Thanks for taking the time to visit my JustGiving page.

I am going to swim the length of the English Channel (22 miles) in my local swimming pool (the actual sea is a bit chilly!) between now and Christmas to raise money for the optimum health clinic foundation. I feel passionate about the clinics aim to be able to provide treatment more widely to people with CFS/ME and hope that you will get behind me to help raise money for a truly important cause.

 

In 2004 I became ill with ME/CFS. At the time my two boys were very young, just 2 and 6 years old. The illness effected all aspects of my life - I was housebound for several months, had to give up my job as a primary school teacher and could barely get from the bedroom to the bathroom. I became  a patient of the Optimum Health Clinic having made some progress with other treatments but being nowhere near well. I learned the tools on the psychology side  and also worked with the clinic to sort out the best nutrition programme to support my recovery. The process of recovery took time and effort but without the clinics unique, individualised,  holistic approach I would not have made it to full recovery.

I used swimming as a way of gently regaining my physical strength. This wasn't all plain sailing though as I am a classic competitive achiever type and on my first trip to the pool found myself racing people - my body didn't appreciate this at all! After this bumpy start and by following the clinics 'bouncing the boundaries' approach I was able to gradually build up from just getting in the pool and being pulled along by my husband to now swimming regularly and loving it.

I became a practitioner at the clinic some years ago as I am passionate about supporting people on their own recovery journeys in the same way as the clinic supported me.

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