Chronic Fatigue Syndrome: Cognitive, Behavioural and Emotional Processing Vulnerability Factors

[SilverbladeTE]

What's shocking isn't that Chalder is talentless. It's that she is being paid to be talentless.

But of course, there's no conspiracy against M.E. patients, it's all in our minds ! Ah huh.....

You don't get such political support, honours from the Queen, even, unless it IS a conspiracy.
Conspiracy to prevent medical help.on this scale is genocide and should be dealt with as such, kid gloves off

 

[trishrhymes]

Although I think this stuff is dangerous junk, it has occurred to me that if perfectionism were linked to risk of getting ME, the reason could be simply that a perfectionist is more likely to push through and try to ignore symptoms of illness in the early stages rather than taking time out and resting.

A perfectionist mother will push on with all the home duties and child care, and these days the expectation that she will juggle all this with going out to work and not taking time off...

They may also be more likely to follow medical advice, including advice to exercise.

I see a lot of my own problem with ME getting worse over time being caused by my attitude that I damn well wasn't going to give in and bring up my kids on benefits. Pacing was a luxury I couldn't afford... Sick leave was used only if I literally couldn't get out of bed....

But ....

Anecdotal evidence is not science, and lots of people, including some I know, rested and paced from the start, and are even sicker. And I have no way of knowing whether my illness would have taken a different course, better or worse, if I'd been able to rest properly from the start.

On another aspect, I wonder about the ethics of asking family members about sick people's pre-illness behaviour and personality type. It suggests to them that the person may have been to blame for their illness. We have enough problem with this already...

 

[Barry53]

Although I think this stuff is dangerous junk, it has occurred to me that if perfectionism were linked to risk of getting ME, the reason could be simply that a perfectionist is more likely to push through and try to ignore symptoms of illness in the early stages rather than taking time out and resting.

I am sure also that if you were to study perfectionists against a range of other groups, you would find that perfectionists will be one of the groups more prone to stress anyway. In my earlier days I was (very!) unrealistically perfectionist, and I can assure people it is very stressful trying to live up to the impossible . Hopefully some of the more realistic research programmes underway might uncover the biological link between stress and ME.

 

[TiredSam]

On another aspect, I wonder about the ethics of asking family members about sick people's pre-illness behaviour and personality type.

Well if there's any risk of subjective questionnaires from sufferers not getting you the results you want, why not base your study on subjective hearsay questionnaires from those around the sufferer to make sure the actual patient doesn't have any say at all? Then turn the "results" into numbers, claim it's science and inform public policy.

It was questionnaires wasn't it, not phone interviews? Not that it makes much difference.

 

[loops]

Ha ha....I took part in a 'study' a few years ago led by Kate Rimes ( the above author). It was to test the effect of Mindfulness on CFS..... Lots of rating your 'fatigue'.....1 to 10.

At the first session we had to see how many times we could stand up and sit down in a minute. At the end of the course...we repeated the test. I suppose this was a crude way of judging the effect of the trial. I remember thinking 'how unscientific'.....and that was in the early days of gullibility.
Glad I learned Mindfulness. Had no effect on my symptoms though...obvs.

 

[Sean]

Cognitive-behavioural models of chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) suggest that personality factors such as perfectionism and high moral standards may contribute to the development of CFS.

So now I am a try-too-hard goody-two-shoes?

Last week I was immoral parasitic bastard patient who didn't want to get better.

All very confusing.

 

[dyfalbarhau]

I can get behind being a self-sacrificing perfectionist with high moral standards. That doesn't sound like a terrible thing to be, all things considered. Do I think that made me ill? No.

 

[trishrhymes]

So now I am a try-too-hard goody-two-shoes?

Last week I was immoral parasitic bastard patient who didn't want to get better.

All very confusing.

Sadly, for these idiots, a complete lack of logical consistency in their BPS model isn't going to occur to them, let alone stop them.

Just gives them more sticks to beat us with.

Patient A is sick because they're a perfectionist who won't give in and take time to rest.

Patient B is a lazy git who falsely believes they're ill and won't exercise.

Actually Patient A and patient B have a severe multi sytem biomedical illness where their cellular energy production system is broken...



I wonder whether there's some way we can subvert all this nonsense by getting a really good booklet outlining all the biomedical evidence for ME produced that Crawley's students can be made to read... Maybe send them all tickets to Unrest when it comes out.

Does anyone know whether there's a magazine or website that all psych. and med. students read? If we could ask someone like @Keith Geraghty to write an article for them... Or put in an advert for Unrest...

