I had the great pleasure of listening to Dr Sarah MyHill speak at my local ME groups annual conference this week. I’m afraid I didn’t take notes so I can’t really give you a resume of what was spoken about, (I was pretty tired after my previous days travel back from Spain), but I do want to share some of my observations.
This small, unassuming woman dressed as though she was going to take her dog for a walk on a farm, kept 70 people, most of whom probably had attention difficulties, enthralled for the best part of 4 hours. Yes it was exhausting! Fired by passion, she also talks very fast, which makes it all the more exhausting to listen to for such a long time, even with a break!
My most profound impression is here is a woman who knows what she is talking about; a woman who genuinely wants to help; an woman who recognises the desperate plight of the ME/CFS warriors who have, for so long, been more or less abandoned by the majority of the medical profession; a woman who will do all in her power to make it possible for as many people as possible to take control over their health and fight the specific underlying causes of their fatiguing illness.
Everything she spoke about made perfect sense to me in terms of my own experience of this condition. It just fit! She prefers to use the term CFS, recognising that there is no one cause of this condition, pointing out that fatigue results at any time when energy production is unable to keep up with energy expenditure. Her general approach is to look at the biological mechanisms of fatigue, to help each individual understand what exactly is missing or blocking their energy production machinery. She talks both in simple analogies which every lay person can relate to and about complex biochemical processes for those who need to fully understand what is going on.
Her down to earth holistic approach gives rise to some extremely controversial opinions as far as conventional medical wisdom is concerned, but conventional medical wisdom has done little for us so far, so perhaps it’s time to try a new way.
I now have a great desire to read both of her books ‘Diagnosis and Treatment of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome: Mitochondria, Not Hypochondria’ and ‘Sustainable Medicine’. I didn’t have the cash with me to buy them at the conference but they will definitely form a part of my library soon! The things she talked about at the conference are definitely worth looking into further.
One thing she said that I wholeheartedly agree with, is that get the body 51% better and it will do the rest itself. My approach is to help people to do this by getting better at keeping energy expenditure safely within what can be produced, and to use body/mind/spirit techniques to help make a little more energy available and to minimise any wasted energy. Although her approach is also quite holistic, her specific skill is helping people to fight the underlying biological causes of poor energy production.
Her aim is to make tests which would highlight specific energy production challenges, available to all, with her book offering a foundation for interpreting them, as she cannot keep up with demand for her services. She is also working on setting up a ‘natural health service’ website, as a forum for finding and rating natural health service providers! Good Luck Dr Sarah Myhill and thank you for working so tirelessly on our behalf!
