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Has anyone tried Mickel Therapy or Reverse Therapy?

charles shepherd

Senior Member
Messages
2,239
Mickel Therapy is another quite expensive and very speculative 'talking therapy' approach to ME/CFS management.

It has been around for several years.

Like most private clinics and alternative/complementary management programmes - eg ANS rewiring, Gupta Programme, Lightning Process, Marshall Protocol, Naltrexone, NLP, Optimum Health Clinic, Perrin Technique, Reverse Therapy etc - that claim to have effective treatments/solutions for ME/CFS, the feedback we receive at The MEA is extremely mixed and sometimes quite negative.

We do not therefore recommend any of these approaches to management - unless you have a lot of money to spare and want to pursue speculative forms of treatment.

If you put Mickel Therapy into the search box you will find previous discussions on MEA Facebook - most recent was on 11 August 2016.

Here is a link to a previous PR discussion on the subject:

http://forums.phoenixrising.me/inde...-with-scamming-people-with-cfs-so-much.44841/

Link to MEA website item on Mickel Therapy:

http://www.meassociation.org.uk/201...ss-programme-link-to-watch-it-again-facility/

I took part in these BBC Scotland TV programmes - part of which covers Mickel Therapy

Dr Charles Shepherd
Hon Medical Adviser, MEA
 

Pam Burrows

Living In State of Hope
Messages
4
@Pam Burrows why did you mention Keratoconus along with ME/CFS and Fibromyalgia. Keratoconus is a genetic and irreversible eye condition that for some can result in blindness. I have a moderate case. Did a practitioner suggest it could be cured?

Hi, Kina,
New here,
I got Keratoconus (KC) symptoms in 1989, 4 yrs after getting CEBV (as CFS was called back then) when I was 36. It took over 5 yrs before I got DXed w/ KC, so my vision problems were thought to be associated w/ CFS or a muscle myopathy. The test for muscle myopathy showed mitochondrial abnormalities of unknown etiology, but my CFS dr (David Bell) recognized the results as being common on other patients of his. At the time, little was known about KC (because no research was being done). It was assumed to be genetic and only found in young men. However, when they finally started doing research & 1st did a survey of patients, they were mostly women who got the disease in their 30s (as I did), who had no family members w/ KC. A few years later, KC research showed mitochondrial abnormalities in KC corneas. So I do believe that CFS has caused mitochondrial damage & thus my KC.
My FM on the other hand, came in the 1990s along w/ neurological symptoms & asthma that was eventually revealed to be caused by 3 yrs of exposure to neurotoxic glue fumes (carpet tile glue never dried) at work. So my FM is from another source.
In 1999, my KC got so bad I was legally blind in one eye (couldn't even see where the eye chart was). In 2002, I got sclera lens that were amazing at Boston Foundation for Sight. They were on Oprah back then as a medical miracle & they truly were for me. No cure; I needed a corneal transplant on my bad eye in 2012. I would like to get a transplant in the other eye & go back to Boston Foundation for Sight (their scleras are very expensive [worth it], but cheaper for a pair than just one). But my CFS, FM, KC & hypersensitivity are all interacting along w/ family tragedy & I'm worse than I've ever been. Not just fatigued, but weak (muscles just don't want to work).
If you ever need help w/ your KC, try sclera lens, esp. the ones by Boston Foundation for Sight. The vision I got was truly amazing (took an art course at RISD to celebrate).
Sorry, my writing (heck, my thinking) is very long winded & rambling. {^_~}

Pam, Living in the State of Hope (RI)
 
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10,157
I got Keratoconus (KC) symptoms in 1989, 4 yrs after getting CEBV (as CFS was called back then) when I was 36. It took over 5 yrs before I got DXed w/ KC, so my vision problems were thought to be associated w/ CFS or a muscle myopathy. The test for muscle myopathy showed mitochondrial abnormalities of unknown etiology, but my CFS dr (David Bell) recognized the results as being common on other patients of his. At the time, little was known about KC (because no research was being done). It was assumed to be genetic and only found in young men. However, when they finally started doing research & 1st did a survey of patients, they were mostly women who got the disease in their 30s (as I did), who had no family members w/ KC. A few years later, KC research showed mitochondrial abnormalities in KC corneas. So I do believe that CFS has caused mitochondrial damage & thus my KC.

