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 | | | | I needed only three sessions and four months. I now have my life back. I am able to make plans to go out even on week nights and I can now experience new things. I have also changed – for the better according to friends and family. I feel free. I can’t thank Dr Eaton and Reverse Therapy enough and I can’t believe there are so many people going through what I went through and think there is no cure. | | JH 2006 | | | | Read more testimonials |
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Video Interviews |
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We have a number of video interviews with ex-clients who have recovered from serious illness through Reverse Therapy.
You can watch these videos by clicking on the links inside the article. |
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Video Interviews |
We have a number of video interviews with ex-clients who have recovered from serious illness through Reverse Therapy.
You can watch any of the interviews by clicking on the links below.
To watch the interview with Jo click here
To watch the interview with Caroline click here
To watch the interview with Alex click here
To watch the interview with Francis click here
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From The Independent on Sunday - July 29th 2007 |
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Yet four years ago Hemmings was told by doctors she might never race again after being diagnosed with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, a debilitating illness which left her exhausted and aching every day, unable to take even basic light exercise. However, just over a year later, she learned about Reverse Therapy, an innovative and successful new treatment, and in February 2005 she was able to resume training again, going on to win a clean sweep of national, European and world titles. |
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From East Anglian Daily Times 8th Feb 2007 |
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Anna Stephenson was a teenager who embraced life to the full - enjoying the likes of music, dance, drama and sailing.
But the Woodbridge school pupil's life fell apart when she became increasingly tired as she studied for her GCSEs. And then, after achieving six A* and four A grades, Anna became seriously ill with the ME chronic fatigue illness.
Anna, from Grundisburgh, is now on the road to recovery from a new 'Reverse Therapy' treatment that her family are paying for privately in London.
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From East Anglian Daily Times 8th Feb 2007 |
Anna on the mend after fatigue illness
Anna Stephenson was a teenager who embraced life to the full - enjoying the likes of music, dance, drama and sailing.
But the Woodbridge school pupil's life fell apart when she became increasingly tired as she studied for her GCSEs. And then, after achieving six A* and four A grades, Anna became seriously ill with the ME chronic fatigue illness.
She was determined to continue with her studies, but had to give up everything outside school, would go home in the afternoon to sleep before doing her homework and then take to her bed for a 14-hour sleep.
Anna, from Grundisburgh, is now on the road to recovery from a new 'Reverse Therapy' treatment that her family are paying for privately in London.
Now the 18-year old is supporting the ME Research UK charity in its effort to raise awareness of the illness.
Anna, a member of the Suffolk Wind Band and Suffolk Youth Orchestra, said: "You do not realise until you have had ME how little other people know about it. A person who has ME does not look ill. They may not look tired , but it is not as thought they have a broken leg, which is obvious to see. It is such a horrible thing to have to go through, not just for the person but also for family and friends and I would not even want my worst enemy to face it."
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From Woman's Own - 9th April 2007 |
Reverse Therapy
Laurna Killin, 33, from Ayr, solved a sore joint problem by letting out bottled-up emotions
"Ten years ago, my hands became achy in the joints. I was referred for X-rays and it turned out to
be Fibromyalgia, a condition that causes pain in the body's tissues and joints.
I was prescribed painkillers to manage the condition but they were so strong they made me ill, and
I became tired and depressed.
My condition worsened until I was in so much pain I couldn't manage stairs. I needed a stick to walk
and had to take time off my work at a call centre.
Then, two years ago, I heard about Reverse Therapy, which claimed to treat the condition. I booked
an appointment. The therapist, Andy, explained the theory that the holds on to unresolved emotions,
which end up manifesting themselves physically. The treatment is called Reverse Therapy because it
reverses symptoms.
Andy asked me to keep a diary about my feelings, which I'd need to work through with him.
Even after the first treatment I felt so much better I was able to walk without my stick and a month later I stopped taking painkillers. Then over the next six months of monthly sessions, I acknowledged that I'd never recovered from the bullying I'd suffered as a child - mostly for being tall for my age. I'd bottled it up and never even told my parents about it.
It's a year since my last treatment and the pain in my joints has largely gone, except when it rains.
Other than that I feel I'm back in the land of the living and finally have my life back.
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From The Newcastle Chronicle April 23rd 2007 |
I got to the root cause of my M.E.
For three years Lyn White's life was blighted by ME until she discovered a remarkable new therapy. Health reporter Jane Picken discovered how it works and how it helped the mum-of-two.
For months at a time, former nurse Lyn White could barely manage to get dressed and make it down the stairs.
And once she did, she would be so weak it was to do little more than lie on the sofa for hours on end, only venturing out if there was someone to assist her or a wheelchair on hand.
This is how ME, or myalgic encephalomyalitis, affected Lyn for two or three month periods over the course of three years - rendering her unable to look after husband Conrad, 50, and their sons Alistair, now 21, and Christopher, 19.
But now, thanks to a new technique called Reverse Therapy, Lyn's life is back on track - with 11-mile walks around her native Durham countryside, skiing trips and kayaking in Sunderland harbour to prove it.
And as a trained therapist now herself the recovered mum is using her own experiences to help others trying to overcome ME.
"I was incapacitated on the sofa for long periods of time and the boys were left to fend for themselves in a way," remembers Lyn, 48, who lives with her family in Neville's Cross, Durham.
"When I started to get better I was so excited to be able to get out and have some fun again and I want to see other people with ME get well too."
ME, which is often referred to as or mentioned along with chronic fatigue syndrome, and is a long-term tiredness which simply cannot be cured with a good night's sleep.
It can have severely debilitating effects on a person's life and can also lead to muscle pain, as well as possible inflammation of the brain and spinal cord.
Women are more likely to get it than men, and there are an estimated 150,000 people with the condition in the UK. Unfortunately no-one knows the exact cause of ME/CFS, although some think a viral infection such as glandular fever can trigger the condition.
In Lyn's case a diagnosis came about in April 2003 when her fatigue and muscle pain became too much and the worried mum collapsed.
After suffering from a life-threatening respiratory illness Lyn had been recovering in Sunderland Royal Hospital when, with her immune system already low, she started to feel the burn of ME.
"I felt this overwhelming fatigue and heaviness throughout my body," says Lyn, who had to give up her job as a staff nurse on a children's ward.
"The mum is the lynchpin of the family and they just had to pick up where I left off.
"My calf muscles were aching and I was having difficulty thinking properly - I felt like my head was full of cotton wool. It also became really apparent when I was trying to get back to walking and I could barely make the length of the ward."
Lyn was discharged feeling weaker than ever and before long started having problems with her bowels. And 11 months later her doctor told her it was ME.
Although all the NHS could offer was a diagnosis and a small amount of support, Lyn was determined to find a way to overcome ME. But she finally embarked on Reverse Therapy after a family member sent her information about the treatment.
So what exactly is Reverse Therapy?
Essentially the treatment works by getting to the heart of the problem or the emotional and psychological reasons behind the symptoms of illnesses such as ME, depression and anxiety.
It's an educational process which teaches people to get rid of symptoms by understanding and acting on the message of the symptom.
"Reverse therapy teaches people to be aware of their bodies and act on what it wants," explained Lyn, who qualified as a reverse therapist in November.
"For example I used to get very anxious when I had ME if I was in the car and not driving, but I decided to start doing something about it by asking to drive.
"My body was telling me I was bottling my emotions up when I really needed to tell people how I felt.
"I was so impressed with how much better Reverse Therapy made me feel over the six months of treatment I decided to train in it myself.
Therapists may also suggest making small lifestyle changes or keeping a journal to identify things that worked and things to avoid.
