The perception exists that people with CFS are simply "afraid" to do things and need to be coaxed to try to do more.
Nothing could be further from the truth. When a person with CFS says "I can't", they mean that they have tried and failed, not that they are too afraid to try. That may be true of people with depression, but cortisol tests prove that CFS is not depression.
I spent yesterday resting in hopes of running some errands today. By the time I got to the second store, my back was in such spasm that I couldn't bend over to look at things or pick up the bag that I'd set on the floor. By the time I was through there, the spasms were so bad I could barely walk and I wasn't sure how I was going to get home.
I've had to hand off work to someone else today because a brief shopping excursion did exactly what I've tried to tell doctors it will: left me in immense pain and barely functional. Yet when I told doctors this is what actually happens, they told me that I'd be amazed what I could do if I tried. Yes, I am amazed at how bad the symptoms get when I try to do what the doctors say I should be able to do easily, and amazed at how readily they dismiss my first-hand observations and substitute their baseless speculations.
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