Reflecting on ME

Hello and welcome to Believe in ME with Rhona Barton.

This podcast is about all things Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (ME) related!

I'm Rhona and I lived with ME for almost 10 years during which time, I was bed-bound and wheelchair-bound, welcome to my Podcast.

Hello and welcome to Believe in ME with Rhona Barton. In this week’s episode, the last one for 2022, I’m going to be chatting about our Reflections on 2022 whilst living with ME/CFS or Long Covid.

You can head to www.rhonabarton.co.uk/media for more information about me and my story.

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Ok, let’s jump straight in!

I hope, if you celebrated, you had a lovely Christmas. As 2022 draws to a close, a lot of people begin to reflect on the past year, but what does that actually mean? How do you do it and why?

For people with ME/CFS and Long Covid, there can be a large amount of time to think. Especially if you are going through a flare up of symptoms, so we’re probably very skilled in reflection.

Reflecting on the past year lets us look at the highs and lows and evaluate them in a way that, we hope, will improve our overall performance in the next year. It gives us the chance to feedback to ourselves about the lessons we have learned and think about changes we may wish to make in the future.

But why should you even bother thinking back over the past year? It’s gone, you can’t change it.

What you can do though, is learn from it. You can think about patterns of behaviour and the outcome of that behaviour on your health, relationships, career, finances etc.

Reflecting can give you an overview of the key occasions that have taken place during the year as well as the steps you took at that time and the outcome or reaction. You may also spot a trend in your reactions. This then allows you to consider how you can deal with similar situations in future. Or, even better, it will help you understand WHY you did something.

One key to reflection is doing it in a productive way.

How do you look back at the past year and draw conclusions that could improve your way of living in the new year?

If we start with some basics, you could just grab a pen, a notebook and some quiet time and start writing. Give yourself permission to be honest about it all. Be direct with yourself without judging yourself harshly. Do your best to remove any barriers or excuses that may stop you from putting in the work. Nobody is going to be reviewing your work. It’s not going to go on display anywhere. This is for you. If you choose to share with others, that’s up to you.

If a pen and paper is too much, consider using a voice recording app on your phone or even a video recording app. Whatever works for you.

If you’re not sure...