Reverse therapy involves around seven sessions of one-to-one consultation, usually two to three weeks apart.
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From Prima - July 2007 |
Mind, Body and Soul
For Fibromyalgia and M.E., both hard for doctors to tackle, look at Reverse Therapy. It's based on research over the past ten years into the complicated relationship between the mind and the body (psychoneuroimmunology). Therapists believe trapped emotions can surface as physical symptoms and, so far, this treatment, which involves talking and keeping a diary to bring buried emotions to the surface, has an 80% success rate in the UK with fatigue-related conditions. For more information call 0870 626 0100.
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From The Observer - April 2nd 2006 |
'My body was aching so much I couldn't even wash my hair'
Interview by Alex Gibbons
A mystery illness made even the simplest tasks impossible and threatened to force Anna Hemmings out of the sport she loved. But Britain's world canoeing champion battled back to regain her title
It all started to go wrong in 2003. From the start of the year I began to feel suddenly very tired during training and would not be able to recover. It had happened before but as a rule I needed only a day to recuperate. Now, it was taking up to a week. I'd go back to training and, after two days, I was back to square one. One afternoon after training I just slept and slept. When I returned to my canoe I realised after 10 minutes that I couldn't go on. I no longer had the energy. I went to see the doctor at the British Olympic Association. He said that I had unexplained under- performance syndrome, a polite way of saying I'd over-trained. He put me on a recovery programme, which I did for two weeks, but it made no difference. I sought numerous opinions from different doctors offering a variety of treatments: acupuncture, spiritual healing, psychotherapy, yoga. Everyone said they had the solution. I'd get my hopes up then a month later they'd be dashed. One doctor even said that my body had had enough and that I should retire. Who was he to tell me to quit? There were times when I was scared that I wouldn't find a way out.
It was then, in September 2003, that I was diagnosed with chronic fatigue syndrome. And yet now it felt as if part of my body was being taken away from me. I'm a very focused person, yet I no longer had a goal to aim at. I would wake up every morning not knowing what to do. It was strange because I looked absolutely normal, yet inside my muscles were aching so badly that sometimes I couldn't even hold my hands up to wash my hair in the shower.
There is a lot of debate about chronic fatigue syndrome and how it should be treated. What happened to me was that I lost balance in my life; I became too consumed with my sport and, paradoxically, some of the qualities that helped me to become a world champion also contributed to my failing health. I was, for instance, too single-minded, too determined. I simply put too much pressure on myself. I always went to bed early, I rarely saw my friends and I always had to eat the right foods. I never gave myself a break. Nor was I good at speaking to people about how I was feeling. I have great friends and I'm close to my sister but every time they asked me how I was, I'd tell them I was fine, even if I'd been bawling my eyes out that very morning. It was the worst period of my life - and I wasn't letting anyone help me.
One afternoon, on a trip to Chicago, one of my sponsors mentioned Reverse therapy. This is all about trying to treat the causes of chronic fatigue syndrome, rather than the symptoms. It recognises that mind and body are connected, that emotional health is linked to physical health. So I began reverse therapy in September 2004, which meant looking into myself more deeply. It was hard at first, very hard. But once I changed my attitude the experience was liberating; soon I was back in a canoe and training again. I entered my first race the following spring and, in July last year, I competed in the European Championships in the Czech Republic. Everyone was telling me to enjoy the experience, but without expecting too much of myself. But of course I wanted to win. There was a real conflict going on. I was tense throughout the race, so when I won by just half a second - well, it was so special. When I started therapy, my goal was always the world championships in Perth in 2005. When I won my fourth title there I had fulfilled my dream of the last two years. I don't worry about chronic fatigue syndrome returning because I know how to identify the symptoms and do something about them. Now, I'm planning for the Beijing Olympics. The marathon isn't an Olympic event, which is frustrating for me, so I have to dedicate my training to the 500m sprint if I'm to compete in China. But at least I am competing again and that is a victory in itself.
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From the Strathspey Herald - 6th December 2006 |
Dave beats pain barrier in bid for fitness
Strathspey & Badenoch Herald - 6th December 2006
AVIEMORE bobsleigher Dave Smith has his sights set on the comeback trail after successfully overcoming an injury-plagued 18 months which threatened to end his fledgling career.
A catalogue of problems, headed by a serious back injury and a bout of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, left Smith facing the possibility of seeing a promising start go to waste after only four years in the sport.
However, the Strath athlete is now looking forward to getting back in a bob after declaring himself fighting-fit as the new winter season gets under way.
His full recovery comes despite having to endure nine months on the sidelines after damaging his back in a freak training accident attempting to weightlift 150kg in July, 2005.
While recuperating, the 28-year-old also suffered the further blow of being diagnosed with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome which left him with a further battle to overcome.
At his peak, the bobsleigher had to stop training, lost a stone in weight, and saw his strength desert him.
But since getting the all-clear from the condition earlier this year, the dedicated athlete has spent the summer months camped at the Olympic Institute in London beginning the long road back to recovery.
Smith told the "Strathy" this week that he now had his sights set on beginning 2007 with a bang by returning to competitive action at the end of January.
"I'm glad to say that I'm now in good shape and I'm feeling stronger and fitter with every training session that goes by," he said.
"I'm back working with my conditioning coach, Clive Brewer, and he said recently that the weightlifting he's seen from me is the best I've been doing for the last few years.
"I hoping that I'll be able to clean and jerk 140kg again within the next month or two.
"During my time out I dropped from 17st to 16st and lost all my strength in my muscles, but now I've put the weight back on and everyday I am getting that little bit more power back.
"I'm getting stronger and I'm certainly fit enough to train, but it's getting to that next level when I'm fit enough to compete again – that's the challenge right now.
"Hopefully I will be back in competition in January or February by getting involved in a couple of Europa Cup races with the GB 3 lads and then I can build from there."
Reflecting on his recovery, Smith said his first hurdle had been to get over the mental scars left behind from his nightmare year.
His time on the sidelines ruined his chances of appearing in February's Winter Olympics in Turin and instead Smith had to watch the action unfold at home in Aviemore.
Nevertheless, the athlete said he had used the disappointment of missing out on what would have been his first Olympics to spur him on back to health.
A talk with friend and four-times world sprint canoeing champion Anna Hemmings also helped Smith overcome his demons and begin training again.
"Having the motivation to get back to full strength was a big challenge for me, but Anna had Chronic Fatigue for three years and has come back and had so much success," he said.
"She represented Britain at the 2000 Sydney Olympics, but was diagnosed with the condition, and soon after didn't have the strength to wash her hair.
"Since coming back though, she has become a four-times world champion in sprint canoeing.
"Speaking to her really gave me a boost as it was nice to know that I was not on my own (suffering with chronic fatigue)."
Hemmings also suggested Smith went for Reverse Therapy to identify the problems that caused the chronic fatigue.
He said: "It was a combination of psychological and physiological treatment and enabled me to get a good balance in my life so that I was not doing too many good or bad things to my body.
"It worked really well and after that I had to tell myself I was over the condition and started training again."
Over the summer, some of the UKs finest sports professionals put Smith's body through its paces.
A chiropractor from English Premier League champions Chelsea FC was also drafted in to finally fix his back, and a trapped nerve was soon identified at the culprit.
"He did a lot of work on my back and I was handed a programme to help with my recovery." said Smith, who stands at 6ft 7ins.
"The staff at the Olympic Institute also did all sorts of tests on me. For one I was strapped to a machine and covered in electrodes so they could see how my muscles worked when I ran or lifted weights – we did this for five hours a day.
"I was there all summer training and I worked with a psychologist who helped the England Rugby Union squad during their 2003 World Cup campaign to get my confidence back.