It's too bad that it took 5 years to get diagnosed. I got diagnosed quite easily because it started off as astigmatism and moved into keratoconus proper as time went on. I am not sure where you are getting the information that little was known about Keratoconus in 1989 because it has been a known eye condition since the mid-1800's and I was diagnosed with it in 1985 or so and my Optometrist explained to me exactly what it was, that it can be inherited (many studies have supported this -- about 7 percent inherit it), and how it is treated. A few studies have shown a higher prevalence in females but not written stone. Most of the females on my mother's side have it to some degree which supports being inherited, at least in my case. Other causes include eye injury, some eye diseases, systemic diseases such as Leber’s congenital amaurosis, Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, Down syndrome, and osteogenesis imperfecta.

Just out of curiosity, do you have any links for ME/CFS as a cause of keratoconus because I can't find anything to connect the two. My Karatoconus well preceded my illness my at least 10 to 15 years.

My FM on the other hand, came in the 1990s along w/ neurological symptoms & asthma that was eventually revealed to be caused by 3 yrs of exposure to neurotoxic glue fumes (carpet tile glue never dried) at work. So my FM is from another source.

My FM on the other hand, came in the 1990s along w/ neurological symptoms & asthma that was eventually revealed to be caused by 3 yrs of exposure to neurotoxic glue fumes (carpet tile glue never dried) at work. So my FM is from another source.
In 1999, my KC got so bad I was legally blind in one eye (couldn't even see where the eye chart was). In 2002, I got sclera lens that were amazing at Boston Foundation for Sight. They were on Oprah back then as a medical miracle & they truly were for me. No cure; I needed a corneal transplant on my bad eye in 2012. I would like to get a transplant in the other eye & go back to Boston Foundation for Sight (their scleras are very expensive [worth it], but cheaper for a pair than just one). But my CFS, FM, KC & hypersensitivity are all interacting along w/ family tragedy & I'm worse than I've ever been. Not just fatigued, but weak (muscles just don't want to work).
If you ever need help w/ your KC, try sclera lens, esp. the ones by Boston Foundation for Sight. The vision I got was truly amazing (took an art course at RISD to celebrate).
Sorry, my writing (heck, my thinking) is very long winded & rambling. {^_~}

I am still not sure why you mentioned Keratoconus in conjunction with therapies that couldn't possibly have any effect on it.
 
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15,786
Just out of curiosity, do you have any links for ME/CFS as a cause of keratoconus because I can't find anything to connect the two. My Karatoconus well preceded my illness my at least 10 to 15 years.
Inflammation and reactive oxgyen species (ROS) seem like a couple potential culprits which get discussed in the research.

And there's a fair bit of research showing increased levels of mitochondrial mutations present in patients with keratoconus. Those mutations can also sometimes cause muscle pathology when present in the muscles, though the eyes might be more susceptible to damage resulting from the mutations.
 

Pam Burrows

Living In State of Hope
Messages
4
I am still not sure why you mentioned Keratoconus in conjunction with therapies that couldn't possibly have any effect on it.

Meditation & positive thinking benefit all illnesses. When I'm psychologically in a bad place it is hard cope w/ the pain I have from light & just trying to see things. When I'm in a good state of mind, I see the distortions of light as comets & flowers & how lucky I am to see angels as Christmas trees lights. It used to be quite beautiful at night.

Just out of curiosity, do you have any links for ME/CFS as a cause of keratoconus because I can't find anything to connect the two.
There used to be an online KC support group in the late 1990s. I posted a question about anyone also having ME/CFS & got several responses. I was going to contact Dr Alfredo Sadun @ the Doheny Eye Institute, because he had been doing research on ME/CFS vision problems. But my vision got too bad & by the time I could see again, he had moved on & away from ME/CFS.

It's too bad that it took 5 years to get diagnosed. I got diagnosed quite easily because it started off as astigmatism and moved into keratoconus proper as time went on. I am not sure where you are getting the information that little was known about Keratoconus in 1989 because it has been a known eye condition since the mid-1800's and I was diagnosed with it in 1985 or so and my Optometrist explained to me exactly what it was, that it can be inherited (many studies have supported this -- about 7 percent inherit it), and how it is treated. A few studies have shown a higher prevalence in females but not written stone. Most of the females on my mother's side have it to some degree which supports being inherited, at least in my case. Other causes include eye injury, some eye diseases, systemic diseases such as Leber’s congenital amaurosis, Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, Down syndrome, and osteogenesis imperfecta.
I didn't show signs of astigmatism at the beginning. And when I did, Drs assumed it was normal astigmatism that one is born with. When my astigmatism finally got really bad after 4yrs, the new eye dr (I could no longer drive up to Boston) yelled at me for not having my astigmatism treated when I was a child. He did not believe that I used to have better than 20/20 vision (as a kid, I could read the "Made in Japan" on the Eye Charts). The Dr that DXed me said that my corneas & vision kept oscillating -- looking normal & then not, then normal.
After being DXed in 1994,

