(1) M.E./CFS & FIBROMYALGIA are genuine debilitating epigenetically-acquired neuro-endocrinal disorders.

(2) They are caused by overstimulation of the autonomic nervous system (ANS) and of the HPA-axis, ie the Hypothalamus-Pituitary-Adrenal gland axis. The hypothalamus is the master gland of your body and regulates your whole metabolism. It is located in the limbic system of the brain, also known as the 'emotional brain'.

(3) Overstimulation of these two systems, the ANS and the HPA-axis, triggers virtually ALL the symptoms characteristic of M.E./CFS & FIBROMYALGIA by releasing 'stress-hormones' (eg adrenaline and cortisol) into the bloodstream.

(4) Overstimulation of these systems is caused by one's unconscious perception that a life situation or environmental pressure is 'stressful' or 'threatening' to one's well-being. This perception is based on neural pathways that one has acquired and established in childhood. This early-life 'programming' of your neural networks and of your neurochemistry has been instrumental in increasing your life-long vulnerability to developing a neurosomatic disorder like ME/CFS and/or fibromyalgia.

(5) All the symptoms of M.E./CFS & FIBROMYALGIA are sent by your body to warn you that you need to take new, effective action to resolve the stress response. You may not be aware that you have been under chronic emotional stress. Neurosomatic Therapy helps you discover and resolve the neurosomatic stress that you have been living with and that has caused your symptoms.

(6) Although being ill, your body is actually constantly geared up for appropriate action NOW to deal effectively with the perceived 'threatening' situation. You may not even be aware of this apparently threatening situation, because early-life programming of your neural networks has also helped you become conditioned to living with stress, often putting up with it for many yearsuntil it just seems completely normal. Virtually ALL the symptoms of M.E./CFS & FIBROMYALGIA are the outcome of your body remaining in a constant state of physiological hyper-alertness - ever ready to take the action required to resolve the stress, but never actually taking this action.

(7) You are fatigued and in pain because you are NOT taking appropriate effective action. By resting and 'managing' your symptoms, you are doing the OPPOSITE of what is required for you to recover. Resting simply prolongs the illness because the chronic neurosomatic stress response remains unresolved.

(8) By NOT taking the necessary action, you are suffering from a build-up of suppressed emotional energy, which you have held in because you have been conditioned to do so by your acquired neural networks.

(9) The symptoms CAN ALL BE DISPELLED by taking safe and effective action to create new neural pathways that do not trigger your symptoms. Safe and effective action involves learning how to resolve the chronic stress response for your own personal situation, and then practising taking this new action.

(10) To make a full recovery NST
(a) teaches you an effective method of body-awareness,
(b) helps you to discover the message of your symptoms which will reveal what safe and effective action you need to take - and what adverse, energy-depleting activities and patterns of coping you need to AVOID, and
(c) supports you to actually take that proactive, authentic, effective, energy-enhancing action. We demonstrate this new action in your sessions, so that you can practice them at home between sessions. As soon as you start to take this effective action, specifically designed for you in relation to your own individual circumstances, your symptoms will begin to disappear.

Neurosomatic Therapy supports and guides you through this process so that you can make a full recovery.

If you follow this method, you will recover, and your symptoms will not return - because you will have successfully re-programmed the neural pathways that have sustained your illness and your autonomic nervous system and your HPA axis will no longer need to trigger your symptoms.

This method does take time because we need to allow time for new neural pathways in the brain to develop. Some people start recovering within a week or two, while others may need 6 to 12 months.Everyone who has completed the Recovery Programme has made a full recovery, although for some people, sustaining their long-term wellbeing requires additional top-up sessions from time to time after completion of the Programme.

M.E./CFS & FIBROMYALGIA: DISPELLING THE MYTHS

Because the cause and remedy for M.E./CFS & FIBROMYALGIA have now been identified, and used by many sufferers to make a COMPLETE RECOVERY, we can dispel the common MYTHS that still exist around the origins of M.E./CFS & FIBROMYALGIA.
For example, M.E./CFS & FIBROMYALGIA are:

(1) NOT caused by a viral infection.

How do we know this? Three reasons:

(a) Many people who have M.E./CFS and FIBROMYALGIA did NOT contract a virus before they became ill with M.E./CFS and FIBROMYALGIA., so we need to find a different cause for those people. This means that M.E./CFS and FIBROMYALGIA CAN be caused by a non-viral trigger - and if this is the case for so many people with M.E./CFS and FIBROMYALGIA, then this same 'other' trigger may also be the trigger for MOST or ALL people with M.E./CFS and FIBROMYALGIA.

(b) For many people with M.E./CFS & FIBROMYALGIA who did have an early viral infection, their immune systems (and neuro-endocrinal systems) were ALREADY compromised BEFORE they became ill with that infection. This explains why they never 'recovered', whereas most other people who also got that infection did fully recover.

(c) People who have made a full recovery from M.E./C.F.S. and fibromyalgia include those who had major infections during onset of their neurosomatic disorder as well as those who had none. These infections include EBV, Cocksackie B virus, and 'flu.

The view of the NST approach is that if you contracted a viral infection, this infection exploited an immune system already weakened by chronic neurosomatic stress. The viral infection will certainly have contributed to your weakness, but is not the initial cause. The infection actually made it harder for you to shake off the symptoms of M.E./CFS or Fibromyalgia.

When we were designing our NST Recovery Programme, we looked at what might be the trigger for the initial weakening of the immune and neuroendocrine systems. The neuroscience evidence now points to acquired disrupted neural networks in the developing brain that make people particularly susceptible to neurosomatic illness, and which trigger hyperactivity of the stress response system, ie, the autonomic nervous system (ANS) and the hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal gland axis (HPA-axis). Hyperactivity of the ANS and HPA-axis can account, both directly and indirectly, for virtually all the symptoms of M.E./CFS and Fibromyalgia. Hyperactivity can eventually lead to hypoactivity associated with metabolic shut-down and physiological collapse - again, conditions that can explain all the symptoms of M.E./CFS and Fibromyalgia

This theory is supported by the high recovery rates that suggest that, when we learn to create new neural pathways (which all of us can do), the symptoms actually start to disappear - eventually disappearing for ever - regardless of whether or not you suffered an initial viral infection.

We therefore know that M.E./CFS & FIBROMYALGIA are:
• NOT caused by food and chemical allergies;
• NOT 'all in the mind', although, like for ALL illnesses, we are psycho-neurobiological beings;
• NOT caused be electromagnetic radiation, pesticides or overuse of antibiotics;
• NOT INCURABLE - even if you have suffered a viral infection or repeated re-activation of old viral infections!