By Cort Johnson in Health Rising. Cortisol, our body’s main stress hormone, has an amazing reach. Given the effects it has on our metabolism, inflammation, blood pressure, blood sugar, energy production and even the sleep-wake cycle, it’s no surprise that researchers early on latched onto signs of cortisol problems in chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS) and […]
Fibromyalgia
Why We Need To Get Creative When It Comes To Talking About Pain
A Fatigue Nucleus In Multiple Sclerosis… And ME/CFS And Fibromyalgia ?
By Cort Johnson in Health Rising. Fatigue has been a mystery to the research world. Take multiple sclerosis (MS) – one of the most fatiguing diseases known. Fatigue is often one of the first symptoms that shows up in MS and it’s often the most troubling symptom MS patients experience, yet the fatigue in MS isn’t […]
City Of York Council Ban Blue Badge Holders From City Centre
Ritalin (Methylphenidate) For Chronic Fatigue Syndrome And Fibromyalgia
From Health Rising. Ritalin Is… a central nervous system stimulant. Created in 1954, Ritalin has been in use for over sixty years. (Check out a History of Ritalin here). It was first FDA approved in 1955 to treat ‘hyperactivity’ and later was approved to treat attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Ritalin increases extracellular levels […]
Is Fibromyalgia And Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Actually Small Fiber Polyneuropathy ?
By Cort Johnson in Health Rising. Chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS) and fibromyalgia (FM) produce so many symptoms that diagnosing them can be difficult for uninformed doctors. While we know that small fiber polyneuropathy (SFPN) (or small fiber neuropathy (SFN) commonly occurs in both these diseases, what I didn’t realize until I read the […]
Feeling Alone With ME/CFS, Fibromyalgia Or POTS ? Why Finding A Connection Matters – A Tribute To A Leader Of The Community
As Lockdown Eases, Those Of Us With Chronic Illnesses Must Not Be Left Behind’
By Helen Wilson-Beevers in The Independent. When Boris announced that pubs, cinemas, hair salons and hotels will reopen from the 4th July, there came collective chatter about reclaimed freedom. There is a palpable feeling holidays and nights out are once again within reach; a new normal is just around the corner. In England, too, shielding for […]
Have You Been A Victim Of Medical Gaslighting ?
From A Journey Through The Fog. Trigger warning; the examples of medical gaslighting highlighted in this post may be distressing to some. There is growing awareness around the prevalence of medical gaslighting, especially amongst female patients. Last week tens of thousands of people took to Twitter to share their horror stories of neglect […]
From Fight/Flight To Neuroinflammation: Explaining The “Functional Pain” In Fibromyalgia And ME/CFS ?
By Cort Johnson in Health Rising. There’s neuroinflammation and there’s the stress response. Recently, we saw Mackay and Tate propose that neuroinflammation in ME/CFS and FM was linked to a whacky stress response centered in the hypothalamus. In 2018 Chinese-Duke University collaboration suggested that the stress response and neuroinflammation are linked as well, although […]
Are Intranasal Drugs The Future For ME/CFS And Fibromyalgia ?
By Cort Johnson in Health Rising. The neuroinflammation findings in chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS) and fibromyalagia (FM), while restricted to a few studies, are still pretty compelling. We know that many, if not all of the symptoms associated with ME/CFS and FM such as fatigue, pain, cognitive problems, and mood issues can be produced […]
Why Certain Illnesses Remain Mysterious
By Sarah Ramsay in The Paris Review. When I first began research for my book about women with mysterious illnesses, I was overwhelmed. No two women were alike. The number of illnesses that qualified as mysterious was staggering. Lyme, post-treatment Lyme disease syndrome, candida, Epstein-Barr, Ehlers-Danlos, polycystic ovary syndrome, subclinical hypothyroid, dysautonomia, irritable […]
Beyond Tired : ME/CFS Life – Awareness Week 2020
From the Invisibly ME Blog. The 11th to 17th May 2020 marks ME/CFS Awareness Week. It was also Fibromyalgia Awareness Day on 12th May, which I posted about recently with debunking 6 fibro myths. The colour blue is recognised as the colour of ME awareness and many charities, groups and individuals are doing their bit […]
7 Signs That You’re Running Out Of Spoons
By ME/CFS Self-Help Guru. One frustrating thing about energy limiting chronic illnesses like ME/CFS, Fibromyalgia and Lyme disease, is that energy levels can fluctuate from one day to the next. Christine Miserandino’s Spoon Theory has helped many people understand the concept of rationing out your energy by relating an energy unit to a spoon, […]
10 Things People Don’t Realize You’re Doing Because You Have An Invisible Illness
By Kim Quindlen in Thought Catalog. Often, the hardest part of having an invisible illness is not the chronic pain or the constant discomfort or any of the other symptoms – it’s the fact that other people cannot really see or understand what you’re going through. Although the disability causes endless problems and challenges for […]
16 Things People Don’t Realize You’re Doing Because Your Pain Is Constant
By Veronica Vivona in The Mighty. Living with constant pain can be extremely frustrating. When you don’t feel comfortable, you might develop some habits designed to make things more manageable. You might have back pain that makes it hard to sit in certain chairs. You could potentially have widespread pain that makes it difficult to […]
When You Say Coronavirus Will Only Kill The Vulnerable, You’re Talking About Me
BY BROOKE VITTIMBERG in Fast Company. When news of COVID-19 started to spread, there were two popular responses. The first was to rush to the store, buying N95 masks and hand sanitizer until shelves were bare. The second was to shrug and comfort the masses because mostly immunocompromised people—people like me—would die. On Twitter, […]
What It’s Like Living With Chronic Pain In Your Twenties
Who Is Getting Sick, And How Sick ? A Breakdown Of Coronavirus Risk By Demographic Factors
By Sharon Begly in Stat News. The new coronavirus is not an equal-opportunity killer: Being elderly and having other illnesses, for instance, greatly increases the risk of dying from the disease the virus causes, Covid-19. It’s also possible being male could put you at increased risk. For both medical and public health reasons, researchers want […]
Eating Meat: Links To Chronic Disease Might Be Related To Amino Acids – New Findings
By Laura Brown and Kelly Jones in The Conversation. Plant-based diets have been popular in the media recently, but research shows that going vegetarian or vegan isn’t only good for the environment, but for our health, too. Meat-rich diets are linked to a range of health problems, from heart disease and strokes to type two diabetes and some cancers. […]
To The People Who Assume I’ve ‘Stolen’ My Disability Parking Permit
My Disability Is Dynamic
By Brianne Benness in Medium. Maybe the media has led you to believe that all disabilities are visible and static. Disabilities caused by chronic illness can be anything but. The relationship between chronic illness and disability can be a complicated one. Not everyone who is disabled is chronically ill, and vice versa. And when I […]