SHONA SIBARY: I used to be at bottomless brunch when a jet roared overhead. It was the beginning of per week of concern – of Iran’s missiles, for my daughters and canines at dwelling, and piling on weight with out my fats jabs… I used to be beneath siege in Dubai (with out my Mounjaro!)

Around three times a year I visit my husband, Keith, 58, who lives in the UAE, about an hour north of Dubai.

Over the nine years our marriage has endured this 4,000-mile separation – due to his job as an energy consultant in the region – I have relished these trips as a chance to bask in guaranteed sunshine and escape the drudgery of life as a ­mother of four back home in Sussex. This last week, however, has been a very ­different story.

Along with more than 100,000 other Brits, I have witnessed my much-needed break become a living nightmare. As Iranian drones are intercepted overhead, the topping up of my tan has taken an obvious second place to dodging falling debris.

One week on from the start of this terrible conflict, I am still trapped here, unable to leave. This is my diary of five, unbelievable days, when what should have been a ­margarita-swilling jolly became enforced imprisonment in a Middle East war zone …

Saturday, February 28

There’s a Hilton hotel near Keith’s apartment in Ras Al-Khaimah – an Emirate just north of Dubai – which, every weekend, lays on a fantastic brunch. For about £50 a head you can fill your boots with a buffet extravaganza of everything from oysters and lobster to beef ­tenderloin and seabass.

And that’s just the food. For three blissful hours, alcohol is also included in the price – everything you can imagine from negronis through to bubbly, wine and beer. What’s not to love?

We’ve been coming here for years – but there’s a bit of family lore which says the moment I arrive and eagerly start knocking back ­cocktails, some disaster will, ­without fail, happen back home in the UK, conspiring to ruin my fun.

On one occasion, it was my eldest Flo, then aged 19, shunting the back of another car, and on another, one of the dogs had disappeared and nobody could find him.

So this morning, I decided to head it off by alerting the kids first.

Two of my four children still live at home in Chichester, West Sussex. Dolly, who is 16, usually joins me to visit her father, but she is currently in the middle of GCSE mocks and can’t go anywhere. Annie, 25, is a paramedic degree student on ­regular overnight placements with the ambulance service and had agreed to hold the fort – and Dolly’s hand – plus look after our two ­labradoodles while I was away.

Meanwhile, Flo, 27, lives near the family home with our granddaughter, Hallie, two, and Monty, 23, lives and works in London.

‘Under no circumstances is ­anybody to call me unless there is an absolute emergency,’ I furiously typed into the family WhatsApp group, while simultaneously ­dousing oysters in Tabasco. ‘I don’t want anything to ruin my brunch.’

Literally five minutes later, there was a roar overhead so loud that everybody on the terrace where we were sitting – with its uninterrupted view of the Persian Gulf – looked up.

‘What the hell was that?’ a man at the table next to us exclaimed. Phones were grabbed, drinks hastily put down. Somebody else said: ‘Trump has attacked Iran.’

My first thought was: ‘That’s just across the water.’ My second: ‘­Seriously? You couldn’t make this up.’

Sunday, March 1

There’s nothing quite like the thud of a hangover when you’re experiencing it to a background of falling missiles. I spend most of the day inside, monitoring news and social media sites, trying in vain to get a grip on exactly how much ­danger I might be in.

Yesterday, the Fairmont Hotel on the Palm in Dubai – the famous palm-shaped man-made ­archipelago – was hit by debris from an ­intercepted drone, causing a fire. In itself, this is beyond surreal. (I’ve had brunch there, too. They have a ­fantastic infinity pool overlooking the marina.) Everyone holidaying there must have feared it was a direct hit from Iranian military forces.

The UAE’s Ministry of Interior quickly swung into action to quell mass panic, reassuring visitors and residents that air defences here are among the best in the world and that this was the result of an ­interception, not an attack.

But then, in the early hours today, Dubai airport was also hit by a drone. All flights home have been cancelled, including my own which was due to leave tomorrow morning.

Nobody, it seems, is going ­anywhere. I’m torn between ­panicking and going to the beach. Then settle for panicking on the beach.

Monday, March 2

Usually, when I wake in the morning in the Middle East, I fling open the balcony doors and let the sun flood in before taking my coffee on to the veranda to bask in the peaceful view of the fifth hole of a championship golf course.

Today, however, what got me ­leaping out of bed was an ominous boom directly overhead. As all UAE airspace has now been closed to commercial planes for the last 48 hours, I know immediately it can only mean one thing.

Five minutes later I am messaged by my friend Richard, who also ­happens to be singer Joss Stone’s father. Fed up with the UK, he moved here four years ago and now lives just across the golf course from Keith. Sounding panicked, he tells me he is standing on the 12th tee, spitting distance away, with his dog, Mali, a 57kg Caucasian Ovcharka (the same breed his daughter, Joss, bought after two men were ­jailed for a plot to kidnap and murder her).

‘We were out for our early morning walk and suddenly there’s this huge bang,’ he says. ‘Mali bolted, ­dragging me behind her on the lead. To be honest, we’re both sh***ing ourselves.’

This is now on my doorstep.

Ras Al-Khaimah, or RAK as it is commonly known, has always felt like the safest place on earth. It’s a beautiful emirate with wide open spaces and a strong expat Brit ­community of people wanting a ­quieter, more peaceful life, away from the glitz and glamour of Dubai.

While we live about a mile from the shore, which feels slightly more ­protected, Richard also rents the penthouse in an apartment block right on the beach – next stop Iran.

‘It’s a little bit close for comfort and I do feel quite exposed and ­vulnerable,’ he tells me. ‘But I’d still rather be here, watching missiles being intercepted across the sea, than back in the UK.’

