• Welcome to Phoenix Rising!

    Created in 2008, Phoenix Rising is the largest and oldest forum dedicated to furthering the understanding of and finding treatments for complex chronic illnesses such as chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS), fibromyalgia (FM), long COVID, postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS), mast cell activation syndrome (MCAS), and allied diseases.

    To become a member, simply click the Register button at the top right.

Simon Wessley replies

justy

Donate Advocate Demonstrate
Messages
5,524
Location
U.K
Still on the videos -
He works in a pub until 12 am, then stays up for a bit before going to bed. I can barely function after 8pm.

If i stay up until 12 this is what happens to me - i get wired and my legs start twitching, then i get very cold and start shivering and shaking. My brain goes blank and i cannot hold a conversation. My joints ache all over. Once in bed if i dont warm up i will start to shake uncontrolably, me body temp will keep dropping and unless i have the heating on and a warm body in bed with me i will shake for hours. If i am warm the wired feeling intensifies until even the sound of my husband breathing makes my startle reflex go off - this can go on for hours. Then my foot starts going into a clonus like spasm - it can do this every few mintues for over an hour at a time. Now i really cant sleep and will try to do relaxation or meditation in bed. Usually i will now be awake all night and finally sleep about 7 or 8 am for a few hours.

The next day i am like the walking dead. I have worked out for myself that i need to be in bed by 10, 11 the latest to stop this awful pattern from happening - but even so going to bed ear;ly has not cured my M.E.
 

biophile

Places I'd rather be.
Messages
8,977
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19226353
247 patients fulfilling the Center for Disease Control criteria for CFS were included.
Of the CFS patients ... none had an unhealthy alcohol intake.

Perhaps we all need some Graded Drinking Therapy (GDT) so we can get up to 2 pints of beer every night and binge-drinking on the weekends like the hypothetical typical CFS patient in Chalder's and "Mrs Wessely's" training video.
 

allyb

Senior Member
Messages
127
Location
yorkshire/lancashire border, England
He and his journalistic catspaws spent the summer of 2011 and the autumn of 2012 stigmatising the ME community in the broadsheets. He purported that he was exposing the "militants". But in fact he and Dr Esther Crawley and others were attempting to silence us all.

All that was public. It was very public.

He abused his power as a prominent member of the medical establishment, to get a platform for his personal perspective on ME, and so far lazy journalism has let him get away with that. The ME patient community was never afforded any proportionate right of reply in the media - until now.

But once the Countess of Mar, Dr. Weir, and Professor Hooper secured a hearing in the mainstream press for the patients, suddenly the "courageous" winner of the Maddox prize gets stage fright.

At the first sign of a fair fight he wants to duck into anonymit
Pathetic.

Thank you Mr Reid.

I just want to add that Simon Wessely does this in true psychobabble style, as always; by projecting that it is the Countess of Mar who is the perpetrator in publicizing what is already public, thus effectively projecting blame.

Over the years he has postulated this effective formula, in a very public arena with dogmatic repetition until even the enlightened question what they thought to be true. :redface:
*The Maddox Prize was a measure of the power of that projection.
Wessely has established himself in an unrivalled position in places of immense power; government advisor, The Science Media Centre, pharmaceutical companies, this list is both long and alarming.
The impact has been global!!! :(
All too often, though we know all this; we are rendered innocent bystanders/observers (not militants) made victims of circumstance by his powerful projection and strong use of persuasive langue from a position of power.

I am thankful for the Countess of Mar, grateful that as a sufferer she can with honesty and integrity project back the truth from a privileged position. We have never asked for more than that and I dare to hope/dream we can move forward.

Thank you for posting this firestormm,

Probably guilty of spreading propaganda, but sod it. BTW who is Horace Reid (other than a song title from ELO I rather like)?

and if you are guilty of spreading propaganda......... then I think there may be a job waiting for you at the Science Media Centre. ;)

Kindly regards
allyb
 

Holmsey

Senior Member
Messages
286
Location
Scotland, UK
Horace Reid is a patient from Ireland I think. I remember an article about Mr Reid in a newsapaper that was circulated online. I think that he may have been a nurse before he became ill or another type of medic.

And Firestormm, ELO sang about Horrice Wimp...good song but I prefered Mr. Blue Sky myself.
 

Firestormm

Senior Member
Messages
5,055
Location
Cornwall England
Thank you Mr Reid.

I just want to add that Simon Wessely does this in true psychobabble style, as always; by projecting that it is the Countess of Mar who is the perpetrator in publicizing what is already public, thus effectively projecting blame.

Over the years he has postulated this effective formula, in a very public arena with dogmatic repetition until even the enlightened question what they thought to be true. :redface:
*The Maddox Prize was a measure of the power of that projection.
Wessely has established himself in an unrivalled position in places of immense power; government advisor, The Science Media Centre, pharmaceutical companies, this list is both long and alarming.
The impact has been global!!! :(
All too often, though we know all this; we are rendered innocent bystanders/observers (not militants) made victims of circumstance by his powerful projection and strong use of persuasive langue from a position of power.

I am thankful for the Countess of Mar, grateful that as a sufferer she can with honesty and integrity project back the truth from a privileged position. We have never asked for more than that and I dare to hope/dream we can move forward.

Thank you for posting this firestormm,



and if you are guilty of spreading propaganda......... then I think there may be a job waiting for you at the Science Media Centre. ;)

Kindly regards
allyb

Hey you! :) Nice to hear from you :)
 

barbc56

Senior Member
Messages
3,657
Thank you Mr Reid.

