Tag Archives: Myalgic Encephalomyelitis

“Do something you love. Disabled or not, it’s good for the soul!”

August 3, 2015   Carers, disability, Featured Article, health, Myalgic Encephalomyelitis

I was 16 when I became unwell

Jenny Brownlees is a freelance fashion journalist and stylist. She has ME, and went through a lot of tough times to get where she is now. One thing she found helped her was to follow her creative heart. Here she talks about her experiences.  

I was 16 when I became unwell. Enjoying life and school, becoming unwell in my teenage years hit me hard. I was very creative both in and outside of school. Happiest in art and textiles classes when doodling, making a mess, sewing, designing, I was obsessed with ‘making’ in all its forms. I loved every aspect of fashion and art. It meant so much to me, and was a huge part of my personal identity.

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What is Wrong with ME? gives a candid mother’s eye view of teenage ME

May 9, 2013   Carers, Myalgic Encephalomyelitis, Scotland

Scottish Parliament to host ME awareness event

Published on 09/05/2013 14:46

The Scottish Parliament will be the venue for an awareness event for Myalgic Encephalomyeltis (ME) on Wednesday, May 15.

Merryn Fergusson, whose book What is Wrong with ME? gives a candid mother’s eye view of teenage ME, will be the keynote speaker.

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ME isn’t 'all in the mind’, but it’s still a mystery

November 26, 2012   Carers, Myalgic Encephalomyelitis

As medical adviser to the ME Association and an ME sufferer, Dr Charles Shepherd has spent the past two decades vigorously fighting the dismissive attitude still common among the medical profession. Here, he talks about the latest research into the disorder

‘A significant minority of doctors still don’t believe in the existence of ME. They refuse to diagnose or manage it – that is totally unacceptable,’ says Dr Charles Shepherd

By Caroline Lavender

7:30AM GMT 26 Nov 2012

It was in the late Seventies that Charles Shepherd became ill with myalgic encephalomyelitis, or ME as it is better known. It was an era, he recalls, when the condition was still dismissed as “hysterical nonsense” by most clinicians. Working as a young doctor at Cirencester Hospital, he had contracted a severe case of chickenpox from a patient with shingles. “I’d been perfectly fit and healthy. The infection had resolved but I felt mentally and physically knackered and kept having to take more and more time off,” he recalls.

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