Are your immune genes getting you down? Simmaron would like to know
So many different pathogens can trigger ME/CFS that immune system problems (not the bugs themselves) are probably the key factor in this disorder.
That fact and increasing evidence of high rates of heritability convinced the Simmaron Research Foundation to launch an effort to get at the underpinnings of the immune system breakdown in ME/CFS.
It probably takes three things to get ME/CFS: a genetic weakness plus a environmental insult (such as an infection) coming at just the right time to cause your system to fold. If this study can identify those genetic weaknesses then drugs, some of which may already be in development, could target them – giving your immune system a huge boost.
First, though, Simmaron has to find those genetic weaknesses. Check out a new immune study that could reveal how it all started to go wrong in
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the idea that this can be inherited horrifies me – and is why I will continue to look for a solution until I cannot go on.
Sorry. I think that’s pretty ridiculous.
Do we say people who catch polio have a genetic weakness? We do not.
A better possibility: that the immune system is low – stress alone could do that – and another insult comes along and knocks it completely down. Bad luck to get the double whammy.
If they go looking for ‘genetic weaknesses’ they won’t be able to explain why most of us do NOT pass it on to our children.
What they really have to do is figure out how to bolster the immune system (whatever that means) so it can reset itself. And then trust it – it was developed over millions of years of evolution to handle much nastier things than we have around now.
Alicia
Yes, it takes more than than a genetic problem to cause ME/CFS. My twin brother, for instance, does not have ME/CFS.
It probably takes a genetic prediposition plus some triggering event plus something else -a time of weakness, perhaps – that comes together to push the system in the wrong direction – where, if Broderick in Miami, is right – it settles in a poor configuration.
Finding the genetic weakness could help reset the system.
What scares me is why ME/CFS seems to be spreading around the world with increasing speed debilitating ever more and more of its victims. I know in the past there were outbreaks scattered here and there, but this seems to me to be a different sort of phenomenon taking place. Isn’t anybody asking why this is happening? There has to be a reason for that. I would think that would be a very important thing to ferret out, however difficult that may be.
I read recently that autoimmune diseases in general have increased significantly over the past fifty years.
Or there’s the frequently cycled lie (in Europe at least) that increased incidences of ME/CFS are simply mass hysteria and that blogs such as this one cause masses of people to imagine that they’re sick.
I am extremely interested in this theory as it is one I’ve held for a long time based on our family. On my mother’s side all my aunts & uncle are sick to varying degrees. My siblings & cousins have been diagnosed w type 1 diabetes, hashimotos, cfs, etc. I myself always determined I would not give in to the family “crud” (genetic predisposition) as we called it. Especially since my goal was to do volunteer work in foreign countries for the rest of my life. But dengue fever (environmental insult) following 80 hrs of hard construction work over period of 6 days & a sick roommate to give round the clock care to (just the wrong time) smacked me down off my high horse named “willpower”. Had to adjust to a half life…now I’d give anything for a half life again…just sliding down further & further over these past 17 yrs. My sister & I have said for a long time they need to do a whole study just on our family.
I, too, believe ME and related illnesses “run” in my family. Almost all of my memories of my paternal grandmother involve an exhausted woman who spent most of her days collapsed on the couch. She was extremely sensitive to noise, had excruciating headaches, widespread pain, sleep disturbance, no sex drive (amazing that a child was aware of that aspect), etc. She was believed to be depressed by most members of the family, and judged very harshly. When in my early 20’s and still healthy, a business trip took me near her city of residence — the first opportunity I had to visit her by myself. This visit completely changed my impression of my grandmother. The stories of her youth told me she was a vibrant and interesting young woman with lots of “spunk” prior to her pregnancy with my father (which seemed to be the turning point in her health). I now believe she was suffering from ME.
My father also developed rather disabling health problems as an adult, many of which could be explained by ME. His request to join the army before WWII was almost declined because of a fast and irregular heart beat (he explained it was the stress of the interview), and he experienced the same severe digestive problems I do. He was extremely sensitive to noise and light (wore dark glasses indoors), and lived most of his adult life on prescription tranquilizers. Again, I now suspect he suffered from ME.
I often wish my grandmother and father were still alive, allowing us to exchange stories.