New Zealand: Dr Vallings

Sean said:
Exactly. Context matters.
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I have argued elsewhere that mild depression and anxiety in someone with ME is probably normal, and in both cases it can be adaptive and assist the person. For example, if you are anxious and realise that something might cause a crash, such as going to a big event, then you might choose to stay home. Crash averted.
 
alex3619 said:
I have argued elsewhere that mild depression and anxiety in someone with ME is probably normal, and in both cases it can be adaptive and assist the person. For example, if you are anxious and realise that something might cause a crash, such as going to a big event, then you might choose to stay home. Crash averted.
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Also, they can be actual symptoms of the illness itself.

Brain inflammation, inflamed gut or inflammation in general, will often do things to your mood as well.

edit: spelling :)
 
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Hutan said:
There's lots I'd like to respond to about that interaction.

1. The evidence for excitable personalities
There are plenty of reasons why the studies suggesting that people with ME have particular personalities and the perception of clinicians on this topic could be flawed.

a. the problem of retrospectivity
The Dubbo study is one of the few prospective studies that looked at characteristics of people suffering one of three illnesses known to result in CFS in some people. It did not find any psychological characteristic separating those people who developed CFS and those that didn't. I'm not sure what characteristics were examined though. Unfortunately there haven't been enough prospective studies.

Studies that try to describe the personalities of people with ME are confounded by the fact that having a life-changing illness that few people believe is quite likely to change how a person interacts with the world. Another issue is that a symptom of the illness is a lack of energy, and it is difficult to self-regulate emotions when you have no energy. Another issue is that the person may have lost support structures, financial security and roles that give self-confidence, making it harder to deal with the world with equanimity.

There are problems if people are asked to describe their personality and life before the illness too. Some may make their old life sound extremely busy and full in order to counteract any impression that they are lazy or just want to lie around. Some may drink the BPS Kool-ade and search their past hard to identify stressful events and problematic behaviours to try to explain why they became sick.

These problems can also occur in the clinic. A person who has been looking for answers for years and has lost a great deal may be feeling quite emotional when they finally get to see someone who seems to understand and is encouraging. This is particularly true for people with ME in NZ if they are exhausted from travelling a long way to get to the only ME doctor in the country. The way a person presents to medical staff now may not give an accurate idea of their personality prior to illness onset.


b. Selection bias
The people who participate in research looking at the personalities of people with ME will not be representative of the broader ME population. They may be accepting of the view that people with ME have some personality flaw. They are likely to be well-educated and relatively high-achieving and determined to find a solution to the illness that has disrupted their life.

This is also true of the people that are able to get to the only ME clinic in New Zealand.

c. Assessor bias
It's very easy for personalities to be assessed incorrectly when someone has a prejudice and a desire to find a particular thing. The studies researching personality done by BPS proponents find character flaws in people with ME; the few studies done by non-BPS proponents do not.
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I'd like to add one more here:

d. Situational factors
People who make it to Dr. Vallings clinic probably went to an enormous amount of trouble to get there (many travel long distances, and the cost of the consult is high). They are there because things are really bad, and they have tried everything else and failed. When they arrive at the clinic, this is their last hope. They're feeling utterly desperate for reassurance and above all, answers. They're worried about their future, their employability, their careers, their relationships. All this stuff pours out at the session, making them look pretty intense.
 
strategist said:
Why Ineffective Psychotherapies Appear to Work: A Taxonomy of Causes of Spurious Therapeutic Effectiveness
https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/a7b7/3212b3edcfc4ba62ebc03920e92ad5c6f7e3.pdf
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I love this paper, @strategist! It goes beyond clinical trials and talks about how clinicians can acquire the firm conviction that what they are doing is working, even when its not. A complex mix of things, including naive realism, desire to see onesself as useful, overconfidence (which is trained into them, and then further enhanced by repetition). Then add to that the very unreliable sources of feedback they rely on - which is people displaying polite thanks and then just not coming back!
 
TiredSam said:
I would like to suggest type FFS personality.

I don't even accept that there is an effective way to categorise personality types, or that they are fixed or particularly meaningful. I can be as lazy as anyone, on the other hand I can be very driven and hard-working for sustained long periods. Then I can be very lazy again. It all depends whether I can be arsed doing something or not. What category is that, and do I have to stay in it once I've been classified? I can be friendly and sociable. Or I can be taciturn, grumpy and hard work to have a conversation with. Depends on what mood I'm in and a host of other factors, including whether I'm being paid or not.
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Reminds me of the "some people are left-brained and some people are right-brained" baloney that was rampant not long ago (still persists unfortunately). The concept has since been disproven.
 
TrixieStix said:
Reminds me of the "some people are left-brained and some people are right-brained" baloney that was rampant not long ago (still persists unfortunately). The concept has since been disproven.
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Yea, it has! There was a hilarious bestselling book in 1990s "drawing with the right side of your brain" that recommended you should turn a picture of a face upside down to draw it. Its true we engage a lot of right hemisphere when processing or drawing faces. But turning a face upside down actually does the very opposite - it increases the participation in the left hemisphere! it was all so bunk.
 