I went to the Brown University book store & looked at a thick textbook of just eye diseases. It had everything you wrote in there & that's it; just half a page in a book that was over 1000 pages. Basically KC research was like ALS research was until the "Bucket Challenge", where nothing more was known since Lou Gehrig had died in 1941. But in the 1990s that changed with the CLEK Study showing that there were more people w/ KC than doctors had previously estimated.

It was like CFS research in the late 1980s, where the drs told us that lots of people having CFS were based on anecdotal accounts by patients in support groups (Gosh, we had 100s of people back then at meetings in small Rhode Island). When we advocated for CFS/ME, we learned that the medical research by doctors was anecdotal & we got them to finally start counting us; there were at least 1 million people w/ CFS/ME (same was true in the CLEK study, at least 1 million people w/ KC), which is what MS has & it is taken seriously now, although it used to be called "hysterical paralysis" in the early 1900s.

Sorry, I get kind of fiery. In the 80s & 90s, I was very involved in advocacy (was one of the grassroot members that got the annual International CFS Awareness Day in May going [I located SGs outside the US in non-English speaking countries]) & was a SG leader for a while. Unfortunately I am far too sick & don't see well enough to do that anymore. I thought people who got sick after me, who I helped get on SSDI & such would take over, but I see little difference. CFS/ME, like KC, has been known since the 1800s, but each new outbreak is given a new name taken seriously & then dismissed; so years later drs had never heard of Neurasthenia, Beard's Disease or ME, until patients uncovered the old research. Again, I get fiery! Sorry!
 
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10,157
Meditation & positive thinking benefit all illnesses. When I'm psychologically in a bad place it is hard cope w/ the pain I have from light & just trying to see things. When I'm in a good state of mind, I see the distortions of light as comets & flowers & how lucky I am to see angels as Christmas trees lights. It used to be quite beautiful at night.

This demonstrates what the problem with things like the Mickel/Reverse therapies is. They are effectively state that 'thinking therapies' can cure illnesses and conditions and use pseudoscience or non-science to back up their statements. Using Keratoconus as an example, there is no way that a 'thinking therapy' can have any effect on a thinning cornea. It seems you are referring to 'coping' strategies to help stay positive. You aren't having any effect on the keratoconus itself. I have absolutely no problem with using positive coping strategies to help deal with a condition. I do have a problem with so called therapies and the people who create them duping money out of sick desperate people by lying about how they can cure disease via their protocols. They go to extreme lengths to do this and many of the glowing reports you see all over the internet are fake testimonials.

There used to be an online KC support group in the late 1990s. I posted a question about anyone also having ME/CFS & got several responses. I was going to contact Dr Alfredo Sadun @ the Doheny Eye Institute, because he had been doing research on ME/CFS vision problems. But my vision got too bad & by the time I could see again, he had moved on & away from ME/CFS.

I haven't ever heard of the two being connected. Might have been a coincidence. Are there any articles about this?

I didn't show signs of astigmatism at the beginning. And when I did, Drs assumed it was normal astigmatism that one is born with. When my astigmatism finally got really bad after 4yrs, the new eye dr (I could no longer drive up to Boston) yelled at me for not having my astigmatism treated when I was a child. He did not believe that I used to have better than 20/20 vision (as a kid, I could read the "Made in Japan" on the Eye Charts). The Dr that DXed me said that my corneas & vision kept oscillating -- looking normal & then not, then normal.
After being DXed in 1994,

Your eye doctor sounds like a moron. Why would he yell at you for something you didn't get done as a child, that would be a parental decision, not yours.

I went to the Brown University book store & looked at a thick textbook of just eye diseases. It had everything you wrote in there & that's it; just half a page in a book that was over 1000 pages. Basically KC research was like ALS research was until the "Bucket Challenge", where nothing more was known since Lou Gehrig had died in 1941. But in the 1990s that changed with the CLEK Study showing that there were more people w/ KC than doctors had previously estimated.

