Resources that Shaped My Recovery
Just the resources for now (more to follow in a future post).
Recently, I was interviewed by the fabulous
(both podcast and interview notes shared here)1.It’s the first time I’ve publicly had a conversation around all that I’ve processed in recent months. In connection with the enormity of what I’ve lived through and how I’ve gone about getting from where I once was to where I am now.
At the end, Rachel asked me for a set of resources. Something I have never put together before. For now, I share with you a selection of resources I have read, worked with, watched or listened to.
There was a lot I learnt in the first year of tackling ill health through this approach. Including the many common threads between differing types of chronic illness (such as inflammation, invisibility, misunderstood, lacking interest and so on).
I also felt like there was a meeting in the middle of Science and spirituality. Highly debatable I’m sure. However, this integrative approach is one that served me well and I can see from the books that I read in particular how there has been a balance between the two.
In any case, I’m keeping this one brief and I’m going to come back to this set of resources another time and share deeper insight and reflection on the journey each one took me on.
Let me know what you think, any ideas you have or questions you’d like to ask?
The 1st book that changed my life:
7 Habits of Highly Effective People – Stephen Covey
Migraine specific:
Book: The Migraine Miracle (a game changer when adopting an anti-inflammatory way of eating)
The Migraine World Summit has been an annual event I’ve tuned into for the 7th time this year.
You can register for the same event here:
Learn from the Migraine and Headache Experts - Migraine World Summit
I’ve also started to turn interviews into blog posts such as this one on the nervous system and this one on chronic fatigue.
Trauma Healing / The Nervous System
Amy Apigian - About Trauma Healing Accelerated
Home - MindBody Breakthrough (did a Healing Trauma workshop through these in the UK)
Gabor Mate - Addiction Expert, Speaker and Best-selling Author Dr. Gabor Maté (drgabormate.com)
Mind/Body/Soul, Whole Body Healing
The following books:
You Can Heal Your Life – Louise Hay.
Balance Your Hormones Balance Your Life – Dr Claudia Welch
Fierce Medicine – Anna Forest
The Universe Has Your Back – Gabby Bernstein
The Biology of Belief – Bruce Lipton
The Power of Now – Echart Tolle
The Power is Within You – Louise Hay
Freedom From the Known - J Krishnamurti
The Holistic Psychologist - The Holistic Psychologist - The Power To Heal Yourself
Memoir
Migraine specific: 10. A Memoir of Migraine Survival – Danielle Newport Fancher
My Migraine Breakthrough – Lee Canter
Uncovering Bliss – Em Englert
All in My Head - Paula Kamen
Fibro (& migraine): I Have Fibromyalgia but Fibromyalgia Doesn’t Have Me
Other: Finding Peace with a Devastating Disease - Amy Corfeli
My Stroke of Insight - Jill Bolte Taylor PhD
My own personal resources
A short video on my journey from chronic migraine to nervous system regulation.
From Migraine to Massage (youtube.com)
Podcast: A Holistic Approach to Migraine
Exploring a Holistic approach to Migraine with Amber Horrox (youtube.com)
More podcast interviews to follow.
And of course, I have my own mini podcast on various aspects of healing with future plans to expand upon this.
My fave Substackers:
Madelleine Muller - The Bed Perspective
Natalie Mead - Oops, my brain.
Know any other Substackers writing about mysterious illness tied in with their own health journey? This is a special interest to me. I believe sharing our stories has a deeply powerful and healing effect. Not only on ourselves but also those we share our stories with. Not to mention the support and the community that we feel and build on the back of it.
Have you read any of these books? Which ones would you recommend?
How have you found resourcing?
Share an aspect of your own journey and what you want to give voice to in the comments section or send me a DM.
Rachel has been sharing stories on those of us living with mysterious illness for quite some time and has recently turned her brilliant and much-needed venture into podcast series under the “Lady’s Illness Library”.
Let me know if you find yourself getting stuck into any one of them in particular 🙂
Reducing inflammation is a big one. It blows my mind that this does not form part of our healthcare here in the uk, ie you have an inflammatory condition. First port of call: look into ways to reduce inflammation. It’s the same with emotional dysregulation (one know medical root cause to migraine and seems to be a big link to other chronic illness too - let’s learn to emotionally regulate (this took me past what is medically believed possible in my healing).
Acceptance is a big one too. Managing expectations or others misunderstanding is huge. In the end, it was noise to me. And became about learning to drown out the noise and tune in to what I knew to be true all along (it was me that was disabled by illness, not them. It was me that was solely responsible for a £700 a month mortgage, not them. My responsibility = my way! Was pretty much how I moved forward).
Though clearly, none of this was easy. Mostly, the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life. But similarly the things I am most proud of and my health benefits have been significant year on year as a result.
Thank you for your article listing so many useful resources in one place - I'm looking forward to getting stuck in. Have you read the 'Really Strange' boxset by Steven Haines? It includes four books focusing on pain, touch, anxiety and trauma - when I was first trying to get to grips with past trauma, it was really useful for me in breaking things down and getting the point across without feeling too overwhelming. The books are written in a comic style with beautiful artwork by Sophie Standing