn’t really have anything to do with me because of the old sectarian nonsense.”
Iain has realised that trekking across Scotland - which is a hobby away from his daily job - has helped him make sense of his own heritage and “brought myself back together”.
He added: “And if I have children, I can pass something down that isn’t the sectarian divide.”
Iain Robertson Rambles starts on Thursday, BBC Scotland at 8.30pm.
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