A lot was known about KC prior to the 1990's. KC is considered to be quite a rare condition and many medical conditions that are rare don't get a lot of attention paid to them in books. It doesn't mean the research didn't exist. It was never ignored, as technology to deal with eye conditions got better and more fine-tuned, they were able to treat it better depending on severity.


It was like CFS research in the late 1980s, where the drs told us that lots of people having CFS were based on anecdotal accounts by patients in support groups (Gosh, we had 100s of people back then at meetings in small Rhode Island). When we advocated for CFS/ME, we learned that the medical research by doctors was anecdotal & we got them to finally start counting us; there were at least 1 million people w/ CFS/ME (same was true in the CLEK study, at least 1 million people w/ KC), which is what MS has & it is taken seriously now, although it used to be called "hysterical paralysis" in the early 1900s.

A lot of present research is still 'anecdotal', based on patients reports = psychological research that doesn't measure anything biological, not medical research.

I am not sure where you are getting your numbers from re: people with keratoconus. The CLEK study involved 1209 patients with keratoconus who were examined once a year for 8 years to get a better idea of changes in vision, corneal status etc. Keratoconus has always been taken seriously unlike ME/CFS. I remember picking up a medical textbook in 2007 in the UK and there was no mention in it about ME/CFS at all. Disgusting.
 
Messages
63
The therapist I seen on her advertisement for mickeltherapy it says something like

In the first session you WILL know the root cause of your symptoms after the first session and our anxiety will be a thing of the past

I did six sessions and have no idea even now what I was supposed to be learning or it was supposed to get me better other than don't be bored I got no advice at all and tbh that wasn't really helpful

At the end they always turn the blame into the patient, they have a very subtle way of doing it but they like to shame you and make you feel it's somehow your fault to shirk any responsibility they may have as a therapist
 
Messages
63
Anyone want to see the notes from Mickel Therapy you have to do, I put in a complaint and got mistreated again so I don’t care anymore, if anyone wants to see just let me know
 

justy

Donate Advocate Demonstrate
Messages
5,524
Location
U.K
Anyone want to see the notes from Mickel Therapy you have to do, I put in a complaint and got mistreated again so I don’t care anymore, if anyone wants to see just let me know
It would be great if you could post them here for people to see what really goes on in Mickel Therapy. Are you able to do this?
 
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63
Ok here’s a few, I’ve got loads I did it for a few years , I’ve prob not got them in the right order there just copy and pastes but here’s some, they’re a few years old though, tbh it made me feel really stressed and worse so I prob sound a bit eccentric in the emails I was only doing what I was asked


Monday

Had been working all weekend, felt a bit drained, went out a few times, but couldn't get myself together, so didn't stay out long

Tuesday

Felt quite similar, went to sisters as she was in hospital and some relatives were there, started to come round a bit, went back to mums, started to get the emotions and feel tense and sick, went out

Wednesday

Didn't go out but felt almost recovered from weekend, mum came home, got that tense/sick feeling again and went downhill a bit

Thursday

Felt like I needed to go out, walked in town for a bit about dinner time, went into betting shop, felt okay released tension a bit, dicided to go to watch cricket ,

went to watch cricket, as seen it on tv in betting shop, got home, mum was there, emotions started agian and i lost it a bit, had to lie down, i didnt have the energy to do anything else.

Friday - stayed in most of the day, was a bit boring but didnt want to go out, didnt really feel much emotions.

mum came home, felt okay for 10/15 mins, then she aasked me about car insurance, the emotions came then, then she got on the phone, her voice changed and i lost it, went to work at night, lasted only around an hour

Saturday - Didn't do much all day, but the emotions started at various times, managed to work 11-6am

sun - didnt really feel any emotion until about 3pm, mum was on the phone, felt overwhelemed by it, went upstairs till around 9pm, came back down and sat in living room here voice had changed due to wine and the emotions kicked it, i got a bit overhwlemed and went back upstairs, just leaving for work now, around 9.40 pm
 
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Here’s replay

Thank you for the notes. As far as I am concerned they are brilliant, as they give me a good picture of what happens in your life and how these things make you feel emotionally and physically. Well done on doing them, especially when it sounds like you are really struggling.

Have you any idea what it is about your Mum's voice changing that makes you feel bad? Has it always been this way? Is there any chance at all of you moving out? Even if you rent a room in a shared house or rent a bedsit? It seems to be one of the main things prolonging your illness.
 
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What am i supposeed to do if i dont find mickeltherapy helpful?

