I have been experiencing David’s life today. I’ve been working at home alone and only spoken to four people. Two of the conversations were two-minute chats with people I work with, one was with an insurance salesman (a very brief altercation!!!) and the fourth, a long conversation, was with a man who changed my life.

He’s an ex-client who I’ve known for twelve years or more. I used to visit his company regularly and we always got on ‘like a house on fire’. You know the sort of experience when you know that someone likes you and wants your opinion on how to make things better for his brands. Well, that was him. I loved feeling so valued and always made sure I worked extra hard to be really helpful.

Today’s phone call was to sound out my advice and thoughts on a new business venture for him and I was glad to help him out. I am certain that this man saved my emotional well-being and I can say, without fear of contradiction that he was the catalyst for my life turning from one of misery and drudge to one of happiness and light.

How on earth could a client have done all that?

Simple really – I had a ‘near-miss’ with him if you get my drift! It was a cold dark March evening in 2000. I had to work for the evening. It was my company’s annual awards dinner that we throw for the best advertising in the industry. I was speaking and he was in the audience. A big crowd of us decided that at 11pm when the do finished the night was too young to be over. We went to the Hilton in Park Lane for a drink at their roof-top bar but when we arrived it was closed to new entrants because it was so packed.

I found myself in a taxi with him and two of his colleagues as well as one of my team. His colleague suggested a bar in the Kings Road that he was a member of so we wouldn’t have any difficulty getting in. It turned out to be a seedy drinking club! One of his colleagues was very drunk and slept on the sofa all night. My colleague and his remaining colleague were on the dance floor and I was in a corner with him.

We were talking about all sorts of stuff and the conversation was going in directions it really shouldn’t for a client:agency discussion. Anyway, at 4am we caught a taxi together and he dropped me at my hotel before going on to his own hotel. There was a moment when he might not have continued on to his own hotel but thankfully he did. We were both married at the time. When I woke up the following morning, I was deeply relieved that the night had ended as it did but also mortified to remember the content of our conversation.

My mind was a whir of stuff for weeks. Not least the fact that I had to face him in a couple of weeks when I was due at his offices to present the results of a piece of research that was critically important to his team. I was terrified and miserable. What if he’d told his colleagues about our inappropriate conversation? What if he laughed at me? What if I curled up with embarrassment and couldn’t present?

After all, my addled brain’s logic went – I’m fat, frumpy and other than being good at my job have no other redeeming features.

I called in the SAS of difficult situation handling, Claire. I confessed to her what I’d done and what we’d said to one another and after she’d stopped laughing she went into overdrive of helpful advice and concern. She took me shopping because she said I needed to be totally confident when I stepped onto the platform to present and in order to achieve that I had to look great. I wailed ‘I can’t look great, I’m fat and frumpy’. Nonsense was her retort. We’ll have you shaped up in no time.

She has always been really good at knowing what will suit me and knowing how to make the most of what you’ve got. I bought three outfits, all corkers and some other bits and pieces to make me feel good. We stopped for lunch to rest our weary bones and I spent the hour we were in the pub sobbing about how unhappy I was and how desperate I was to get out of my situation.

Suddenly the scales fell from my eyes as they say. I knew what I had to do. I had to leave my husband and strike out on my own. The experience with my client had made me aware that I could feel emotion. I’d forgotten how (other than self-loathing). I knew if I stayed married I’d never be able to experience love again and I knew that even if was never lucky enough to find love that I couldn’t be worse off than I was anyway.

I knew I could not ever be in a relationship with this man and I would never have entered into an affair. That wasn’t what made me decide to leave my ex. It wasn’t a forlorn hope of something with him, it was a need for self-preservation. It was a need to be able to wake up in the morning and feel alive with happiness. So what could have been just another sordid incident between two people who should know better turned into one of the best things to ever happen to me.

I have told the story of how Claire helped me before but this part of the tale has only been known by a small handful of close friends (including DM – this isn’t going to surprise him in any way.

The following week, I turned up at his office feeling sick with worry. I need not have worked myself up into a stew because he was a complete gentleman and swanned into the room at the last moment (not leaving any time for embarrassing pauses). He shook my hand, looked deep into my eyes with a huge broad smile and said I looked great. I got on my podium, did my presentation while he made an occasional observation that let me know he remembered THAT night and as he did so, I scanned the faces of his colleagues to look for signs of smirking but there were none. Phew. I got away with it…..

Since that time, our friendship has developed. Now DM knows him, after spending a night propping up a bar with him a couple of years ago. He still values my opinion and I still feel as though he’s my friend first and an ex-client second.

So, tonight, despite having no human company at all today, I feel as though life is a bowl of cherries just waiting to be eaten! Yum.

This time last year I was on my way to a work do where I would certainly have seen this man and two years ago, DM was waiting for me.