Pattern of Recovery from CFS/ME

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[DATE OF FIRST PUBLICATION OF THIS PAGE - FEBRUARY 2024]

General Principles

The general principles are:

Use your Brain – think ahead

Nonlinear recovery with catastrophic events

The pattern of recovery will not be linear, and it will not be monotonic – see the graph below which models how recovery happens. Monotonic is a word much used in mathematics – in essence it describes a pattern of behaviour that always ‘moves in the same direction’.

We start life in the top left-hand corner of the graph below (point X). Unhealthy lifestyles erode well-being, and we gradually slide down the slippery slope. Then there may be a catastrophic trigger, at point A: viral infection, poisoning, bereavement, trauma, financial crisis or whatever. We drop off the edge of the curve, landing at point A’, and eventually, we may slide to the bottom right-hand corner (point Y).

The journey back to top left corner health is much more difficult. It is a hard slog up the slippery slope. But suddenly you get to that critical point, B, all is in place, the brain and body can safely come out of Naviaux’s defensive hibernation mode (see Metabolic features of chronic fatigue syndrome and Metabolic features of the cell danger response) and energy is available with which to have a life, and you flip up the curve to B’.

Welcome back to the world!

Recovery graph.png

I have witnessed some remarkable recovery stories in my four decades of medical practice. Think of Craig not being able to count from one to ten and then recovering well enough to be able to help with my books and website and achieving an ambition by writing Rockets and Raindrops.
Recently, one of my secretaries received an email, asking that it be passed onto me.
It read thus:

C……. could you mention this to Sarah when you communicate next? I would just like her to know that after reading her book (advertised within a website article) my life turned around. Having ME since childhood I was diagnosed in 1984 as having ME.  Since then, all the help and remedies, even from the ME support magazines, dealt only with the symptoms. Seemingly in their research, the 'experts' were acting on individual symptoms as causes. On reading your ME book I found you listed 100% of my symptoms and gave me the root cause of the ME and guidance to managing and healing from ME - which WORKED! I am functioning near 'normally' now and always recommend your work widely to other ME sufferers. THANK YOU so much for the work you do.

This person had run 50 miles in just over 9 hours, up and down the Shropshire Hills, and had come 3rd out of a large field of very fit competitors. So, dear reader……now comes some very important advice…..

Never Ever Give Up

This poster used to be pinned outside my consulting room and its words have become the Group Motto of the Facebook Group – ‘Support for Followers of Dr Myhill’s Protocol’ , as run by Katie Twinn and Craig Robinson – Facebook Group - ‘Support for Followers of Dr Myhill’s Protocol’

Neverevergiveup.jpg

The words of Sir Winston Churchill (30 November 1874 – 24 January 1965) echo in my ears: 

“Never give in. Never give in. Never, never, never, never—in nothing, great or small, large or petty—never give in, except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never yield to force. Never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.”

The enemy here is CFS, ME or LC.

Whoever you take your inspiration from, never ever give in. That point ‘B’ could be just round the corner, and as Craig has said – there are good times ahead of you, waiting for you to be there.

Footnote

These are stones laid with some public ceremony to denote the completion of a large, important building. And the phrase ‘foundation stone’ has come to mean a basic principle upon which all else relies. Here are two examples of foundation stones –

  • King’s College Chapel, Cambridge – In 1446, during the Feast of St. James, and shortly before the Wars of the Roses, King Henry VI laid the foundation stone of this chapel, a chapel that was intended to be a small part of a greater court. Though the court was never completed, the chapel still stands, complete with foundation stone.
  • The mysterious ‘London Stone’ – time has all but erased the history of the London Stone, although it is believed to be of Roman origin, and its name can be traced back to the 1100s. This chunk of limestone is a small portion of the original piece once secured into the ground. It was moved in 1742 and was built into the south wall of the Church of St. Swithun London Stone in 1798. Though the church was demolished in the 1960s, the stone remains.

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