My last blog post was now several months ago, and I was talking about how much healthier I have been. One of the questions I posed at that point was, when should I start working? Well, the cost-of-living crisis rather forced my hand and, fed up with constantly stressing about money, I took the little… More Where was I? Freelancing with a chronic illness!
One of the hardest things I found about getting sick was the feeling that I had completely lost my identity: who I was, and what made me me. In the first years of being sick I found this really difficult. Turns out, chronic illness identity, the future and dreams, are all big and complex topics… More Chronic illness identity, dreams and the future!
One morning last week, the day after exchanging some typo-ridden, slightly feverish texts with a covidy mum, I got an email with this blog post attached. This post is her reflections on my near-miss with covid, her experience of covid, and her thoughts on my chronic illness. So enjoy! As a parent – and certainly… More Mum, Covid and Chronic Illness, a Post by Mum!
By summer this year the number of people with Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (ME) is expected to have at least doubled since the beginning of the pandemic due to the huge numbers of people developing ME from covid. So funding and support for people with ME, and money going towards ME research is more necessary than ever. ME… More 4 Things That You Can Do for ME Awareness Month
Dear ME, Its been more or less eight years that I’ve spent with you and honestly I still don’t know how I feel about you. At all. I want to say you’ve taken my life away, made me live a half life, and doomed me to rot away in bed. But that’s really only partially… More Dear ME: a letter to my chronic illness
I decided to stay a little longer in St Helena whilst I was out there, so I spent several days rearranging my travel plans, which seemed like an opportune time to write this post. Having been lucky enough to travel quite a lot, both long and short haul, whilst being various stages of sick, I… More 7 tips for travelling whilst sick
A couple of weeks ago, when I was still in St Helena, I climbed what I am considering a mountain. Sure we drove halfway up and walked the rest, but even so, I climbed way further than I have climbed in the last few years. Even two months ago, walking to the supermarket sent me… More My health is improving… finally!
Many people do not have very much experience interacting with or being friends with wheelchair users and so might not know some of the basic rules of what I am going to call wheelchair etiquette. Whilst a lot of this is common sense, it still seems to need to be said, as I have experienced… More Seven rules of wheelchair etiquette
About three weeks ago my good friend, and fellow disabled person, Alicia Shearsby, contacted me and asked if I wanted to be involved in a project with her. As a sensible person, who knows when they have too much going on, I obviously said yes despite being very busy. For the next week we both… More Branwen and the Hare Moon
I don’t think I ever really understood how detrimental loneliness and isolation can be, until I got ME/CFS and POTs. Being chronically ill can be an incredibly isolating and lonely experience, and it can feel as if there is nothing you can do about it; as if for as long as you are sick, you… More Chronically ill and isolated