I have had ME for a long time:  too long.  In the early days I tried various, often dubious, and sometime plain wacky, treatments that were about.  Not too surprisingly they had little effect and, to be honest, when that month’s miracle (and usually expensive) cure did not work I was pretty devastated.  Every method had someone saying how much it had improved them but this only ever appeared to be a marginal improvement and then for a select few, for a short time.  In the end I gave up trying and used a careful regime of rest and activity (a sort of pacing) that worked reasonly well to control things.

I now think things are changing … there appears to be a number of, well ok, lets be honest, dubious sounding and expensive treatments but they do appear to have some very promising results.  A common feature is a problem with various hormonal systems, such as the thyroid, adrenal, immune and others within the body, often controlled by a part of the brain called the hypothalamus.  At this point I must apologise to all those who I am misrepresenting because this is very much my own warped and ignorant interpretation.

There appear to be two major approaches to this problem:  taking hormones directly (as advocated by Doctors Peatfield and Myhill) and a talking approach (such as Reverse Therapy, Mickel and Lightning Therapies).  I have had more direct contact with the latter, which appeal as they do not involve taking a cocktail of rather potent drugs.

So how can talking stop, cure or help ME?  None of them consider ME to be psychological, all in the mind or trivial.  They take slightly different approaches but there appears to be a common thread that they allow the body to get out of a state that is either caused by or causes ME.  This involves a lot of work on your part;  one has to be committed and is not for the faint-hearted.  It is difficult to measure ME improvement so things are very controversial, but some have claimed very high success rates.  They are not perfect but I think they are worth investigating and may well lead onto an even more successful method.  From my own experiences with Reverse Therapy there is a unique feeling when things click and come right which I have not had in the years of ME.

Is it time to be more optimistic for future treatments?  I think it could be.