"I then had the physios and doctors pushing me beyond my limits to see if the pain I felt was due to the injuries or just normal pain felt after a workout.
"I basically went through the pain barrier, but it was all worth it as I'm now back to fitness and can finally look forward to the future."
A positive Smith said he would continue to split his training between Edinburgh and the Strath – where he uses facilities at Glenmore Lodge and Macdonald Aviemore Highland Resort – to stay on course for a return to competitive action in the New Year.
He said: "I'm now not too far off where I was before the injuries and it is just so great to be back training. I'm getting closer to the standards of the rest of the GB team every day and I'm really enjoying myself at the moment.
"Just to be back involved with the GB setup has made all the effort and work worth it and I'm now hoping to bring a bobsleigh up from London to Glenmore Lodge in the next few weeks so I can practice my pushing.
"It'd be great to get a chance in the Europa Cup events in January and February and then to compete in the British Champs in Austria at the end of the season.
"After that I'm hoping to stay fit and healthy this year so I can have a chance of getting in the team for the European championships and World Cup events in 2008.
"If all goes well, I'd then like to think I could go to Vancouver for the Winter Olympics in 2010."
The athlete also predicted happier times for British bobsleighers as a whole over the next few years.
"There's 30 of us in the squad and we now have a very good programme in place.
"We have had a big boost in funding recently too, so we're hoping we will start producing over the next few years."
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From The Independent - December 22nd 2006 |
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Anna Hemmings won her fifth world marathon canoeing title this year. A great achievement given that the 29-year-old economics graduate was told by medical experts three years ago that she would have to retire from her sport after being diagnosed with chronic fatigue syndrome.
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From The Independent - December 22nd 2006 |
From chronic fatigue syndrome to a fifth women's world marathon canoeing title
Anna Hemmings won her fifth world marathon canoeing title this year. A great achievement given that the 29-year-old economics graduate was told by medical experts three years ago that she would have to retire from her sport after being diagnosed with chronic fatigue syndrome.
It is a condition that has blighted the careers of other top sports people such as Peter Marshall, the former world No 2 in squash, and for a while Hemmings thought it had done for her too. "It was a condition that left me feeling exhausted, aching with pain all over my body," she says. "I was actually scared, really scared that I would be trapped by it for ever."
She escaped with the help of a new method called Reverse Therapy, which helped her to identify the triggers that were overstimulating the brain's hypothalamus gland, which controls the body's functions.
Hemmings, whose marathons involve 18 miles of river, seems to have cracked the fatigue problem good and proper these days. She celebrated her latest world title in France three months ago by partying in St Tropez before returning home for a big night in a bar in Wimbledon Village.
"Winning the title last year just seven months after returning to training was one thing, but retaining it presented another kind of pressure," she said. She will seek to do the same again next year - but after thatwill focus on her "next big goal", the 500-metre sprint at the 2008 Olympics.
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From The Northern Echo - 26th January 2007 |
I used reverse gear to beat ME
Hundreds of thousands of people have their lives blighted by ME, or Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. Could the condition be reversed by changing our behaviour? Health Editor Barry Nelson meets a North-East convert.
Busy Staff Nurse Lyn White tried to shrug it off at first.
"My throat felt terrible, I thought it must be tonsillitis," recalls Lyn, who was working on a children's ward at a new Durham hospital at the time.
Lyn went to see her GP who agreed that she probably had infected tonsils. But overnight her condition worsened significantly.
"In the morning I felt quite panicky. I was finding it difficult to breath and the swelling in my throat meant I couldn't even swallow my own saliva," she says.
Lyn packed an overnight bag and jumped in a taxi to her local doctor's surgery. Her GP took one look at Lyn's inflamed throat and arranged for her to be admitted to hospital.
"It was terrifying. I couldn't swallow or talk and the swelling was blocking the airwaves. At one stage I thought I was going to die," she recalls.
The mother of two was given medication to reduce the swelling and an oxgyen face mask. "They put me in a bed next to the intensive care unit," she says.
Her illness was diagnosed as supre glottitis, a potentially life-threatening swelling of the glottis, the vocal apparatus of the larynx probably caused by a virus. It was while she was recovering that the staff nurse began to develop a different set of symptoms.
"About the third day into my illness I felt an incredible heaviness in my legs," says Lyn. "It felt like your batteries had run down. I was getting pains in the back of my calves and it felt like I had just run a marathon."
Doctors ran a series of tests to find out what was wrong.
"They kept telling me I might have had a heart attack but I knew that wasn't right," she says.
Lyn, who was then in her mid-40s, was allowed to go home after a week in hospital. While her throat condition had cleared up, she still felt utterly shattered.
"I just felt this awful heaviness in my limbs which wouldn't go away," says Lyn.
For the best part of a year she tried to follow her GP's recommendation and rest as much as possible. She did try to go back to work at the University Hospital of North Durham but had to go home after colleagues told her she looked "grey" with fatigue.
Still baffled by her energy-sapping illness, Lyn persuaded her GP to refer her to specialist at Sunderland Royal Hospital. It was early in 2004 that the specialist told Lyn she was almost certainly suffering from Myalgic Encephalomyelitis, otherwise known as ME.
According to the ME Association, the main national charity which represents people with this condition, ME affects an estimated 250,000 people in the UK.
Symptoms include chronic fatigue, muscular pains, digestive problems, memory lapses and what sufferers describe as 'brain fog', where patients find it difficult to concentrate.
Research into ME suggests that it has physical rather than psychological causes but there is still little hard evidence to explain the symptoms. In the worst cases some patients are virtually bedbound. Some are so weak they have to be fed by tube.
Armed with a diagnosis, Lyn was determined to find out as much as she could about ME and figure out how to get well again. "I remember deciding I was not going to be sick any more," she recalls.
She searched the internet obsessively, read every book on the subject and took "vast amounts" of supplements and vitamins, including Omega 3 fish oil. Virtually housebound, apart from trips in her wheelchair, Lyn became increasingly angry that her life had been blighted by ME.
Her husband, Conrad, a consultant in genito-urinary medicine at the University Hospital of North Durham, was "frustrated and upset" because there seemed nothing that conventional medicine could do to improve his wife's condition.
Her teenage sons helped out by pushing their mother's wheelchair and helping her up and down stairs. Lyn was at a low ebb when several newspaper cuttings from an aunt in Scotland popped through her letterbox.
"They were articles about someone who had ME who had recovered by using techniques called Reverse Therapy and Mickel Therapy," she says.
Lyn had never heard of either therapy and admitted being deeply sceptical.
"What really hooked me was the claim that this approach had an 86 per cent success rate. I thought I had to give it a go."
Lyn clicked on to the websites mentioned in the articles and became increasingly fascinated at what she was reading. She was so encouraged that she bought a manual for patients and arranged to be visited at home by a Newcastle-based therapist.
"The two approaches are based on the same underlying theory that in ME patients part of the brain, known as the hypothalamus has gone into overdrive," says Lyn.
The significance of the hypothalamus is that this area of the brain is where the nervous and hormonal systems of the body interact. According to Reverse Therapy, ME is the result of individuals consistently failing to heed signals from these nervous and hormonal systems.
Instead of acknowledging these impulses and acting on them, people ignore them, block them off and build up chemical imbalances in their bodies as a result.
The end result - according to this view - is an incapacitating illness we know as ME or Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. This approach is still controversial and the ME Association refuses actively to endorse it.
However, the ME Association accepts that there are many success stories and has a "neutral" view on whether ME sufferers should try this approach.
Initially, Lyn followed the Mickel Therapy approach but has now switched to Reverse Therapy.
