The title of this post is from one of my favourite Aztec Camera songs and it reminds me very much of when I first got ill, when ME punched into my life, and everything was so frightening and terrible. And on the subject of letters, I am at this moment bowled over by the wonderful Countess of Mar, a longtime advocate for people with my illness (she has been ill herself from organophosphate poisoning), who has just written a dazzling open letter to Simon Wessely.
After the article in the Independent recently, in which the Countess of Mar and others suggested Simon did not deserve the Maddox medal, there was an utterly predictable and nonsensical response from Esther Crawley and her friends, mainly psychiatrists and psychologists. Responses to her letter are at bottom of the Indy letters page, you need to scroll down.
I'd decided not to blog any of this because I'm so very bored and exhausted by the Wessely school - as I've said elsewhere Simon gets himself more coverage than the American presidential elections.
I'd decided not to blog any of this because I'm so very bored and exhausted by the Wessely school - as I've said elsewhere Simon gets himself more coverage than the American presidential elections.
But the letter from the Countess of Mar just had to be blogged.
Maybe, maybe, maybe, just maybe these 'bio-psycho-socialites' will now leave us the hell alone.
Just maybe.
*Simon's response to the Countess of Mar, and her reply to his reply.
** The entire Mar-Wessely thread is now here.
*Simon's response to the Countess of Mar, and her reply to his reply.
** The entire Mar-Wessely thread is now here.
5 comments:
We can but hope.
And thanks for the other links. I did not know about the other letters. I will check them out.
Definitely worth blogging about, by the way!
Hey Amy, As I often say I do not know how I would cope with the machinations of the Wessely school if I was still severely ill and bedridden, it would be so frightening. Though his influence still appals me. In the 80s we were, in a way, better off, we were not harrassed like this. Yes, we had the yuppie flu label, but we were not under the thumb of the psycho-socialites as I now think of them. We were allowed peace to be ill. Thankfully, I was diagnosed long before he had influence, and moreover we do not have these CFS/brainwashing clinics up here. I just hope the Countess's letter can make a real difference. Or will she be branded an extremist too? I imagine Simon's PR machine will be revving up as we speak. I just wish he would do the decent thing and leave the ME arena for good (as he keeps claiming he has done). Or admit he has been wrong. Let us all move on and get decent biomedical research and decent funding. No one is gaining anything from this impasse.
I agree with every word. Things hadn't got this bad even when I was diagnosed in 1991 (although I had been ill for years before).
And yes, when one is severely affected and bed bound all this does take on an extra threatening, frightening dimension.
Oh my word, that woman is a gem.
Psycho-socialites! Love it!
I too am bored by the Wessely Show but I did read that he'd finished his lunch by the time Countess Marr turned up at the appointed time and had to pay for her own. I'm always suspicious of mean people as they are almost always mean in spirit, in my experience. I know people can be genuinely short of cash but can give in other ways - kind words, being a good listener, etc.. The fact that he had finished by the time she arrived was just bad mannered and rude.
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