I can’t quite agree. There’s ­something about being stuck, of having no choice but to be here, that feels unnerving.

Plus, the kids are mutinous. Annie, I know, has been counting down the hours to my return. She’s had a ­difficult week with the dogs. They always get diarrhoea when I’m away from the separation ­anxiety and one of them now also has a viral ­infection.

The dishwasher has ­broken, Dolly is buckling under the stress of her exams and – ­perhaps worst of all – I left my Mounjaro pen in the fridge at home because I thought I was only going to be away for a week. It appears that I’m not only trapped in a war zone, but that I’m going to get fat again as well.

Tuesday, March 3

Today I woke, bolt upright, at 4am convinced I could hear loud explosions in the distance.

It’s a lonely hour at the best of times to be lying in bed, filled with dread at what is happening in the world. But when it’s the morning of the third consecutive day of Iranian retaliatory strikes on Gulf states and the bed you’re lying is in a mere 50 miles from the enemy, you know it’s probably wise to get up and check what’s going on.

The problem is, it’s almost impossible to know.

The UAE’s National Emergency Crisis and Disasters Management Authority (NCEMA) regularly posts on X with messages like: ‘Air defence systems are currently responding to a missile threat. Please remain in a safe location and follow official channels for warnings and updates.’

I’m not usually a worrier, but how do I actually know if I’m in a safe location or not?

Information from our own ­Foreign Office isn’t much clearer. Like ­thousands of other UK ­citizens stranded here, I have ­registered my presence with the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office to receive updates.

These have proved to be ­frustratingly vacuous. Here’s one I received in my inbox early this morning: ‘We have dedicated teams around the clock to provide support to British nationals including signposting, advice on travel options and tailored ­assistance for vulnerable groups. We recognise this is an unsettling time …’ blah blah blah.

I’m not exactly sure how ‘­signposting’ is going to help me right now. What I really want to know is: how the hell are you going to get me out of here?

I have at least managed to rebook on another Emirates flight leaving in the early hours of ­Friday morning, March 6, back to ­Gatwick, but with all flights ­currently suspended, I’m not holding my breath.

I know some people who have paid taxi companies in the region of £600 just to get them a few miles over the border into Oman. The airport in Muscat is open and operating flights, although at highly inflated prices. Other friends are currently on a 13-hour bus journey across the desert to Saudi’s airport in Riyadh – which also, apparently, offers another route out.

For those, like me, who have no choice but to wait, it’s hard not to feel like a sitting duck. While there is a pervading sense of calm and ‘business as usual’, the golf club bar last night, usually a buzzing social hub for the British expat community here, was emptier than Keith has ever seen it before.

I’ve now gone from thinking: ‘This will all blow over,’ to ‘Could we be on the brink of World War III?’

Wednesday, March 4

As another morning dawns on day four (or is it day five? I’ve lost count) of this unprecedented conflict, there is at least one ­certainty amid the chaos and confusion. It’s going to be another gloriously sunny day.

That’s the thing about Dubai. You never need to worry about the weather. It feels wrong to be stretched out on a sunbed, ­cocktail in hand. It reminds me of that first lockdown in March 2020 when, despite the horror of what was happening across the UK, the spring weather was ­incongruously glorious. If you could ignore the fear of catching Covid and the ­rising death toll, it almost felt like a gift of a holiday. We barbecued every day and drank our bodyweight in Whispering Angel rosé. ­Nothing seemed more at odds.

And it’s a lot like that here right now. Yes, we’re in the middle of a war zone, but today I booked an appointment to have my roots done and then went to a beach club. I mean, what else am I ­supposed to do? Sit quaking in fear inside Keith’s apartment?

Thursday, March 5

My flight home tomorrow has been cancelled and Emirates say all flights out of Dubai to every destination in Europe are ­absolutely chocka until next ­Friday – more than a week away. I’m now genuinely concerned that I’m never going to get out of here.

The situation is starting to seem desperate and I know I’m not alone in feeling this way. There are thousands of us stranded here, all with lives we have to get back to and a very real, pervading sense that we could be in this for the long haul.

Latest news is that the UK ­Government has chartered a repatriation flight from Oman to help British nationals get out. It was supposed to leave last night, but didn’t due to ‘technical issues’. Apparently, it’s scheduled for departure later today and will prioritise vulnerable people first.

I’m not even going to bother ­trying to secure a seat. I know I’m now a week overdue on my ­Mounjaro jab and piling on the pounds by the day, but I hardly think this puts me into a priority category. Not yet anyhow.

And as for Dolly back home? You would think, mid mock GCSEs and largely fending for herself, she’d be desperate for my return. Quite the contrary. Apparently, teachers at school are being extra nice to her because both her ­parents are trapped in a war zone.

She told me yesterday, quite gleefully, that they are being very sympathetic about the fact she is sleeping through her alarm every morning and turning up for school an hour late. And when her head of year discovered, yesterday, that she had pierced another two holes in her left earlobe – something that is normally frowned on – she was simply sent on her way with a sympathetic back pat.

If I didn’t laugh, I might just cry. I know I sound flippant, but inside there is a rising sense of panic.

The thing that’s getting to me most is not knowing when I’ll be able to return. Paying a dog walker every day is costing me an absolute ­fortune, and I’m ­seriously ­concerned that my elder daughter, Annie, who is vainly ­trying to hold the fort in my absence, is fast ­losing the will to live.

She actually said to me this morning: ‘I don’t care if you have to travel out by camel. Just please get home.’

I am, at least, able to send them both Deliveroo takeaways as a treat through the app. It’s weirdly comforting to be reminded that, while I may be stuck in the middle of a hellish Gulf conflict, somewhere else in the world it’s still two-for-one night at Domino’s.