"What Reverse Therapy believes is that your body is sending you messages all the time. If you ignore these sensations then your hypothalamus picks up on this," says Lyn.
"If you are feeling fear it wants you to find a way to be safe; if you are angry, it wants you to defend yourself. If you ignore them it is like a pressure cooker and all the emotions boil up."
At this stage, according to the theory, the Adrenal gland goes into overdrive flooding the body with adrenalin.
"When the feedback mechanism breaks down, hormonal and nervous messages get short-circuited and people can get stuck in that state."
Essentially, says Lyn, the message of Reverse Therapy is that you have to listen to your body rather than your head and act on these impulses.
As soon as she started having therapy and following the Reverse Therapy path, Lyn started to feel better. She had ten therapy sessions in total, some at home in Durham, some in Newcastle and some in Edinburgh.
As part of the therapy she used message cards to prompt her to remember to 'heed her bodymind rather than her headmind'.
To the amazement of her family and friends Lyn is now fully restored to health. If anything, Lyn now feels even better than she did before her illness.
"My energy levels are better than they used to be. I recently walked 11 miles around Derwentwater and I completed a sailing course, something that I last tried in my 20s," says Lyn.
However, she admits that "speaking her body" rather than her mind can sometimes be uncomfortable for those around her.
Now a fully qualified Reverse Therapy practitioner, Lyn, now 48, is keen to help other ME sufferers in the region. "You need to have a diagnosis of ME which excludes other conditions and unless you are committed it is not likely to work, " she warns.
But for her, following Reverse Therapy was "a joy" rather than a chore. "It actually makes you more real. I'm still excited about it ," she says.
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From The Daily Express - January 24th 2006 |
New hope at last for ME sufferers?
World Champion athlete Anna Hemmings stood in the shower and felt she hadn’t the strength to lift her hands to her head and wash her hair. Her muscles ached, her head was muzzy and she felt defeated and demoralised.
This was not the aftermath of one of her furiously-paced 32km marathon kayak races which had brought her four world championship gold medals. Anna had barely trained for months, was sleeping 14 hours a night and taking a nap in the afternoons, and she collapsed with weariness if she tried more than a gentle paddle.
She had Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS), or ME – an illness so debilitating it can keep patients housebound for decades. At 26 it looked set to rob her of a glittering career, her livelihood and even the very core of her identity, and no one could say how long it might go on. But last October a fit and glowing Anna was back on the podium after reclaiming her world crown in Perth, Australia, following a four-year break. “That victory was sweeter and more special than any other in my career” she says.
Now 29, she attributes her health to a controversial new treatment developed by British psychotherapist, Dr John Eaton. The treatment is based on the idea of “Bodymind”, which seeks to explain the link between the brain and physical health. Reverse Therapy Practitioners believe CFS is caused by the Bodymind reacting to emotional stresses by sending the hypothalamus into overdrive. This pea-sized area of the brain in turn overworks the adrenal glands, causing muscles to burn up too much glucose, resulting in fatigue and pain. The therapy is designed to send a message to the hypothalamus that the problems have been dealt with, allowing it to stop sending out distress signals.
Anna became so ill in the spring of 2003 while training in Florida that she had to abandon racing for the season. She then consulted the British Olympic team doctor and tried every alternative treatment. She had acupuncture and reiki, saw a nutritionist and an endocrinologist, took up yoga and swallowed vitamins and other supplements. But nothing worked.
When I met her recently during a break from training on the Thames, she recalled: “One doctor told me all I could do was rest. I asked for how long and he just said ‘Until you get better’. I’d heard of people having this for 10 or 20 years and I thought: ‘No, that’s not happening to me.” “It was very frustrating when people said things like, ‘Why don’t you get your act together?’
Some suggested I was scared of not winning again. But you don’t get to be world champion if you are lazy or not willing to put yourself on the line. It was hurtful to have people doubting my integrity.”
When Anna started the therapy, she was told to keep a symptom diary for two weeks. Then she and Dr Eaton worked out what triggered the symptoms. “Everyone has different triggers but one of the most common is not expressing emotion,” she says. “Though I felt hugely angry and sad about my CFS, I always told friends I was fine. I didn’t cry with anyone though I cried a lot on my own. I also had a lot of ‘must-dos’ in my life, including, ‘I must get ten hours sleep a night’ and ‘I must eat the right things’. “I thought I was in tune with my body but I ignored alarm bells going off all over the place. My body cried out for a bit of balance in my life and when I didn’t listen, it gave me the symptoms.”
Dr Eaton’s treatment was to write messages on cards which she had to read aloud and act on whenever the symptoms appeared. “They said things like: ‘My symptoms are with me now as a reminder to stop isolating myself.’ The next time my friends asked about the illness, I burst into tears and told them how awful it was. It was really liberating.”
Anna gave up all her other treatments. After starting the therapy in September 2004, her symptoms subsided and she was back in training last January. “It has taught me to be happier. I’ve consolidated friendships and brought more emotional balance into my life and can still do my sport at the highest level,” she said.
Dr Eaton employs 32 therapists, treating around 600 people at £80 a session. An audit of 407 cases in May found that 83 per cent reported that symptoms had gone or reduced significantly. More trials are about to begin. Dr Eaton hopes for wider acceptance for the therapy by publishing his results in a medical journal. He says that therapy sounds simple, that does not make it easy. “People are dominated by head intelligence which blocks their sensitivity to their bodies so they keep doing things that are not healthy for them,” he says.
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From The Sunday Times - January 8th 2006 |
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Britain's leading female marathon canoeist, Anna Hemmings, 29, spent 2½ years battling Chronic Fatigue Syndrome before making a dramatic recovery and winning both the European and World Championships last year As a kid I was always active. There wasn't an afternoon when I didn't do sport after school. I played judo for Middlesex; I was ice-skating at national level when I was nine. I spent Saturdays canoeing. My friends didn't get it. As teenagers they were going to parties and staying up late. If I went out at all, I'd be looking at my watch and then leave early because I had to get up at 6am to train. My life revolved round my training schedule. |
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From The Sunday Times - January 8th 2006 |
Anna Hemmings
Interview by Caroline Scott
Britain's leading female marathon canoeist, Anna Hemmings, 29, spent 2½ years battling Chronic Fatigue Syndrome before making a dramatic recovery and winning both the European and World Championships last year As a kid I was always active. There wasn't an afternoon when I didn't do sport after school. I played judo for Middlesex; I was ice-skating at national level when I was nine. I spent Saturdays canoeing. My friends didn't get it. As teenagers they were going to parties and staying up late. If I went out at all, I'd be looking at my watch and then leave early because I had to get up at 6am to train. My life revolved round my training schedule.
The worst thing about getting ill was that I lost my identity. I'm such a focused, challenge-oriented person, and when I couldn't train, I didn't have a goal. I'd wake up and think: "What do I do today? Where's the challenge?" I first went to the doctor in April 2003 because I couldn't recover from training. My muscles ached and I was constantly exhausted. To begin with, my coach was very patient, but after a couple of months he said: "Anna, you've just got to deal with the tiredness." The doctor felt I was overtraining and needed to slow down. But that didn't make any sense. I sought opinions everywhere. I saw an endocrinologist, an oriental medical practitioner, a nutritionist — at one point I eliminated red meat, sugar, wheat and dairy from my diet — but nothing made a difference. I was sleeping for 14 hours at night and napping for another couple of hours during the day. Even washing my hair in the shower was a struggle, because I couldn't hold my arms up. And because I couldn't compete, I lost my national-lottery funding and then the flat I was trying to buy. That was a really low point. My mum kept reading stuff on the internet and giving me supplements, but I wasn't getting better. I didn't want to talk about how I felt. When anyone asked, I'd say: "Yeah, I'm fine." I used to cry a lot on my own, but I found it hard to open up, even to friends, because I didn't want to appear weak. A couple of people said: "Just get your act together, Anna, and stop being lazy" — it was like turning a knife in a wound. After six months the doctor diagnosed chronic fatigue syndrome, for which there is no cure, apart from rest, and I'd tried that. I went to Canyon Ranch in Arizona and did yoga and meditation; I tried spiritual healing and psychotherapy. I spent many of those sessions in tears and I just got more and more depressed and isolated. But for my friends and family, I was still putting on a brave front. I'd spend a morning crying on my own, then when someone asked me how I was, I'd say: "Oh, fine, thanks."
