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Daily Mail - yoga cures myalgic encephalomyelitis

Wayne

Wayne

Senior Member
Messages
4,306
Location
Ashland, Oregon
I just checked out the article and found it interesting and plausible. Here's the wrap-up at the end--looks like she did a lot more than yoga.
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Slowly, I began to feel stronger and was able to do some of the stretches. But it was the mindfulness yoga brought that affected me more deeply. I began to feel more in tune with my body.

I realised to recover fully I had to rethink my life. I changed my diet, giving up sugar, dairy and wheat, and started reading more, something I’d not done for years. I also left my husband of four years; it wasn’t easy and he’d done nothing wrong, but I wasn’t happy any more.

I loved yoga so much that I signed up for a three-and-a-half year teacher training course with the British Wheel Of Yoga and qualified in 2008. Yoga didn’t just change my life — it gave me my life back.
 
W

worldbackwards

Senior Member
Messages
2,051
I think if they put in enough versions of ME, eventually a panel will have to choose what the real one is, in a kind of 'Would I Lie to You' type scenario. This is the third in the last few weeks. I'm feeling that Daily Mail love like a savage beating.
 
Hip

Hip

Senior Member
Messages
17,852
Well, whether it was yoga, her change in diet, or some other unknown factor that led to her cure from ME/CFS, one thing is for sure: she certainly does not have ME/CFS now; if you read her website, you'll see she has run four half marathons.
 
Wildcat

Wildcat

Messages
1,446
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I don't find the story plausible at all. I had 20 years experience of hatha yoga (and Iyengar) and meditation, before ME. Hatha yoga is far more demanding than it looks, especially for beginners.

Six months into severe ME, trying doing just a few basic gentle floor postures nearly finished me off. I ended up immobile for days from doing what was really a tiny amount of yoga. I couldn't move a muscle, just my eyelids occasionally. I had no care and was basically in and out of unconciousness for days, unable to get out of bed or phone for help. Thats days without food or help of any kind. I felt I was fading away and feared that I would just fade away and die. In fact the yoga was damaging.

Although I was bedbound and immobile a great deal of the time over the next years, nothing compared to the extreme response to what (in a healthy state) would have been a brief but energising yoga practice. I didn't know what I was ill with at the time.
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Also, despite decades prior experience of meditation, it was not even possible to meditate for the first 5 years of ME.
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Gingergrrl

Gingergrrl

Senior Member
Messages
16,171
Is the "Daily Mail" comparable to something like the "National Enquirer" in the US? I'm trying to get a sense of what it compares to.
 
WillowJ

WillowJ

คภภเє ɠรค๓թєl
Messages
4,940
Location
WA, USA
Gingergrrl said:
Is the "Daily Mail" comparable to something like the "National Enquirer" in the US? I'm trying to get a sense of what it compares to.
Click to expand...

Best as I can tell, the "Sun" (which just reported that stopping eating junk food--written by a food psychologist--"cured" ME) would be most like the "National Enquirer". "Daily Mail" would be slightly less bad (probably no aliens or bigfoot, and less vicious attack pieces)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supermarket_tabloid#Red_top
 
Forbin

Forbin

Senior Member
Messages
966
Articles like these seem to suggest a different level of cultural awareness of ME in the UK (as opposed to the US).

Although there was a considerable amount of US press attention (mainly in magazines) given to CFS, née Chronic EBV, in the 1980's, so far as I am aware, articles on overcoming CFS, let alone ME, are all but unheard of in the mainstream or even tabloid press in the States today. A news presenter on US TV could never introduce a story by just using the terms "CFS" or "ME" without spelling out what the abbreviations meant. Though some people would have heard of "chronic fatigue syndrome" in the US, I don't think the percentage would be very high.

To an outsider, this seems like a double-edged sword in the UK. The greater awareness is potentially for the good, but it seems mainly driven by those who would like to sway public opinion toward the "nothing to see here - just some emotional/motivational issues" point of view.

The two issues may go hand in hand. Where there's little public awareness, there's little need to control the message. Ironically, the more you tell the public it's nothing... the more you have to tell the public it's nothing.
 
Gingergrrl

Gingergrrl

Senior Member
Messages
16,171
@Forbin I totally agree with what you said and that's why I was wondering what kind of newspaper or magazine the Daily Mail might be b/c I have never seen a story about CFS in a supermarket tabloid. And the term ME is still unknown here. I guess it is better to be invisible than to have negative press?
 
