Teenager struck down by ME speaks out on baffling illness

A TEENAGER has spoken out in a desperate plea for understanding as she struggles to live from day to day with an illness that has no known cure.

Nicola Winnall used to spend her days skiing, canoeing, mountaineering and cycling. Now she struggles to sit up in bed for a few minutes at her Bewdley home.

Nicola is just 19 and suffers from ME - an illness with no cure, no clear cause, no test for diagnosis and no overall effective treatment.

For this week's ME Awareness Week she wanted to describe how it feels to live with a condition that affects 150,000 people in the UK.

"I want people to know what it's like," said the former Bewdley High School pupil. "More people are aware of it now but I don't think they know how it feels to have to cope with it. ME sufferer Nicola Winnall who experiences such fatigue that she is rarely able

to read.

"Sometimes I feel so ill that I am afraid I am going to die. Then it gets worse and I'm afraid that I'm not going to die. I feel that I am looking out at reality from somewhere else far away.

"At my worst, my body is so weak I cannot move and have to lie still in great pain and discomfort. My fingers are unable to straighten, I cannot open my eyes and I am unable to speak.

"It is a continuous struggle during which there is no rest or freedom from pain."

Nicola had eczema at the age of three and has also suffered from asthma and chronic hyperventilation. She has felt unwell for as long as she can remember and ME was finally diagnosed at the age of 15. Four years later, she struggles to walk a few steps to the bathroom.

"Before the diagnosis, I thought I was going mad," she said. "I chose to muster all the strength I had within me to carry on but in the end ME got the better of me and I had to admit that I wasn't able to lead a normal life."

She was "utterly drained" at the end of her A-level exams in health and social care and psychology and had to cancel a place at Chester University where she planned to train as a counsellor.

Now she has to live at home in Bliss Gate Road, Callow Hill, with parents Rosemary, 55, and 65-year-old Tony to take care of her. They both work at Wyre Forest Visitor Centre and her 22-year-old brother Simon is also nearby in Stourbridge to help look after her.

A devout Christian, Nicola has changed her ambition. She wants to work in a healing ministry or with the Red Cross using the experience she gained helping out at a school run by family friends in South Africa.

"I pray a lot. My faith has given me the strength to carry on. I very much look forward to the person I'll become without this constricting illness," she said.

"ME is the hardest mountain I have ever had to climb and I cannot, as yet, see the summit."

ME fact file...

ME - myalgic encephalopathy - is also known as Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and is a neurological illness that affects the immune and central nervous systems.

Its severity and symptoms vary. Some people can be bed-bound, unable to move, speak or swallow.

Disabling fatigue is the main symptom, producing problems with physical and mental function, muscle and nerve pain, hypersensitivity to sound, light and touch, nausea, poor temperature regulation, poor memory and concentration.

Bacteria, viral infection, exposure to toxic chemicals - such as insecticides - and prolonged severe stress are all thought to be possible causes.

There is no treatment that works for everyone but rest and a graded programme of exercises are recommended.

Help is available from:

Association of Young people with ME (AYME), PO Box 605, Milton Keynes MK2 2XD. Tel 01908 373300.

www.ayme.org.uk.

Action for ME, PO Box 1302, Wells, Somerset BA5 1YE. Tel 01749 670799.

www.afme.org.uk

ME Association, 4, Corringham Road, Stanford le Hope, Essex SS17 0AH. Tel 01375 642466.

www.meassociation.org.uk