I saw Dr Vallings 10 months after my severe ME onset. I was so ill I could barely sit in the chair and talk to her. I handed a list of my symptoms over to her. It had taken me a hour to get to her and I burst into tears while with her. I was so so ill. She diagnosed me with ME and I was so grateful to her. The added stress of seeing GP's who were flummoxed as to what was wrong with me. My GP's knew I was very sick and did a lot of testing but I don't think they would have given me a diagnosis of ME.

After seeing Dr Vallings I was relieved to see the words "Chronic Fatigue Syndrome" written in very large letters across the page of my GP medical notes. (I would have preferred ME!).

I often think back to my doctor visits before I got ME and how relaxed I were at appointments. When you get an illness where there is no treatment and no understanding of what is causing it and the symptoms are severe and frightening, it creates a lot of anxiety.
 
Personality types turn up in the most unexpected places, in our local farming paper for example.
In summary the study reported on showed that curiosity about a new object is more likely to occur if it is directly preceded by some nice food than by standing out in the rain. Not only are we talking about the bleeding obvious here, we're talking goats! Oh, and goats with a bolder personality are more likely to be curious. Not at all clear how they tested for bold goat personality but facial expressions were involved, I guess questionnaires didn't work so well...
animal moods.png

http://digital.southernrurallife.co.nz/olive/ode/srl_daily/
 
In the spirit of goat personality assessments from facial expressions...

Hutan said:
Anyway, Dr Vallings didn't give us all that detail but she did tell us that people with ME are like dogs and sportspeople - we all sleep lightly, always in a state of alert. And that we have 'excitable personalities'.
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For what's worth (and it's main worth may well be in showing that you can find a dodgy study to support any theory :)), news of
an experiment titled, "An Examination of Adult Women's Sleep Quality and Sleep Routines in Relation to Pet Ownership and Bedsharing," has just come out. It studied 962 American women to see how pet ownership impacted their sleep. Fifty-five percent of the woman participating in the study let at least one of their dogs sleep in their bed, 31 percent of the women shared their bed with a cat.

The research is reported as showing that while cats and human partners were "disruptive," dogs were peaceful bed companions. So those dogs aren't sounding very excitable or very light sleepers to me.
 
Woolie said:
Yea, it has! There was a hilarious bestselling book in 1990s "drawing with the right side of your brain" that recommended you should turn a picture of a face upside down to draw it. Its true we engage a lot of right hemisphere when processing or drawing faces. But turning a face upside down actually does the very opposite - it increases the participation in the left hemisphere! it was all so bunk.
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That would maybe help with the drawing, but for the reason that you would have to concentrate on drawing what is actually there, and not what you think is there. (shapes, shades, etc) It would apply to drawing anything. :facepalm:
 
From the Irish ME/CFS Association:
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We are pleased to announce that Dr Ros Vallings, an international ME/CFS expert from New Zealand, has agreed to give 5 public talks in May 2019. They will be hosted by volunteers in Cork, Dublin, Galway, Limerick & Sligo. Dates and venues have not been set yet.

Dr Vallings will also be giving a talk to GPs. She gives similar talks in New Zealand. This meeting is being jointly organised by the Irish ME/CFS Association and the Irish ME Trust.
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Code: 
https://www.facebook.com/TomKindlonMECFS/posts/1211871762294280

 
Just seen the comment about PWME sleeping lightly like dogs, always alert. Is there evidence for this or is it some generalisation? My sleep issue is getting to sleep not light sleep. these days (and for most of my life)when I sleep I feel like I conk out pretty well and can even sleep through the postman knocking if I’m sleeping late. Unless she’s referring to tired but wired, but that’s not sleeping at all until it wears off.

I’ve been a light sleeper for a few years in the past and know what waking at the slightest thing is like, this was caused by regular disturbance by confused night time wandering parent with dementia who would come in to the wrong bedroom at around 2 am and switch the light on and ask who I was.......after a few months of this.I would then even wake at this time when at my home in a different city. And any noise would wake me.
 
NelliePledge said:
Just seen the comment about PWME sleeping lightly like dogs, always alert. Is there evidence for this or is it some generalisation? My sleep issue is getting to sleep not light sleep. these days (and for most of my life)when I sleep I feel like I conk out pretty well and can even sleep through the postman knocking if I’m sleeping late. Unless she’s referring to tired but wired, but that’s not sleeping at all until it wears off.

I’ve been a light sleeper for a few years in the past and know what waking at the slightest thing is like, this was caused by regular disturbance by confused night time wandering parent with dementia who would come in to the wrong bedroom at around 2 am and switch the light on and ask who I was.......after a few months of this.I would then even wake at this time when at my home in a different city. And any noise would wake me.
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Who knows what she meant? If she does not validate her observations through scientific publications, her experience from seeing patients remains hear say. We now know patients deal with tremendous amount of neuroinfoammation. Depending on the state they’re on (rested, crashed, over-stimulated, stressed out etc) their sleep will reflect that state.

The very unfortunate aspect of discussing her views is that it certainly shades her career accomplishments deep gray. Patients deserve more than that.
 
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