Is ME/CFS all in the mind?
Absolutely NOT!
ME/CFS is a very real, physical condition. It is a complex interplay of nervous system dysregulation, hormone imbalance, immune dysregulation, genetic predisposition, and inflammation. However, it is often triggered by stressful life events, highlighting the overlap between mind and body.
If you have been told that ME/CFS was "all in your mind",
that is devastating, and I'm sad and angry that you experienced that.
Equally, if you have been told ME/CFS is "incurable",
that is also devastating, and I'm sad and angry that you experienced that.
It’s time to find middle ground.
The old narrative, “It’s all in your mind,” was wrong.
But so is the recent one, “It’s so physical that it’s incurable.”
It's time for a new narrative based on the latest research that honours and supports how very challenging this illness is, as well as providing hope and pathways that guide you to recovery safely. ME/CFS is real, serious, and physical, and the body can recover when we address the neurophysiological processes and behaviours driving it.
Why does CFS happen?
CFS isn’t caused by a single factor. It often involves a combination of:
- Heightened stress response: Your nervous system can become dysregulated and maintain a heightened physiological stress response, as shown in this diagram. Toxic living or working environments can reinforce a heightened stress response and affect recovery also.
- Immune system changes: Inflammation or immune misfires can sap energy and increase fatigue.
- Mitochondrial changes due to prolonged stress affecting energy production in the body.
- Genetic and biological factors: Studies like the DecodeME study are helping us understand why some people are more vulnerable (though not gauranteed) to get ME/CFS.
- Habitual thinking and belief patterns are influencing health every day. Monitoring, predicting, catastrophising, worrying et cetera can have a negative impact on your physiology and recovery.
- Coping patterns and lifestyle cycles: Overdoing it on high-energy days and crashing afterward can unintentionally prolong fatigue. This is because you are running on fake adrenal energy which is not sustainable.
- Trauma: Past trauma may have activated the physiological stress response and may be preventing recovery without you realising its effects. Resolving this deep-seated trauma can be a very powerful step in the healing journey.
Research Insights into ME/CFS Treatment
I have written three blogs summarising the latest research in ME/CFS and how this affects treatment options and recovery.
The information from these blogs has been incorporated into my articles in Brainz magazine.
Research into Effective Treatments
For decades, ME/CFS has been trapped in a narrative of hopelessness. But this perspective is being actively challenged by both patients who are recovering and a new wave of integrative research.
What does new research show about how we should be approaching ME/CFS?
DecodeME: ME/CFS genes and recovery
The DecodeME study links genetics to ME/CFS, but does this mean recovery isn’t possible?
Discover how disposition is not certainty, and how many other controllable factors can influence recovery.
Recovery and the Science of ME/CFS
Learn about my own experience of the despair and turmoil of living with ME/CFS, and read about how the science behind brain retraining assisted me in my recovery. This article also discusses the controversy between very different opinions within the ME/CFS world and how that gap can be bridged.
How Empower Therapies can help
The Switch 4-day programme draws on all this research to help you gently turn off your stress response, giving your body the chance to heal naturally. You’ll learn to spot thinking and behaviour patterns that fuel fatigue, then use practical techniques to undo these limiting patterns.
The major difference between The Switch and other brain retraining techniques is that we also address the original root cause of your illness by using The Deep Switch to access and resolve any original trauma that is maintaining the stress response and is inadvertently preventing your recovery.
Plus we address lifestyle choices that have been scientifically proven to benefit recovery.
Chronic fatigue is one of our biggest client groups, and I have 16 years of experience in helping thousands of people to recover.
ME/CFS recovery rates at Empower Therapies
We track client outcomes very carefully with all clients filling in RAND-12 Health Surveys before and after the course. Here is data from all our ME/CFS clients for a 2-year period.
In this time period, 95 people did The Switch for ME/CFS.
No one dropped out of the programme, and all 95 have been included in the data.
Additionally 12 people applied but did not progress to attending The Switch
and are therefore not included in this data.
Health post-course
83.2% ranked their health as “excellent, very good or good”.
Symptom Resolution
82.1% reported having resolved their symptoms "completely" or "a lot".
Recommendation
94% of ME/CFS participants would recommend The Switch.
If you’re not quite ready for a 4-day course, are not well enough to attend or don't have the finances to attend, our Next Steps to Recovery 2-hour intro programme or the pre-recorded Switch Webinar Series, which you can work through at your own pace over six weeks, could be a perfect starting point. These courses give an overview of mind-body health, the impact of stress and thinking patterns, and simple techniques you can begin using right away.
For those with very low starting points, such as being bed- or house-bound, 5-10 minute private sessions with me can provide support to get improvements to make these webinar steps achievable.
Email us to enquire.
How can you help yourself?
- Restore your hope for recovery by watching some of the movies on this website. Just knowing that there are people who are recovering, and there are explanations and answers for chronic fatigue can help you to relax and calm your stress response and get a lift in energy levels.
- Start actively reducing your stress response by doing breathing exercises, meditation, yin yoga and activities that you find particularly relaxing.
- Many clients have found that using a little more energy in their voice tone and body language can help them to start having more energy. However, this must only be done in conjunction with calming the stress response. Until you have calmed your body out of the stress response and allowed natural healing to take place, it is unwise to do large amounts of exercise. Read my blog about post-exertional malaise to understand this better.
- If you feel a need to connect with other people with ME/CFS, that's all well and good, but choose your support groups very carefully. Avoid groups that ban recovery story sharing and focus on symptoms. Choose groups that have a positive focus on finding solutions. Two excellent groups to join are Raelan Agle's YouTube Channel and the CFS/Long-Covid/ Post Viral Mindbody Healing Facebook group.
