by Jamie Bullen

Mobile phones, iPads and other electrical gadgets often come top on all our wishlists but life is very different for one woman whose allergy to wi-fi has become a daily battle.

Hannah Metcalfe, 34, from Elham, lives a very different life to most women her age.

She becomes ill when she picks up an iPad or looks at a computer screen for too long and can only use a mobile phone in an emergency.

Over the years she has suffered from fatigue, painful headaches and stomach cramps and also claimed it nearly led to pneumonia when she returned from Australia in March 2011 after losing a stone and a half.

Born in Stelling Minnis, she studied law at the University of Kent before becoming a trainee solicitor in Ashford before tragedy struck in November 2010 when she suffered a miscarriage.

She believes the effect of her office’s fluorescent lights played a part in her baby heartbreak and is now calling for a debate about overexposure to electromagnetic waves in the UK.

She has now lived on a farm for five years with her partner Mark Terry, also 34, and three-year-old son Ollie.

She said: “I don’t believe it is psychosomatic or just in your own head as the sceptics say, This has been recognised by Sweden and I know Holland have announced something as well, it is about time we do something as well.

“There is so much kids are being exposed to and I do worry it could affect them.

“When I came back from Australia I was pretty ill even on the verge of pneumonia I lost a stone and a half and I was so fatigued I couldn’t even cook dinner.”

Ms Metcalfe said although she has made some changes she still gets the most of life and continues to take part in a weekly street dance class in Canterbury.

"I just deal with it every day, I’m quite an outdoor person anyway whether out in the garden or playing with Ollie and the animals so it wasn’t a massive part of my life anyway.

“I guess it was just addictive certainly turning on Facebook in the morning.

“I lost my career and I keep thinking to myself if I wasn’t in this situation where would I be, I’m concerned for other people who could lose their careers and leave their homes."

She added that she uses the social networking site to keep in contact with fellow sufferers and said in one case a man escaped to the woods to deal with his sensitivity.