I Quit!

It’s my birthday today, and I’ve decided it’s time to make a few changes in my life. Principally, I’m quitting my mostly-full-time job of working on recovering from Chronic Fatigue Syndrome so I can focus on other things; like having a great life!

My symptoms are relatively mild now: anxiety, tension in my head, runny nose and tiredness mostly in the afternoons. But they’re not so incapacitating now. Having an afternoon siesta a few days a week seems to work for me now; perhaps I should move to Spain or something? I haven’t had one of those killer headaches in a while, touch wood, and so long as I get a decent sleep at night and don’t go out more than 4 or so nights in the week, I can keep them at bay.

My fitness is really good now, probably better than most 46 year old guys, so I’m pretty capable physically. I’m still applying the principles of Mickel Therapy and some of the stress-reduction tools from the Gupta Program; but from now on that’s going to take a back seat to actually getting on with life. I suspect part of the anxiety I feel now is really about not moving forward towards my future goals; which has seemed impossible when I haven’t been feeling well… but that’s continuing to improve.

I believe that a full recovery is now just a matter of time, so long as I continue to maintain a healthy lifestyle doing things that I love. That will mean going out more, rebuilding a new social circle, connecting with healthy inspiring people with a positive mindset, getting some acting work and finally pursuing my dream of doing comedy.

Unfortunately this blog is a distraction to moving forward, so I won’t be writing here any more. If you want to keep in touch, please subscribe to my home page. I initially set this blog up to track my progress on the Gupta Program, but then it kept going after I didn’t get the result that I wanted and kept searching for other alternatives. Recovery is taking longer than I would have liked, but it does seem to be happening bit by bit.

I made a commitment to myself when I was at my lowest point that I would find some way out of this nightmare, and then after 12 months of full health I’d tell everyone how I did it. Why the 12 months? Because I got tired of having people say they’d recovered when they weren’t actually back to a full 100%, or that they had found “the answer” and wanted me to try it too even though they weren’t really better yet. Eventually I learned to say “get back to me in 12 months time and let me know how it’s going for you”.

I’m not quite where I want to be yet, but I’m no longer in a constant state of fear over the whole thing, so the bulk of my suffering is over. I’ll be back in a years time or so to honor my promise. In the mean time if someone were to ask me now how to recover from CFS, I’d point them in the direction of graded exercise and Mickel Therapy.

Thanks everyone for being there for me when I needed support the most. It’s been a wild ride. I wish you all well in your recovery; remember that you can get better. Never give up. It takes time and patience but I believe it’s possible, you’re capable. 🙂

Love,
Graham

Update 15-Aug-2016: Turns out I wasn’t as well as I thought, and I didn’t quit after all.