I'd been out of the sport for 18 months when an employee of my sponsor, Pindar, introduced me to Reverse Therapy. Its premise is that Chronic Fatigue is a mind-body-environment imbalance, and the therapy tries to reverse that. Every day I wrote a journal recording the stresses and pressures that triggered my symptoms, and very soon I began to see a pattern. I had no balance in my life. I was consumed by my sport to the point that I would do anything to be the best, even if it wasn't making me happy. A big contributor to chronic fatigue is non-expression of emotion. The longer it went on, the more I suppressed what I felt. The other big trigger is fear, and I feared the symptoms. As an athlete, no matter how bad you feel, you go out to win. The therapist hit raw nerves. He'd say: "You must feel very isolated out there." I'd cry through every session. But it was only when I broke down in front of friends that I started to make progress. Letting everything go was really liberating. No one judged me or thought any the less of me. In fact, they made an effort to drag stuff out of me. The therapy helped me realise that I constantly put pressure on myself, not just to be the perfect athlete but the perfect sister and daughter. When I began to unravel my anxieties I got better quite quickly. After three months I went for a 10-minute run and I felt completely exhilarated. The more I did, the more confidence I gained. I honestly would not change what happened, because I couldn't have carried on the way I was. I'm so much more chilled out now. I can have a late night and my training doesn't fall apart. On the start line of my first local race in over two years, I felt pure terror, but it was also wonderful to be back on the water again. The European Championships in July 2005 was my first international race in three years, and my first marathon in four years. I was more nervous than I'd ever been, because I didn't know how I'd deal with it. It was such an incredibly tense race and such a relief to finish. Winning was the icing on the cake. For me, the biggest victory was getting to the start line.
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From Conscious Living - September 2005 |
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Sharon Matthews came down with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) in 1997. For eight years she struggled with the common symptoms of muscle pain, headaches, exhaustion, dizziness, irritable bowel and ‘brain fog’ (poor memory and concentration). A woman in her twenties, she was soon forced to give up her job in a bank and, by degrees became entirely reliant on her boyfriend to do the simplest things. She herself became housebound, fearing to walk even a hundred yards for fear she might collapse in the street. Told that there was no cure for her condition, Sharon’s life looked bleak indeed. But in the Summer of 2003 she began her first consultation in Reverse Therapy. By the following Spring she was entirely symptom-free. A few months after that she was back at work in a new job and living a full and active life. |
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From Conscious Living - September 2005 |
Sharon Matthews came down with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) in 1997. For eight years she struggled with the common symptoms of muscle pain, headaches, exhaustion, dizziness, irritable bowel and ‘brain fog’ (poor memory and concentration). A woman in her twenties, she was soon forced to give up her job in a bank and, by degrees became entirely reliant on her boyfriend to do the simplest things. She herself became housebound, fearing to walk even a hundred yards for fear she might collapse in the street. Told that there was no cure for her condition, Sharon’s life looked bleak indeed. But in the Summer of 2003 she began her first consultation in Reverse Therapy. By the following Spring she was entirely symptom-free. A few months after that she was back at work in a new job and living a full and active life.
Reverse Therapy and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome
Reverse Therapy is a groundbreaking new therapy for the treatment of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) or Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (ME) and Fibromyalgia (FM), pioneered by Dr John Eaton, a UK based academic and former psychologist and psychotherapist who has spent the past nine years researching ‘Bodymind’ intelligence and developing and refining a unique therapeutic approach to ‘Bodymind’ healing. Although Reverse Therapy can be used to treat a wide variety of symptomatic conditions, it has been mainly used for the treatment of CFS/ME, producing nothing short of spectacular results in the UK so far.
Reverse therapists consider Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, Fibromyalgia, and so-called Post-Viral Fatigue Syndrome, to be different expressions of the same underlying condition. Symptoms are created when Bodymind detects that a state of ‘dis-ease’ exists – a fundamental disharmony between Body intelligence and Head intelligence, and between environmental demands and personal needs. Specifically, Bodymind – working mainly through the Limbic system – registers that the individual is under threat from external pressures and that the emotions linked to these pressures are creating an overload within the body. This triggers the Hypothalamus – the area in the brain that is responsible for maintaining homeostasis (equilibrium) – to overwork the glands – particularly the Adrenal glands to the point of exhaustion. That, in turn, leads to overwork of the Immune system, the Gut, the Muscles and Circulation until these different systems cease to function normally – leading to the multiple symptoms described. One reason so many sufferers incur viral problems at the start of the illness is not because the virus caused the illness but because a breakdown in the Immune system led to a breakdown in the organism’s defences.
However, these problems can quickly be reversed once the Hypothalamus returns to normal function. Reverse therapy focuses on working with Bodymind healing processes in order to abolish the state of dis-ease that underlies the need for Bodymind to create symptoms in the first place.
What is Bodymind?
Dr Eaton first became interested in the relationship between the body’s intelligence and a state of ‘dis-ease’ in 1996 when his wife, Yvonne was diagnosed with a rare and debilitating auto-immune condition called Sarcoidosis. At first he noticed that his wife’s symptoms often rose or fell according to her emotional state, indicating that some symptoms may be a type of ‘distress signal’ designed to alert his wife for a need to re-establish her emotional health. He then came to believe that certain symptoms might also contain an implicit ‘message’ that - if acted upon - could reverse the body’s need to create the symptoms. Dis-ease, it became clear, was a state in which the individual had somehow lost the ability to connect to, and actualise, their emotional needs.
Further investigation led him to the realisation that body intelligence was centred in the limbic system – often called ‘the emotional brain’. Essentially, Bodymind uses emotions – neurochemical changes in the body – to warn, guide and protect us. Subtle sensations of discomfort can come up to alert us to unwelcome influences, while ‘bigger’ emotions like fear, anger and joy can teach us, respectively, to get support, assert our rights, or engage more in fulfilling relationships. It is only when these emotions, and the actions related to them, are blocked that Bodymind starts to create symptoms as a last resort – trying ever harder to get our attention to the things we need to do to restore health. In this sense all physical symptoms have a meaning and purpose and healing comes about as soon as we uncover their hidden message.
Bodymind contrasts with Headmind – the ordinary mental intelligence so many of us acquired in the Western system of education and upbringing. Headmind works on rules and concepts, expectations and demands, words and memories. Strictly speaking it does not belong to us but was given to us so, in a sense, Headmind contains all the norms of the social order. While it has its uses it can go disastrously wrong for us when it becomes an end in itself, divorced from the passion of Bodymind. This is really the basis of what is called dis-ease – a split between head and body that means we lose sight of who we really are, and of the emotions that bring authenticity and fulfilment to our lives. At that point Bodymind will step in and trigger the Hypothalamus to send symptoms to urge us to take corrective action.
“The longer we ignore those signals the louder & more pronounced & chronic the symptoms become”, says John. “ When the client overcomes the environmental trigger however, Bodymind picks up the message that there is no longer a problem and dissolves the chemical memory and symptom – or symptoms - associated with it. Symptoms then disappear simultaneously”.
