Preparedness for when

nuatha

NewShadow wrote: »

Shhhh...

You're ruining my illusion that come SHTF we'll coincidentally all be in the same building (or train/plane/highstreet) and instantly recognise each other just in time to co-ordinate the defence against the hordes...

Heaven help the hordes.
I suspect it might take a while to re-create the support network that connects us - but we'll all be benefiting from the shared knowledge and discussions from this thread.

GreyQueen wrote: »

Hell, if I see Bob, I'm siding with the zombie hordes........:p

Siding with or slinging to :rotfl:

thriftwizard

I'm another part-time ME/CFS sufferer, although it's a long time since I had a bad bout; caught glandular fever at 19, ended up dropping out of uni, and have fought the good fight on & off ever since. I well remember the days of putting one foot in front of the other, mentally telling myself "I CAN MAKE IT," one word with each step, just to get to the post box at the end of the street. And the days when I had 5 children aged from 10 down to 3, couldn't walk for my legs wobbling - a horrible deep-seated tremor that scared the life out of me - or see properly for "halos" and just had to lie down, but also supervise homework & feed the little dears whilst their voices just rang right through my head. Two years later I still had shooting pains in my head and occasional leg-wobbles...but somehow the kids all survived & have grown up into adults I'm very proud of. DS1 had it at the same time, having also had glandular fever, so I also had a major battle with the school authorities on my hands too, as he really wasn't well enough to be there quite a lot of the time. Luckily I wasn't driving at the time, though; I couldn't have.

But that was 18 years ago and I haven't had a major bout since; a few rough patches, but nothing to compare with that or the one when I was 19. And DS1 hasn't, either. I know I'm very lucky & I would totally go along with there being more than one cause, as other friends have been diagnosed with it & never got much better; there are a lot of symptoms in common, but it's constant for them, and not for me.

[Deleted User]

GreyQueen wrote: »

Hell, if I see Bob, I'm siding with the zombie hordes........:p

You love me really.

GreyQueen

Bedsit_Bob wrote: »

You love me really.

Just keep telling yourself those sweet little lies............ :rotfl:

I'm putting this pooter to bed for the night as I need to see what happens in the next chapter of my book before bedtime.

Am presently alternating between Knit Your Own Apocalypse and Macrame With Zombies, (advanced edition).

maryb

I had ME in my mid 30s and remember it with horror. I was lucky and recovered to a large extent - though I would still be described in Victorian times as 'one of those women who are not very strong'. What made the difference in my case, oddly, was having a baby - and I must be the only woman in the country who can honestly say that having a baby made her less tired!!! But it gives the endocrine system a huge shake up and in my case something reset.

Interestingly, there was a case in the news recently of a woman who went through an early menopause but then was involved in a horrendous car crash which jolted her system into life again with the result that she had a (very precious) baby a couple of years later

But I do remember that one of the symptoms of ME that I found almost painful was feeling the cold. Pale, aching and freezing describes me in those days.

I posted a while back about a nasty fall I had which resulted in a fractured vertebra. I have been extraordinarily lucky and six weeks on, I seem to be almost healed, despite having osteopenia verging on osteoporosis ( I did use comfrey, known traditionally as knitbone) At any rate I have no pain to speak of and can do most things involving bending lifting and stretching.

But I am still sooo cold all the time. Even today which was warm and sunny I was barely comfortable. My family roll their eyes in utter incomprehension. It really takes me back to the worst days of ME. I don't know if this is a common reaction to injury? If it is, then I think it is something that as preppers we might like to think about

dragonette

TW & MaryB, thank you for posting about your ME, I'm finding here much more helpful than any of my support groups!

I find cold is always a huge issue, and it's from not producing enough body heat for me. All the blankets in the world can't help without a heat source - a microwave heat/wheat bag can be very helpful.

Will read back further tomorrow, at a reasonable time of this morning really...

NewShadow

Hope everyone remembers to vote - should they be able.

No point complaining about the PTB if you don't - they only listen to the one's that make their mark.

GreyQueen

When I was diagnosed with my rare endocrine disorder (unrelated to the ME, it has a distinct cause and shows up very clearly on tests) I was advised to be careful about what I took away from support groups.

My consultant wasn't being disrespectful to the concept of support groups in general, or to the very reputable specific support group for my group of rare illnesses, in particular.

But what she did note is that hanging out with support groups can give you a negative impression of the likely consequences of having your particular condition. As in, the people who are more well don't tend to be in the support groups, they're out living their lives. Therefore, the support group aren't a representative sample of those suffering from X and the newly-diagnosed X sufferer might be left with the impression that things are/ will be worse than they probably will be for them.

Even 30 years on, I still can't work a full day, even at a sedentary office job. I work two-thirds of a workday and occasionally have to come home and go to bed for an hour or so. Am invariably in bed by 10 pm, sometimes hours earlier than that.

Re the cold, that happens to me when I get overtired. I call it losing my thermostat. I cannot get warm no matter how many layers of clothes or bedding or how high the heating is set. All that works for me is to crawl into bed and curl up around a HWB and rest for a few hours.

maryb, very pleased to hear that your vertebrae fracture has healed well. And I have also heard of ME being cured by pregnancy, so some of it clearly has an endocrine component.

I've had ME long enough for the medical establishment to have run the gamut from the yuppie flu years, through it being a psychiatric problem, through the BMA announcing all over the media that they accepted it was a proper illlness (3 weeks after that, my GP told me he 'didn't believe in it' during a consultation).

I take some small comfort from the history of TB. The bacterium which causes it was identified by Dr Robert Koch in 1882. Even well into the twentieth century some doctors could not be dissuaded from believing that it wasn't caused by neurosis. And this was a disease causing one in seven deaths in developed countries!

ETA; I voted postally 2 weeks ago. And will be busy in the local authority call centre today taking calls about the election, no doubt. Gonna be some tired people on my team tomorrow as some of us will be working the count (not an option for me with ME and an endearing habit of transposing numbers, I could probably slew the result all on my ownsome).

Cappella

I shall definitely be voting. i walk past the polling station on the dogs constitutional anyway; but I'm always saddened and sometimes angered by the number of people who 'don't bother'. Being able to vote is a privilege many don't have, and our one opportunity to make a small protest about things as they are. Even if nothing seems to change afterwards - sorry, having a cynical moment here.

Thank you for the information about ME. Some of he online sites were confusing as they seemed to conflict with each other. I did know about the tiredness, but not about the other symptoms or the cause of it; but I don't see how any reputable doctor can say they 'didn't believe in it'. Grey queen, I really hope you've changed doctors since then, he sounds dreadful.

[Deleted User]

I shall most certainly be casting my vote today at least for the local councillor but we are also expected to vote on a Police Commissioner and I have NO INFORMATION whatsoever about who is standing, what their policies are, how they will take police matters forward, NADA! and we're expected to vote for someone under those circumstances? I think NOT!!!