I did it with you a while ago but i feel much worse, i feel confused

Do you want to have a chat about it? I could ring you Thurs or Fri?

hi, i could do but im not sure really if it could help or not


Hi . Some Mickel Therapists are offering 2 free sessions in January. Would you like me to organise someone to contact you about this? You'd need to get back to me ASAP so I could organise it. The therapy has developed a lot since you last had a session, so it would probably be helpful. Anxiety tends to be from having too many emotions that haven't been dealt with, inside us. In the past it has been really difficult for you to take an action on these emotions and perhaps that is why there is that great anxiety still. It is great that you are still seeking a resolution for your symptoms and that you have never given up. That takes a great deal of courage. Could you let me know as soon as you get this email if you would like the free sessions and I will do my best to organise it for you - they would be by phone or Skype be another therapist. Or let me know if you would prefer an informal short chat with me. Cheers


It was good to talk to you last night and found how much your life has moved on in the last few years. It might not feel that way to yourself, but last time I heard from you, you were living with your Mum and only working a couple of nights a week. You've done well, moving away from home and working full time. Don't forget to pat yourself on the back. None of that is easy when you've got a chronic condition.

In the course of making enquiries to see if we had any free Mickel Therapy sessions available for you, I discovered that our head therapist, had answered an enqiry from you late last year. was worried in case you never received her reply, as she is having intermittent problems with her emails. She apologises if you never received it and says to tell you that she is still avilable to help you with treatment if you want it.
 
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63
Sorry for the delay in getting back to you.

The thing was that messed your head up a few years ago, have you spoken to a professional about it? It's obviously significant for you. What would be the best course of action so that you work your way through that?

Well done on doing these notes.

It was great that you went for a walk and great that you bought Netflix. It's really important to take an action such as these when you feel bored. It's probably a good idea also to have some activities that you are interested in pre arranged. I remember that you used to go to the gym, and you used to like football and you used to like adrenalin inducing activities. Would you be interested in starting these up again? Or have you got any activities that you would be interested in having a go at? Don't be afraid of being too tired to do them. If they are things that you genuinely enjoy doing, they will make you feel more energised.

Re: the person at work who wanted to use something that you were using and got mad at you - it made you feel angry. Remember that if you don't do anything with that anger, (ie, telling the other person in a nice way that it's made you mad and setting a boundary so they don't do it again), then that anger remains in the body as energy, which triggers the body to produce symptoms. It can manifest as pain, or anxiety and depression. It's difficult in a work situation, but telling the other person politely not to ask for equipment when you are using it, is much more health giving than holding it in.

Do you know what it was that made you feel angry near your Mum?

When you went off for a drink with the people from work, were you finding it difficulty to know what to say in general or was it when people asked if you were okay?

Anyway, well done on what you have done so far. If you send me a reply and perhaps some more notes, I'll see what I can do to advise you.
 
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63
And the last email from that therapist was this one from me to them which got no reply and I think that means the therapies over

if by professional you mean nhs then yeah i have done, i did cbt, no i dont know why i feel angry near my mum, i dont know what im supposed to do about it, im not sure if its worth mentioning because ive told people before but it doesnt help really
 
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63
I got loads more I’ll put them on if people enjoy them

I suppose people can make their own minds up if they think it’s me in the wrong or them, I’m not that bothered anyway but i justnthinkmpeople might find them interesting

If people can’t make sense of it just ask me questions but I’ve just pasted them all without editing so it doesn’t all make sense to me either
 
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63
Also if there’s any names in there please someone let me know, I find it draining reading them all but if there is ill delete them
 

justy

Donate Advocate Demonstrate
Messages
5,524
Location
U.K
Also if there’s any names in there please someone let me know, I find it draining reading them all but if there is ill delete them
Thanks for posting these up. It sounds like the Mickel therapist is convinced anxiety causes M.E symptoms due to repressing bad feelings. This is so ludicrous that i actually dont know what to say.
 
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63
Thanks for posting these up. It sounds like the Mickel therapist is convinced anxiety causes M.E symptoms due to repressing bad feelings. This is so ludicrous that i actually dont know what to say.

Even if that is true and most doctors think it isn’t, they don’t actually know how to help people with anxiety or emotions

If you read the book they give an example and there’s a guy who they wind up and he gets angry and storms out of the therapy

According to mickeltherapy the guy is Now on his way to being cured

I remember doing mickeltherapy once and leaving and then being sick on the street outside, it was so stressful having your emotions probed, I felt like an animal in a zoo but once this happens I’d imagine most people become worse, I know I did