There are in fact three stages of ‘dis-ease’ in people with CFS/ME or Fibromyalgia. The first stage is an alarm reaction – or ‘a wake up call’ - where the body triggers a series of hormonal changes that place the body on red alert. If the body’s messages are ignored at this stage, in time ‘dis-ease’ progresses into a state of resistance. In this stage Bodymind realises that its early warning signals are being ignored and that we are continuing to resist the need for change. In the resistance stage symptoms begin to intensify and become more chronic. Finally, if we continue to ignore the body’s messages – if Headmind keeps blocking our emotions and needs - we eventually reach a state of exhaustion. In ‘The stalemate stage’ our ‘Bodymind’ is still trying to keep the body on red alert but our body’s hormonal system – and other functions within the body - can no longer cope having reached the limit of their ability to keep going under emergency conditions. Symptoms then worsen and become even more chronic and a vicious cycle begins.
What is Reverse Therapy?
Reverse Therapy is essentially a Bodymind healing process. Although it involves face-to-face consultations without physical massage, medication or supplements it is not a form of psychotherapy. John is adamant that psychotherapy is not appropriate for people with CFS or Fibromyalgia as they do not have a psychological problem. Any suggestion that this could be the case he believes to be not only insulting but wrong. Sufferers with these conditions have a non-specific illness, expressed as a glandular disorder, creating real physical symptoms. But the appropriate form of treatment he recommends is one which addresses Bodymind’s need to create symptoms in cases of emergency.
“Most forms of Psychotherapy focus on getting rid of symptoms, he says, but Reverse Therapy doesn’t do that. It works with symptoms rather than against them. Reverse Therapists don’t focus on dreams or work with childhood memories and - most importantly - they don’t try to change peoples’ thoughts about the past. What Reverse Therapy does is to help people become more aware of their body’s communications”.
Reverse therapy is really an educational process in which clients learn to understand the split between Headmind and Bodymind, raising their awareness of Bodymind communication through feelings, sensations, emotions and symptoms.
By learning to attune to Bodymind – and Reverse therapists use a variety of sensate focusing activities to do this – people gradually uncover the hidden message of the symptoms. A journal is used to pinpoint increases in symptoms and specific situations in which that occurs. At that point the Reverse therapist collaborates with the client in order to put together new strategies for the expression of emotion, and new activities to reduce external pressures. Empowering the client through applied learning is at the core of therapy.
The ingredients that make up Reverse Therapy aren’t new – it has been greatly influenced by the groundbreaking work of Ernest Rossi into the psycho-biology of mind-body healing and the ideas of Milton Erickson in particular (also Eugene Gendlin, Hungarian Psychologist, Hans Seyle, Dr Candace Pert and Fritz Perls’ Gestalt Therapy amongst others) - the synthesis and step-by-step treatment process is unique. He also claims that, although the process has taken years to develop and refine, it is in fact a relatively easy process to follow and understand.
“Treatment is essentially a simple, educational and collaborative process where clients not only learn about their illness but become active partners in their own healing”, Dr Eaton says.” The solution is in every client’s hands and it starts by them learning how to work with the body’s own intelligence – with Bodymind. Indeed, most clients actually enjoy the treatment, it empowers them. These factors alone are the reasons why Reverse Therapy has been so successful”.
Reverse Therapy differs from psychotherapy approaches in a number of ways. The first is the fact that Reverse Therapy is not interested in trying to work with or change Headmind – our attitudes, thoughts, beliefs, values and ideas – in fact, it bypasses it, focusing instead on action and emotion. Nor do Reverse therapists accept the existence of the ‘Unconscious Mind’, arguing that all its key attributes – instincts, passions, intuitions, emotional memories, automatic reactions and associative learning – can be more easily explained by looking at Bodymind. This holistic perspective restores the unity between mind, body and person and is in line with most of the newest advances in research into the biochemistry of the brain and nervous system.
The second difference – and perhaps the most important – lies in activating the symptom message. This process actually lies at the core of Reverse Therapy. Knowing why a symptom is there is merely a Headmind response and is not enough: the message needs to be consistently and decisively acted upon before Bodymind can feel able to reduce symptoms. Initially, Reverse therapy investigates what was happening in the client’s life when symptoms first began and clients are asked to recall events, feelings, sensations and emotions associated with the symptoms to get a sense of what the body’s intelligence was - and is - trying to encourage them to do. Obtaining an accurate symptom message is crucial to effective therapy and this requires considerable skill on the part of the therapist. One of the key qualities Reverse therapist must possess in order to be effective is an acute sense of Empathy, which enables them to develop their own feeling for what is going on in the client’s intelligent body.
However Dr Eaton believes that a problem may occur when the condition becomes prolonged. When this happens, the ‘illness experience’ itself – of feeling ill, disabled, frustrated, rejected, abandoned and distressed - can create yet more environmental pressure. This fresh pressures can then create further changes in the emotional brain and HPA axis and intensify symptoms. This too can be resolved in Reverse Therapy.
“Because sufferers are desperate to get well they can become very sensitive to the appearance of symptoms and so frequently ‘scan’ their bodies, although most are not conscious of doing this . After a while this checking becomes a habit, its connection with fear is picked up by the emotional brain, triggers an alarm reaction in the Hypothalamus and eventually a new chemical memory is created – but this time for the experience of illness!”, he says.
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From The Daily Telegraph – August 22nd 2005 |
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For Anna Hemmings, the Sydney and Athens Olympics tell two very different stories. In 2000, the professional canoeist was a member of the British team, but just four years later, she was in no position to compete against the world's best. Hemmings was suffering from chronic fatigue syndrome, and was so exhausted that she slept for 15 hours a night and was sometimes too tired to wash her hair. |
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From The Daily Telegraph – August 22nd 2005 |
| 'Reverse therapy' helped cure a champion canoeist's exhaustion.
Christina Hopkinson reports
For Anna Hemmings, the Sydney and Athens Olympics tell two very different stories. In 2000, the professional canoeist was a member of the British team, but just four years later, she was in no position to compete against the world's best. Hemmings was suffering from chronic fatigue syndrome, and was so exhausted that she slept for 15 hours a night and was sometimes too tired to wash her hair.
Anna Hemmings says her recovery from chronic fatigue syndrome is thanks to Reverse therapy's 'mind-body healing process'
A year later, and it's all change again. Last month, Hemmings won the 32km marathon in the European Championships in the Czech Republic, thanks, she believes, to a revolutionary treatment for her condition. She's now gearing up for the World Championships later this year, and the 2008 Olympics.
Things began to go wrong in April 2003. "I knew I didn't have a cold or flu," she says, "but I was exhausted and my muscles ached. I was sleeping lots and was generally fatigued." She went to see British Olympic doctor Richard Budgett, who diagnosed her condition as "unexplained underperformance syndrome", thought to affect between two and 10 per cent of elite endurance athletes.
"He didn't seem to think it was that serious, so he put me on a rehab programme which meant I went out on the water for low-intensity sessions for two weeks. But at the end of the fortnight, I was still tired. I couldn't perform at the British team trials and by June, I'd stopped training altogether."
Having assumed recovery would be quick, Hemmings began to panic. "It was coming up for the Olympic year and I was beginning to get desperate. And it wasn't like having a broken arm - I looked fine, so people didn't understand how I felt."
In September, Hemmings was diagnosed with Chronic fatigue syndrome, the debilitating and little understood illness that affects between 120,000 and 250,000 people in Britain. She tried Oriental medicine, acupuncture and yoga, and consulted a nutritionist and an endocrinologist, but nothing helped ease the exhaustion. "It felt like I was searching for a needle in a haystack that might not even be there."
