Rachel Whitfield
- Condition
- Long COVID
- At worst
- Severe (mostly bedbound)
- Ill for
- 8 months
- Published
- Sep 2021
Summary
She used rest, pacing via the spoon-theory method of small weekly activity increases, sleep aids followed by mindfulness-based sleep acceptance, meditation, a hot tub, a COVID-recovery yoga group, and breathing-retraining physiotherapy with a practitioner known as 'the Breathing PT' (Kelly Mitchell). In May 2021 she attended a three-day Lightning Process training course with practitioner Fiona Finch, which she calls a game changer. A mild initial COVID infection in December 2020 was followed by a severe crash in January 2021 with repeated boom-bust cycles; she was housebound for much of March, took a month off work, and needed family and friends to cover childcare and cooking. Within a week of the Lightning Process course she was cycling 20 minutes at an elevated heart rate and running and cycling long routes, went on to run 10 miles in July and complete a half-marathon in August, returned to full-time work and school runs, and states 'I have fully recovered.' The account does not mention any relapse or ongoing maintenance requirement after recovery.
Read it in their words
longcovidcured.com — a recovery advocacy site.
What they credit
Credits Brain retraining, Lightning Process, Radical rest, Lightning Process, Meditation, yoga, breathwork, Pacing and the energy envelope.
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