Hip

Hip

Senior Member
Messages
17,852
minkeygirl said:
One comment says:

Myalgic Encephalomyelitis is a neurological illness like MS and Parkinsons. It is not possible to recover from a neurological illness by yoga or any other form of exercise; this lady was misdiagnosed.
Click to expand...

Perhaps whoever that commenter was should read this PR article on a study looking at recovery from ME/CFS arising after mononucleosis (glandular fever): according to the study, 11 years on from getting sick, 28% were working full-time, and 13% rated themselves as recovered.

There was no mention of medications or therapies used to achieve this recovery, so presumably these recoveries were spontaneous, albeit occurring slowly over 11 years.

So in fact it looks like it is indeed possible to recover from a neurological illness, even without yoga.

I guess though if ME/CFS can slowly go into remission, and someone is following a particular therapy like yoga during that time, they may assume the therapy was the cure, whereas the cure may have been spontaneous.



I do wonder though whether enterovirus-induced ME/CFS may be more difficult to fight off than EBV-induced ME/CFS.
​
 
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Gingergrrl

Gingergrrl

Senior Member
Messages
16,171
@Hip the people in that study got sick with mono at a younger age which I think was in their favor. In addition, they all self reported as having had "mono" none had an EBV test so it is unclear what they truly had as their original trigger. This also seems totally unrelated to the claim that yoga can heal ME.
 
T

taniaaust1

Senior Member
Messages
13,054
Location
Sth Australia
Wayne said:
I just checked out the article and found it interesting and plausible. Here's the wrap-up at the end--looks like she did a lot more than yoga.
-
Slowly, I began to feel stronger and was able to do some of the stretches. But it was the mindfulness yoga brought that affected me more deeply. I began to feel more in tune with my body.

I realised to recover fully I had to rethink my life. I changed my diet, giving up sugar, dairy and wheat, and started reading more, something I’d not done for years. I also left my husband of four years; it wasn’t easy and he’d done nothing wrong, but I wasn’t happy any more.

I loved yoga so much that I signed up for a three-and-a-half year teacher training course with the British Wheel Of Yoga and qualified in 2008. Yoga didn’t just change my life — it gave me my life back.
Click to expand...

Looking at that she probably had an issue related to diet .. Candida, gluten sensitivity, food intollerances or even something like hyperinsulinemia which can greatly affect some people and cause a lot of symptoms.

I can believe many of these people may of been quite sick but I dont think they had ME.
 
T

taniaaust1

Senior Member
Messages
13,054
Location
Sth Australia
Wildcat said:
.

I don't find the story plausible at all. I had 20 years experience of hatha yoga (and Iyengar) and meditation, before ME. Hatha yoga is far more demanding than it looks, especially for beginners.

Six months into severe ME, trying doing just a few basic gentle floor postures nearly finished me off. I ended up immobile for days from doing what was really a tiny amount of yoga. I couldn't move a muscle, just my eyelids occasionally.
Click to expand...

Although I was bedbound and immobile a great deal of the time over the next years, nothing compared to the extreme response to what (in a healthy state) would have been a brief but energising yoga practice. I didn't know what I was ill with at the time.
.
Also, despite decades prior experience of meditation, it was not even possible to meditate for the first 5 years of ME.
.
Click to expand...

I too had yoga experience before getting ME.. I practiced yoga of various kinds and also taught meditation at a level higher then beginners classes.

When I got ME I couldnt do the hatha yoga classes I used to do and ended up trying to do a class with elderly people. The oldest in the class was 97 years old I think. She could do more then I could do (thou I'd had years of experience of doing yoga).

Any standing postures were dangerous for me (I no longer had any balance) and many other postures were bad too esp when if I was balanced on a arm in some way, my arm could just give out sending me nose diving to the floor. I almost ended up with a blood nose in a yoga class!!

Thou I was an experienced meditator, I lost the ability to meditate with the ME. I couldnt figure this out until my EEG scans showed my brain waves dont react how they should when you shut your eyes and relax. I had ME EEG abnormalities.
....

I also had to give up tai chi which I'd done for years. I had to give this up before I even got the OI. After I got ME I started to get very painful knots in my back which restricted my movement during Tai Chi classes and once there.. a knot could last for ages. I had a painful back knot for many many months after a class.
 
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