The role of psychology in chronic illness

[Esther12]

Psychological and exercise treatments have been repeatedly proven to not help ME patients, and a large majority report harm from those treatments.

I think that this is too strong. It's probably fair to say that psychological interventions seem to be no more effective than placebo, and don't seem to lead to statistically significant improvements of more objective measures of outcome, and that lots of patients report problems with them. I don't really follow the different CFS and ME criteria debates much though.

What makes you think I don't have PEM?

EDIT: or that i'm suggesting exercise or denying symptoms?

I think I'm going to back out of here now. I should have seen discussions would take this turn.

I didn't see anyone saying that you don't have PEM, or the other stuff. I could have missed it though, as there were some long responses here.

 

[Cheesus]

I am impressed by how extensive and intelligent your response has been, Esther. I don't, however, have the capacity - energetically or intellectually - to respond in kind. I had hoped to share with others what I have found to be very beneficial to me. Hopefully those that are open to these things can benefit, whilst others steer clear. Sometimes I forget that others' realities are very different from my own, and so what I find to be uplifting and enhancing isn't universally appreciated.

I wish you the best of health.
Cheesus

 

[Esther12]

I am impressed by how extensive and intelligent your response has been, Esther. I don't, however, have the capacity - energetically or intellectually - to respond in kind. I had hoped to share with others what I have found to be very beneficial to me. Hopefully those that are open to these things can benefit, whilst others steer clear. Sometimes I forget that others' realities are very different from my own, and so what I find to be uplifting and enhancing isn't universally appreciated.

I wish you the best of health.
Cheesus

Best of luck with everything.

I'd really encourage you to be deeply sceptical of the claims coming from people like Rankin, and to try to track down the evidence that they cite to support the claims they make. People like to believe that they have more control over their lives than they truly do, and a lot of the 'magic power of the mind' stuff plays into deeply ingrained instincts that have a long history of misleading people, and leading humans to view and treat one another unfairly.

We're all stuck in the same reality as one another, even if we view it differently. That's why it's so important to try to look critically and carefully at what the evidence shows.

 

[A.B.]

People like to believe that they have more control over their lives than they truly do, and a lot of the 'magic power of the mind' stuff plays into deeply ingrained instincts that have a long history of misleading people, and leading humans to view and treat one another unfairly.

The psychological approach equates control over self with control over the illness. It conveys the message that a person, given enough determination, has complete control over an illness. One can see why this is popular.

This self deception might be useful in a case where the person has a problem that makes them feel miserable, and where said problem gets better over time on its own.

CFS seems to be a different type of problem though, one that generally doesn't get better on its own. Then this self deception is harmful because it leads to wasting time/energy/money.

 

[Beyond]

The "gains" from my NUMEROUS self-deceptions and purely psychological approachs to my problems are always temporary. Why? Because although I have been even really better from them at times, the physical reality which comes in form of pain, some form of malaise or sleep deprivation (which means pain and malaise) always make these crystal castles tremble and fall. The positive attitudes and projects are quickly substituted by the logical "negativeness" that derives from feeling like shit again. That is what logically happens when you try to treat only psychologically problems that is both emotional and physical (the physical being the most important as it causes ongoing emotional trauma).

Meditation, good food, walking and doing some activities and psychotherapy are helpful, or very helpful, but they wont cure the specific physical dysfunctions that invariably need a physical treatment.