Alex Stewart: Scotland back-row opens up on diabetes diagnosis

Alex Stewart did not feel like the same player, nor the same person, who had burst onto the Test scene in such impressive fashion during the 2024 Women’s Six Nations.

The tough tackling back-row, whose game is built on physicality and work rate, could not understand why her normally reliable engine suddenly seemed to be running on empty.

That was until she received a medical diagnosis which, in her own words, “hit me like a brick”.

During this year’s Six Nations, the 21-year-old was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes and coeliac disease.

“It took a couple of months of real tiredness and feeling really lethargic going to training, not feeling myself, kind of low moods and things like that, which kind of edged me to speak to the doctors a bit more,” Stewart told the BBC’s Scotland Rugby Podcast.

“I was losing a lot of weight as well, which is obviously due to the diabetes.

“One blood test can tell you a whole lot and a whole lot that I didn’t really expect to come back from it. I thought I was maybe a bit deficient in iron or something like that, but no, it was a massive shock.”