A chance conversation led her to explore a controversial treatment called Reverse therapy. "It instantly made sense to me," she says, "because it was described as a 'body-mind healing process', in recognition that the physical and the psychological were connected."
Practitioners of Reverse therapy believe that emotional blockages in the mind cause the hypothalamus gland to overreact, leading to responses in the pituitary and adrenal glands that put the body into a state of red alert.
In her first session with the session's founder, Dr John Eaton, they analysed what Hemmings had done for six weeks before the symptoms developed. She had changed coaches and was living in Florida, away from her family and friends. "This told us that her illness had a lot to do with getting the balance right between work commitments and spending time with people who are emotionally supportive," says Dr Eaton.
Hemmings rated the severity of her symptoms on a scale of nought to 10, and kept a journal so she could relate them to other aspects of her life. "I didn't tend to get them 24/7, but certain activities and environments were triggers."
During her subsequent sessions with Dr Eaton, they studied the journal to identify those triggers. "We realised that my life was imbalanced and that I was bad at expressing emotions. Every time there was an unresolved emotional issue, it left behind an emotional discharge that built up.
'And that's it... just conversation, a journal and some flash cards'
"Of course, you have to be dedicated to be a champion, but I went over the top," she says. "I was too single-minded and couldn't admit to any signs of weakness."
When the Reverse therapy sessions came to an end, Dr Eaton gave Hemmings message cards to read every time she suffered the symptoms. "I'd read a card, which said something like, 'My symptoms are with me now as a reminder to stop isolating myself', and it would encourage me to confide more in people close to me and to let them help me."
And that's it. No treatments, tablets or massages. Just conversation, a journal, and some flash cards. Yet Hemmings's recovery has been remarkable. In January, she began to train again. Having missed almost two years, her fitness returned quickly, and she has begun to win championships again.
Dr Basant Puri, an expert in chronic fatigue syndrome at Hammersmith Hospital, London, is sceptical that a therapy based on talking could reverse the effects of the illness. "This would refute all the powerful evidence to suggest that it's caused by a viral infection," he says. "The brain is full of mysteries, but I can't think of a mechanism by which talking through symptoms would 'cure' someone."
Dr Puri has found that the most dramatic improvements occur when patients take a combination of EPA (Omega-3 fish oil) and virgin evening primrose oil. "This works with CFS sufferers, but often patients who are referred to me have another condition, such as, for example, depression."
But Hemmings is adamant that her illness was neither viral nor psychological. "Recognising that there's a mind element to it is different from thinking that it's all in the mind," she says. "That's what works with Reverse therapy - it recognises that your emotional and physical health is so closely linked."
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From The Art of Healing - August 2005 |
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Janice Sutton, a freelance journalist who worked with BBC Radio for 10 years before moving to Australia, reports on Reverse Therapy - the radical new approach to Bodymind healing that is coming to Australia in November 2005. |
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From The Art of Healing - August 2005 |
Reverse therapy - a new treatment for Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and Fibromyalgia
Janice Sutton, a freelance journalist who worked with BBC Radio for 10 years before moving to Australia, reports on Reverse Therapy - the radical new approach to Bodymind healing that is coming to Australia in November 2005.
Sharon Matthews came down with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) in 1997. For eight years she struggled with the common symptoms of muscle pain, headaches, exhaustion, dizziness, irritable bowel and ‘brain fog’ (poor memory and concentration). A woman in her twenties, she was soon forced to give up her job in a bank and, by degrees became entirely reliant on her boyfriend to do the simplest things. She herself became housebound, fearing to walk even a hundred yards for fear she might collapse in the street. Told that there was no cure for her condition, Sharon’s life looked bleak indeed. But in the Summer of 2003 she began her first consultation in Reverse Therapy. By the following Spring she was entirely symptom-free. A few months after that she was back at work in a new job and living a full and active life.
Reverse Therapy is a groundbreaking new therapy pioneered by Dr John Eaton. Although Reverse Therapy can be used to treat a wide variety of symptomatic conditions, it has been mainly used for the treatment of CFS, producing nothing short of spectacular results in the UK so far.
Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS), also known as Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (M.E), Post Viral Fatigue Syndrome (PVFS) or Chronic Fatigue & Immune Dysfunction Syndrome (CFIDS) is a relatively common, complex & genuine physical condition that can cause profound and often prolonged illness and disability in people of all ages. Although the illness is officially recognised by the World Health Organisation, The US Centers for Disease Control (CDC), the UK Government and, in Australia by The Royal Australasian College of Physicians - who three years ago produced Clinical Practice Guidelines for the management of the condition - CFS/ME still remains a controversial and baffling illness. Unfortunately, the ongoing controversy has only served to fuel the widespread ignorance, misconception, scepticism, prejudice and even hostility that exists within the medical profession and wider community about the illness.
“For a CF person to be listened to, understood and believed is a rare experience for them”
(CFS sufferer).
A recent UK Government report into CFS/ME suggests that the broader impact of the condition, even in its milder form, can be extensive with quality of life often diminishing more severely than for any other chronic illness. Disability is said to be on a par with Multiple Sclerosis and Rheumatoid Arthritis. Action for M.E. (UK) says that the condition not only imposes a substantial personal, social & financial burden on sufferers and their families, but the lives of those who are severely affected - or those with longstanding illness - are also often profoundly compromised. In fact, it seems that all too often the immobility and isolation experienced by many sufferers can lead to isolation and ‘invisibility’ - an experience that often goes hand in hand with the gradual - and often insidious - erosion of self esteem and confidence as relationships crumble & finances buckle under the constant strain of trying to cope with prolonged unemployment and disability without the support they need. Indeed, the emotional fall out for people with CFS/ME can be severe with many people with CFS/ME experiencing an array of complex emotions: from confusion, fear and uncertainty - particularly pre-diagnosis - to feelings of denial, anger, abandonment, invalidation, victimisation, guilt, shame, hopelessness and grief as sufferers struggle to accept the loss of their old life.
“All in the mind’ attributions are not only wrong and unfair, they only serve to compound sufferers’ confusion and misery. All too often their illnesses are dismissed out of hand, or if taken seriously, they are told there is nothing to be done for them”……. “ But Chronic Fatigue Syndrome is a genuine physical condition and the symptoms are very painful and very real. Sadly most sufferers get little or no support and many have to battle to get even their most basic needs met”, says Dr Eaton
Three years ago the RACP conservatively estimated that between 200-700 cases per 100,000 people in the UK, USA & Australia have CFS/ME. Today, numbers are said to have reached almost epidemic proportions, with more than 1 million people in the UK alone said to have CFS/ME. There is still no specific diagnostic test for the illness, with positive diagnosis relying on the presence and pattern of certain characteristic symptoms and by ruling out other medical conditions such as anaemia, coeliac disease, chronic infection, malignancy, immunodeficiency, thyroid disease, sleep or mood disorders to name a few.
