Ex-BBC journalist Rory Cellan-Jones has shared a health update in a new interview about his year-long adventure with Sophie, his rescue dog from Romania.
The BBC’s former technology correspondent said his Parkinson’s has ‘gotten quite a bit worse in the last year’ while adding that Sophie has been a ‘great support’ for him.
Promoting his new book, Rory, 66, from west London, told BBC Breakfast viewers on Wednesday that Sophie From Romania is ‘also very much the story of my Parkinson’s’.
The broadcaster, who first revealed his diagnosis in 2019, explained: ‘She was going to be part of my exercise regime, exercise is really important for Parkinson’s.
‘I used to go out with our old dog, Cabbage, seven o’ clock, rain or shine every day and I was counting on doing the same with Sophie, and it didn’t happen for a year.
The BBC ‘s former technology correspondent said his Parkinson’s has ‘gotten quite a bit worse in the last year’ while adding that Sophie has been a ‘great support’ for him
Sophie was living on a barn in Romania for a year before Cellan-Jones and his wife, Diane Coyle, decided to adopt her
Since joining him in the UK, Sophie has become something of an internet celebrity
During his appearance on BBC Breakfast on Wednesday, October 9, Cellan-Jones said Sophie is ‘something wonderful to focus on’ as he navigates his journey with Parkinson’s
‘But she has been a great thing to focus on. we’ve both got problems, we know about her problems.
‘I’ve got a progressive condition which has gotten quite a bit worse in the last year, and she is something wonderful to focus on. She’s a great support, she doesn’t know it, but she is,’ he added.
Sophie was living on a barn in Romania for a year before Cellan-Jones and his wife, Diane Coyle, decided to adopt her.
When she arrived at their west London home just before Christmas 2022, frightened and tired from her 72-hour journey, Sophie hid behind their sofa. It would be a year before Cellan-Jones and Sophie would have their first walk together.
During an appearance at The Times and The Sunday Times Cheltenham Literature Festival earlier this week, Cellan-Jones said he was ‘ashamed’ to admit he gave Sophie Prozac to help manage her depression and anxiety.
He told host and BBC presenter Paddy O’Connell: ‘I suppose we were [ashamed] in the kind of old-fashioned [way]. Just like people didn’t like to talk about depression in humans, we didn’t really like to talk about depression in dogs.’
When his dog behaviourist, Si Wooler, recommended Prozac, Cellan-Jones said he was ‘shocked’.
In the end, the decision to start Sophie on the anti-depressant ‘kind of worked’, the veteran journalist told BBC Breakfast hosts, Sally Nugent and Jon Kay, on Wednesday.
‘We had a big breakthrough last summer, when she was coaxed out from behind the sofa and began sleeping in a bed.
‘She went on Prozac,’ Cellan-Jones continued, adding, ‘That was the story which seemed extraordinary at the time, [it] seemed a really weird thing to do, [but it kind of worked. It built her confidence up to that level.’
During an appearance at The Times and The Sunday Times Cheltenham Literature Festival earlier this week, Cellan-Jones said he was ‘ashamed’ to admit he gave Sophie Prozac to help manage her depression and anxiety
!['That was the story which seemed extraordinary at the time, [it] seemed a really weird thing to do, [but it kind of worked. It built her confidence up to that level,' he added, explaining how the medicine helped Sophie's depression and anxiety](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2024/10/09/11/90637015-13940751-image-a-6_1728468001341.jpg)
‘That was the story which seemed extraordinary at the time, [it] seemed a really weird thing to do, [but it kind of worked. It built her confidence up to that level,’ he added, explaining how the medicine helped Sophie’s depression and anxiety
Sohie began walking by the end of February, over a year after she came to the UK, but her progress hasn’t been linear, Cellan-Jones added
Cellan-Jones expressed his hope that both he and Sophie will together be able to ‘live our lives to the utmost’
Sohie began walking by the end of February, over a year after she came to the UK, but her progress hasn’t been linear, Cellan-Jones said.
‘Sometimes she’s a bit confident about walking, sometimes she gets to the end of our street and goes “No, I’m going no further” and puts her paws down.’
Cellan-Jones adopted Sophie after the death of his beloved collie-cross Cabbage in 2022.
In an interview with BBC Breakfast at the time, Cellan-Jones, who worked at the broadcaster for 40 years, described how the ‘terrified’ Romanian rescue dog struggled to settle into her new life.
‘She was much more frightened than we’d imagined,’ he said. ‘There is a bit of a cautionary tale here about being aware of what adopting a dog from Romania or other foreign countries means.
‘We didn’t go into it blind, we’d seen the dog on video and she seemed to be okay.’
However, Cellan-Jones theorised, Sophie’s long journey from the Eastern European country had likely been a ‘pretty scary experience for her’.
He added that his family was using a combination of patience, pet psychology and scraps of leftover Christmas turkey to help Sophie acclimatise to his family home.
Since joining him in the UK, Sophie has become something of an internet celebrity.
Cellan-Jones’ social media posts about Sophie have racked up hundreds of thousands of likes; a video of his beloved rescue taking a bit of sausage from Cellan-Jones’ hand was watched by over a million people.
In an interview with MailOnline, Cellan-Jones said his experiences living with Parkinson’s, a neurogenerative disorder that causes tremors and movement problems, have helped him understand Sophie a bit better.
Explaining his illness sometimes triggers bouts of depression, he said: ‘It occurs to me that Sophie is broken because of her excessive fearfulness — and in my own way, so am I because of my Parkinson’s.
‘But that doesn’t mean there isn’t hope and possibility for us to live our lives to the utmost.