I just want to add that Simon Wessely does this in true psychobabble style, as always; by projecting that it is the Countess of Mar who is the perpetrator in publicizing what is already public, thus effectively projecting blame.

Over the years he has postulated this effective formula, in a very public arena with dogmatic repetition until even the enlightened question what they thought to be true. :redface:
*The Maddox Prize was a measure of the power of that projection.
Wessely has established himself in an unrivalled position in places of immense power; government advisor, The Science Media Centre, pharmaceutical companies, this list is both long and alarming.
The impact has been global!!! :(
All too often, though we know all this; we are rendered innocent bystanders/observers (not militants) made victims of circumstance by his powerful projection and strong use of persuasive langue from a position of power.

I am thankful for the Countess of Mar, grateful that as a sufferer she can with honesty and integrity project back the truth from a privileged position. We have never asked for more than that and I dare to hope/dream we can move forward.

Thank you for posting this firestormm,

and if you are guilty of spreading propaganda......... then I think there may be a job waiting for you at the Science Media Centre. ;)

Kindly regards
allyb
So now we are using psychobabble on Wesely. Rather ironic. Kind of funny but still ironic.

Barb C.:>)
 

alex3619

Senior Member
Messages
13,810
Location
Logan, Queensland, Australia
How about homeopathic exercise? :rofl:

Barb. C.:>)

Oh, the Laws of Similarity and Contagion! Good idea. We can have a sporty type touch a computer gaming console (brand of your choice but see further comment) and then play sports games. Exercise by similarity and contagion! Do make sure its not a kinect or otherwise too movement oriented (wii etc). By building up the time we do such homeopathic exercise, surely we will improve.:snigger:
 

barbc56

Senior Member
Messages
3,657
But if it's homeopathic exercise, wouldn't we reduce exercise which in homeopathicspeak means an increase in activity? I don't think that makes sense but neither does homeopathy.:lol:
Barb C.:>)
 

meadowlark

Senior Member
Messages
241
Location
Toronto, Canada
Re Wessley's letter to the Countess, I'm astonished that it's so badly written. That first paragraph is worthy of a 12-year-old--and I don't mean to insult 12-year-olds. Conversational English (which I have to assume is Wessley's e-mail style) is hard to understand when it's written down, and it seems he can't even punctuate. This isn't snobbery from me. Wessley's writing about something critical to his career, to a major critic who's highly placed in government. Best to express himself as well as possible. As a psychiatrist, he's had a very literate education. To have written that e-mail, he must have had a migraine--that's the most generous interpretation, anyway. In the end, the effect disrespectful. I'm amazed he didn't start it all with "Hey, Countess!"

As for that video, I saw it a few years ago and it depressed me for weeks. Justy has the right word for it: "deluded."
 
Messages
646
Wessley's writing about something critical to his career, to a major critic who's highly placed in government.
Mar is not and never has been nor ever will be "highly placed in government". She's a 'cross bencher', something which while deserving of the endless sniggers that inuendo might engender - means 'no party affiliation'. Worse Mar is actually an example of one of the more egregious anachronistic stupidities of the UK Parliament - an elected Hereditary Peer - meaning that when Prime Minister Blair (spit) grudingly accepted his Party's commitment to reforming the Upper House, the collective inbreds who dominated the whole thing, were cut down to a tenth of their former number, they got to elect whom amongst them were going to remain to speak for 1% of the 1% who by dint of inheritance still control much of the UK's wealth.

I somehow doubt that anyone outside the M.E/CFS bubble will notice whether or not Wessely has addressed Mar (real name Margaret Lane) in terms of a double subjunctive - though I guess he could have attracted wider attention if instead of his inelegant but servicable English he'd yewsd stret styl in'it bruv. Perhaps the SMC could arrange classes for him. Roll on the revolution.

IVI
 

taniaaust1

Senior Member
Messages
13,054
Location
Sth Australia
Re Wessley's letter to the Countess, I'm astonished that it's so badly written. That first paragraph is worthy of a 12-year-old--and I don't mean to insult 12-year-olds. Conversational English (which I have to assume is Wessley's e-mail style) is hard to understand when it's written down, and it seems he can't even punctuate. This isn't snobbery from me. Wessley's writing about something critical to his career, to a major critic who's highly placed in government. Best to express himself as well as possible. As a psychiatrist, he's had a very literate education. To have written that e-mail, he must have had a migraine--that's the most generous interpretation, anyway. In the end, the effect disrespectful. I'm amazed he didn't start it all with "Hey, Countess!"

As for that video, I saw it a few years ago and it depressed me for weeks. Justy has the right word for it: "deluded."

I doubt he has much fear of the Countess of Mar, he knows he can carefully use all the words he needs to use to throw poor general public thoughts offwhen he needs to (and of cause he dont give a rats arse about what most of us think of him).
 

ukxmrv

Senior Member
Messages
4,413
Location
London
Meadowlark, quite a few patients have corresponded with Wessely over the years and what marks his replies as interesting is that he rarely uses a spell-checker, good punctuation or good grammer. I've always assumed that he has a secretary or a colleague who writes his more formal communications for him.
 
Messages
646
Fair enough criticism, folks. It's a minor detail, but I found it weird. Sometimes the tiny things are suggestive, that's all.
Apologies Meadowlark - my previous reply was rather more blunt than I intended (shouldn't post after midnight !). I know that a lot of people think a great deal of Mar - but there's no room for sentiment in political processes and that means we need to be very clear about who we are depending on, and just what their limitations are. Mar really has no traction with either of the two main parties, nor does she have an opinion shaping constituency beyond Westminster or those attracted to her special interests (M.E, GWS,OPP and Cheese !).

IVI