ME/CFS recovery that works for you
One-on-one somatic coaching that goes beyond brain retraining and baseline progression. Receive personalized support for your recovery.
A brief summary of the baseline and inner parts work approaches to ME/CFS recovery.
It is possible for you to recover!
It is my passion to help clients recover from ME/CFS and get back to what they love.
I have experienced the suffering of ME/CFS and the loss and hardships it causes as well. I know how difficult it is to recover. I am a single mom and faced unique challenges getting my health back. I could not have gotten to where I am now without individualized support from a coach and community that helped me believe it was possible and showed me how.
This is why I offer offer high-quality, individualized care. I want you to not only have the information you need, I want to help you put the information into practice so you start seeing results.
Baseline and somatic inner-work
No one’s experience of ME/CFS is exactly the same, and we all have different responses to various therapies. That said, there are similar patterns in most ME/CFS cases that can be addressed with coaching.
First, we end the push-crash pattern and bring stability to our body. We do this by staying within our baseline or, as I like to call it, our window of tolerance for physical, cognitive and emotional stress. When our body is living within the comfortable threshold of what it can manage without feeling worse, energy starts to come in and we can slowly and safely increase our activity. Even when I just had a few minutes of “feeling good” each day, I chose to focus on activities that were nurturing and exciting to me for those few minutes. I created an environment of safety and joy for myself, and my body responded by creating more and more energy.
The second piece of recovery is sometimes called brain retraining, but as a somatic coach I go even deeper through emotional expression and inner parts work. Expressing ourselves freely and doing inner parts work creates safety in our body from the inside out, which leads to lasting recovery from ME/CFS symptoms.
Why does this work?
When our body’s stress load becomes too much our nervous system interprets the stress as a real threat to our life. The nervous system’s only job is to keep us alive, even if that comes at a high cost. In ME/CFS, the response to this perceived threat is to completely shut down the autonomic nervous system, which would normally regulate all the bodily functions we don’t consciously control.
Still in a heightened state of fear, we feel both anxious (“wired”) and extremely tired. Our body is no longer able to tolerate any kind of stress because even “good” stress adds more sense of danger to a nervous system on high alert.
The good news is that, despite how awful it feels, there is nothing wrong with us. In fact, our nervous system is working extremely well to protect us. All we need is to do is lower the stress on our body and remind our nervous system that our normal activities are not dangerous. It seems simple, but our nervous system is going to need patience and a lot of support to release the stress response it perceives is keeping us alive.
To feel safe, we need to:
be supported by people who truly care
express our emotions and show ourselves a lot of compassion
end the push-crash cycle and build real stability in our body
feel agency in our lives and build more choice into our daily rhythms
voice our needs and let others know what we are and are not available for
listen and reassure ourselves when our body sends signals it does not feel safe.
Gradually, we do start to feel safe and become more resilient to stress. We develop self-compassion and acceptance. We build evidence that movement, cognitive exertion and socializing are safe. We get back to doing what we love while developing a new relationship with ourselves and the world. What starts as a life-crippling conditioning turns into a life-renewing recovery.
How long does it take?
This process isn’t a step-by-step linear process. It’s cyclical. We stabilize, express our emotions, and stretch ourselves - all at the appropriate time, over and over again. The nervous system releases the stress response organically as we show ourselves compassion and open ourselves up more and more to this process.
It doesn’t work to urgently push ourselves or go through the motions without a strong commitment. The nervous system can’t be fooled. It takes time and trust in the process to see lasting benefit, and everyone’s process is different.
This is why I offer high quality, individualized support for ME/CFS recovery over a minimum of six months. I know this process well having gone through it myself and walked alongside so many who are on the same path.
In 2 years I went from being house-bound and unable to talk for more than 15 minutes to now being able to exercise, work and care for my kids. I also consider myself lucky. I had the right kind of support at the right time. I would not have gotten as far as I have without the kind of personal support and accountability I now provide for others.
Everything I do is personalized to you and what works best for you. If you are curious about how I can help you with your ME/CFS recovery please feel welcome to book a consult call with me!
Body Wisdom
End the push-crash cycle and create stability
Set yourself up for restful sleep
Keep strong boundaries and prioritize your recovery
Perrin lymphatic drainage technique
Practice vagus nerve toning and nervous system regulation
Eat what energizes you
Inner Work
Uncover and heal conscious and unconscious beliefs, thoughts and stories that hold you back
Express yourself
Choose the thoughts, beliefs and behaviors that will move you forwards
Cultivate self-compassion
Mindfulness
Energy
Slowly and safely build your physical and cognitive capacity
Do what you love and energizes you
Restrengthen your body and increase ATP production
My promise to you
Integrity
I value honesty, equality and collaboration. I am a co-creator with you and will honor your values, intuition and needs as a coach should. I am not a medical professional or licensed mental health professional and will let you know if anything is outside the scope of my training.
I celebrate the diversity of gender expressions, sexual orientations, abilities, brains, cultures, ethnicities, heritages, skin pigments, religions, spiritual practices and all forms of expression that inform our humanity.
Compassion
The investment of your time, your resources, your intention and your willingness to be seen, heard and loved is something I feel honored to hold and nurture. My training is trauma-informed and sensitive to all the ways human beings suffer. I am committed to creating safe containers that are healing and nurturing.
The only way forward, truly, is through compassion and love.
Value
It takes a lot of courage to do this work, and it takes a commitment. My promise to you is to offer individualized, high-quality coaching that integrates all levels of knowing - somatic, cognitive, spiritual and emotional - so you not only have the information and tools you need to heal, you also can embody and default to the new habits you choose for yourself.
There are no other coaching programs that I know of that offer this much individual coaching support and 24/7 chat and voice support. Please let me know if your financial situation is a barrier to care as there are a limited amount of sliding scale packages available.