Reverse therapy regards CFS as a multi-system disorder - affecting the Immune system, Endocrine system, Central nervous system, Sympathetic nervous system, and the muscles, gut and circulation. Australian, US and UK Chronic Fatigue Associations estimate that the prevalence of the disorder may be as high as 200 per 100,000 people. This could mean that there as many as 40,000 cases in Australia, many of whom remain undiagnosed. From the Reverse therapy point of view CFS is a serious physical illness created by the central nervous system and is not a psychological problem, Symptoms are created automatically by reflex Neuro-chemical reactions that lead to disorders in the Hypothalamic-Pituitary-Adrenal (HPA) axis. Sufferers are not conscious of these complex Neuro-chemical changes and – unless they enter Reverse Therapy – are unable to control them. The key to working with CFS, and similar non-specific illnesses, lies in realising that the symptoms are produced by the body in order to warn, guide and protect the individual from harm. In that sense the body is exercising an intelligence of it’s own, which John, and many other researchers call ‘Bodymind’,
John first became interested in the relationship between Bodymind intelligence in 1996 when his wife, Yvonne was diagnosed with a rare and debilitating auto-immune condition called Sarcoidosis. At first he noticed that his wife’s symptoms often rose or fell according to her emotional state, indicating that some symptoms may be a type of ‘distress signal’ designed to alert his wife for a need to re-establish her emotional health. He then came to believe that certain symptoms might also contain an implicit ‘message’ that - if acted upon - could reverse the body’s need to create the symptoms.
Finally, his investigations led him to the realisation that the body has an intelligence all of its own and that this intelligence was centred in the limbic system – the so-called ‘Emotional brain’. Essentially, he believes that all physical symptoms have a meaning and purpose and that healing can come about as soon as we uncover the deeper meaning of the messages the symptoms are trying to convey to us.
Bodymind’s main purpose is to promote health. It does this by monitoring the efficiency of the different systems under its control, maintaining a balance between external demands and internal resources, and using emotions and symptoms as feed-back to warn the person when he or she is under threat. Bodymind also actively seeks the maximum of pleasure, satisfaction and personal fulfilment – and symptoms can arise when these are lacking, such as often happens, paradoxically, in states of illness – Bodymind sends further symptoms to warn us not to give up activities that can get us back on the road to recovery!
Another realisation that led forward to Reverse therapy was the finding that some types of illness – those that John calls in his book ‘non-specific illnesses’, which include CFS, Fibromyalgia, Irritable Bowel Syndrome, certain Auto-Immune conditions as well as some Skin disorders, Circulatory problems and Pain conditions – are linked to the state of ‘dis-ease’.
Dis-ease arises when we are profoundly out of sync with our own deepest needs, when Headmind and Bodymind are in conflict, we have lost the balance between external pressures and personal needs and, as a result, have lost touch with who we really are. This state of dis-ease, which is picked up by Bodymind’s sensitive, shielding, mechanisms, triggers the need for Bodymind to ‘up the ante’, using symptoms as a more urgent warning signal that corrective action is more and more urgently required. Chronic Fatigue Syndrome fits the picture of a disorder in which symptoms are created through glandular dysfunction, but which points to the action of Bodymind working through powerful mechanisms in the Emotional brain.
In fact it is the Hypothalamus – the ‘master controller’ of the glandular system, which sits just underneath the Emotional brain that is key to understanding the development of CFS. The job of the Hypothalamus is to translate the perceptions of the Emotional brain into hormonal messages working mainly through the Pituitary and Adrenal glands. When the Bodymind feels that we are under threat in some way – and also that we are failing to heed it’s warning signals, it triggers the Hypothalamus to put the organism on ‘red alert’ and to use symptoms as a last resort to warn us that we are in jeopardy. At that point Bodymind pauses to check whether we are taking corrective action to restore emotional balance to our daily schedule. But if unhealthy situations continue – whether at work, in relationships or in the home, then the Hypothalamus becomes persistently over-active, leading to a breakdown in the organism’s delicate feedback control over the different body systems. At this point the symptoms may become chronic and Bodymind stores away a cellular memory in the Emotional brain about the problem, so that each time similar situations come up the cellular memory activates the Hypothalamus again.
“The longer we ignore those signals the louder & more pronounced & chronic the symptoms become”, says Dr Eaton. “ When the client overcomes the environmental trigger however, Bodymind picks up the message that there is no longer a problem and dissolves the relevant cellular memory and the symptoms associated with it. Symptoms can then disappear pontaneously”.
Reverse Therapy works by taking the side of Bodymind (rather than Head intelligence) and finding out what it is that the body is trying to ‘say’ through the symptoms. Although it is a talking cure Reverse therapy is not a psychotherapy but a Bodymind healing process. Most forms of Psychotherapy focus on getting rid of symptoms but Reverse Therapy doesn’t do that. It works with symptoms rather than against them. Reverse Therapists don’t focus on dreams or work with childhood memories and - most importantly - they don’t try to change peoples’ thoughts about the past. Nor do Reverse therapists work with beliefs or other cognitions. Still more radically, Reverse therapists do not actually agree that there is such a thing as ‘The Unconscious Mind’. Instead they argue that most of the unconscious processes that produce emotions and symptoms are the work of Bodymind.
At the heart of Reverse therapy lie three core processes that complement each other. The first is to investigate the history of the symptoms, focusing particularly on what was going on in the client’s life when symptoms first appeared, and also on more recent situations in which symptoms were re-triggered. As this investigation unfolds, clients are taught how to attune to Bodymind communication using simple body-focusing techniques – what Reverse therapists call ‘going into your Body’ rather than ‘staying in your Head’. In this way, clients develop intuitions about the emotions that Bodymind is encouraging them to express. And that, in turn, leads to the discovery of the ‘symptom message’ – the specific, corrective actions Bodymind is calling for in order to abolish the state of ‘dis-ease’ and restore emotional balance to the client’s life.
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From Grazia - 25th July 2005 |
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Athlete Anna Hemmings is tipped to win at the European Championships next week. Yet just a year ago, the canoeist was crippled with fatigue. Here she reveals how a revolutionary new treatment saved her career. |
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From Grazia - 25th July 2005 |
Athlete Anna Hemmings is tipped to win at the European Championships next week. Yet just a year ago, the canoeist was crippled with fatigue. Here she reveals how a revolutionary new treatment saved her career.
People assume that ME is a disease that affects unhealthy or lazy people, but I’m a professional athlete. When I first felt shattered, I assumed I’d been overdoing it and had a few early nights. But I kept getting more tired and my muscles wouldn’t function. Eight weeks later, I had to give up training. I went from exercising 16 hours a week and sleeping nine hours a night to no exercise and sleeping up to 15 hours. Some days, washing my hair was too much.
My doctors believed I’d been over training. Finally, after six months, the sports Team GB doctor diagnosed chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS), as ME is now known. I was terrified my career was over, as there’s no recognised treatment. Since I was eight, my sport had meant everything to me.
No one could say why I’d developed CFS as tests didn’t reveal a cause. Then, last summer, a friend told me about Reverse therapy, a new treatment with amazing results. It’s based on medical evidence that negative emotions, like anxiety, emit a chemical discharge in the body. If left unexpressed, these can build up, switching on symptoms like exhaustion. I knew nothing was wrong with me physically, so it made sense.
As part of the treatment, I was asked to keep a diary of my symptoms. After a few days, I saw I was writing the same thing, that I was terrified. It dawned on me that I was terrified of failure, and I’d been hiding it most of my life. I’m so self-reliant and focused on winning, I hadn’t let myself dwell on fears.
During sessions, we’d discuss times when I’d hidden my feelings. The therapist also wrote messages on postcards for me to read when I needed to. One reminded me to be open about my illness. So if people asked if I was better, I should say, “ Actually, no.” It was like being forced to change my personality and I was in tears after every session. But I could feel it working - I had to score my symptoms on a scale of one to ten and each session my score went down. After three months, I was averaging three, and I felt well enough to go out in my kayak and do some training.
Incredibly, three months later, my training was going so well that it was almost as if nothing had happened. This May, I won two 15-mile races and I’m back in the national squad. I’m now preparing for the World Championships and the Olympics in 2008. I can’t believe it’s all turned around so fast - I feel healthier, mentally and physically, than ever.
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