Just musing...

Better than crying...

 

[TiredSam]

So now I am a try-too-hard goody-two-shoes?

Last week I was immoral parasitic bastard patient who didn't want to get better.

All very confusing.

A classic case of Wolf in Sheep's Clothing Syndrome. Paper coming shortly. Probably be knocked out by tomorrow.

 

[antherder]

So now I am a try-too-hard goody-two-shoes?

Last week I was immoral parasitic bastard patient who didn't want to get better.

All very confusing.

Is your last name Jekyll?

 

[TiredSam]

At the first session we had to see how many times we could stand up and sit down in a minute.

That sounds like an extremely dangerous thing to ask an ME sufferer to do.

 

[loops]

I know @TiredSam...! They were absolutely clueless.

 

[Sean]

Is your last name Jekyll?

Certainly not!

Yours sincerely
Mr Hyde.

 

[trishrhymes]

 

[Sean]

At the first session we had to see how many times we could stand up and sit down in a minute. At the end of the course...we repeated the test. I suppose this was a crude way of judging the effect of the trial.

Try some BWT (Brick Wall Therapy)...



With practice and commitment you can even temporarily transcend the conscious self.

Though some 'experts' claim that is due to concussion.

 

[adreno]

So perfectionism and high moral standards can lead to CFS? Judging from their research, I believe it is safe to assume that Chalder et al. does not suffer any of these traits.

 

[Countrygirl]

What's shocking isn't that Chalder is talentless..

Really?

..er.................references please!

Extraordinary claims, require extraordinary evidence.

 

[Jenny TipsforME]

@adreno perhaps they're practicing resisting perfectionist tendencies out of fear of developing CFS

These retrospective questionnaires seem like a nonsense to me. What are they actually measuring? It's current attitudes about memories of past attitudes. What your current attitude is will impact (eg looking for a reason to blame former self to get a sense of cause and effect, or a positive attitude towards perfectionism as reaction to accusations of laziness "no I like to do things well"). Anyone who's done psychology 101 can tell you that memories are reconstructed each time you remember.

This could only attain credibility as a prospective study eg like the one that studied students who got glandular fever and then followed up to see who developed CFS afterwards. If the ones who got CFS were perfectionist at start of glandular fever but not the ones who didn't it could be a thing.

I thought this perfectionist stuff was done with 10+ years ago?

I can get over invested in one goal though. That might be a perpetuating factor. Eg focusing on one thing to the extent of blocking out warning symptoms and not switching off mentally from the one goal. This makes it a pacing difficulty though rather than a predisposition.

 

[Jenny TipsforME]

From the other thread on this paper

@adreno perhaps they're practicing resisting perfectionist tendencies out of fear of developing CFS

These retrospective questionnaires seem like a nonsense to me. What are they actually measuring? It's current attitudes about memories of past attitudes. What your current attitude is will impact (eg looking for a reason to blame former self to get a sense of cause and effect, or a positive attitude towards perfectionism as reaction to accusations of laziness "no I like to do things well"). Anyone who's done psychology 101 can tell you that memories are reconstructed each time you remember.

This could only attain credibility as a prospective study eg like the one that studied students who got glandular fever and then followed up to see who developed CFS afterwards. If the ones who got CFS were perfectionist at start of glandular fever but not the ones who didn't it could be a thing.

I thought this perfectionist stuff was done with 10+ years ago?

I can get over invested in one goal though. That might be a perpetuating factor. Eg focusing on one thing to the extent of blocking out warning symptoms and not switching off mentally from the one goal. This makes it a pacing difficulty though rather than a predisposition.

 

[Barry53]

getting a really good booklet outlining all the biomedical evidence for ME

Good idea, but I would suggest making it a bit more well rounded, and digestible to a much wider audience. Maybe have two broad sections:-

1. Two or three real-case examples, such as we have seen fairly recently, that gets across what ME is really like for people, and the sort of people they are ... and are not!. As I think it was Einstein said: As simple as possible, but no simpler. Engage with as many people as possible, including ME sufferers whose coping mechanism is to not get bogged down (as it may feel to them) in the details of ME research and politics, but get on with their life in other ways as best they can - my wife is one.
2. The more technical stuff, but with a brief/simply introductory bit, for those who digested '1' but quail at anything too technical.

We need to increase awareness to a much wider audience, which means much more than just putting information in front of them, but in a form and way that encourages everyone to take it up, and gain new insghts from it. Horses and water. Education in its best sense.