Nearly a decade ago, on my honeymoon in Venice, I realised something was terribly wrong. I had no doubts that I loved my husband, but I didn’t feel anything close to romantic. Instead of seeing the beauty of St Mark’s Square, I thought about the public executions that once took place there. I got dizzy from looking up at the ceiling mosaic of the Basilica. The crowds of people made me nervous, and the gondolas struck me as nothing but charmless tourist traps. I didn’t even have an appetite for pasta.

On our third day in Venice, my husband and I took a water bus to Murano, the Venetian glass-making island. I leaned against the railing of the water bus and felt the strong wind on my body. When I reached up to brush my long, curly hair out of my face, a handful of it came out in my palms.