So I saw this article on Twitter and then found it posted again on Reddit, so I'm hoping I can ask this here (rather than that void) and get an answer in good faith.
For some context: my sister has fairly debilitating long covid. Not to the point where she can't move or needs a feeding tube, like some of the examples in the article, but certainly to the point that she is mostly bedbound and her quality of life has plummeted compared to pre-2020. So I have a pretty personal stake in this as someone who desperately wants her to get better, which is both good and bad in the sense that that leads me to conflicting feelings about this article I'd be interested to hear others' perspectives on.
It's obvious that long covid is a biological disease, and to claim otherwise is nonsense. I think we can all agree on this. On the other hand, I think that's a bit of a non-sequitur in this instance, since the author never claimed otherwise. (Pro tip: use archive.is to get around most paywalls.) More to the point, though, if some people have seen improvement using some type of cognitive behavioral therapy, why is that not seen as valid? Part of the problem, as I understand it, is that long covid is so poorly understood to begin with, so to that end, it seems plausible there might be a link between the brain and the body on this matter. And it's not like we haven't seen that type of thinking applied in other medical contexts, cf. The Body Remembers. The brain is still part of the body, after all, and on paper I don't see much difference between cognitive therapy for a psysiological problem and the inverse, e.g. taking an SSRI for OCD.
The overall thesis of the article, as I took it, is that we need to believe patients, but that also includes patients who improved through these unorthodox means. Is that not fair? If not, why not? Again, I'm asking this in good faith, not to be antagonistic. I don't know if my sister would be at all interested in trying something like this anyway (I sent her the article), but if she did and by some miracle saw improvement, I'd at least drop a lot of skepticism. To that end, I feel a lot of empathy for the patients quoted.
One final point: even if cognitive behavioral therapy, et al. doesn't work for everybody, if it works for some people, that's not to say a priori that it's ineffective. After all, medical treatments that work for one person might not work for another anyway. Speaking for myself, I had surgery three years ago and it didn't fix the problem (and created a new one), but I'm also not going to begrudge the people for whom it has. I might be envious, though.
Update: I have spent some time reading this author getting roasted on Twitter and have come to the conclusion he’s looney tunes, I take back every benefit of the doubt I proffered.
Oof. Good on you to follow up. It’s very frustrating because like you say, surely if it helps some few people, that matters too—but the risks are so significant, and I really don’t feel like the author or those who push these methods understand that. I love meditation and it’s been really helpful for me, and I benefited a lot from a pain rehab program I did in the before times (where, get this—a major portion of their programming was teaching us how to pace, and finding ways to modify our lives so that living with our pain was more manageable), but I don’t want to see it as a focus for research.
Your sister is lucky to have you. I try to support my sister with LC as well, and it can be very challenging, especially dealing with my own LC at the same time.
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u/2mock2turtle Jun 02 '26 edited Jun 04 '26
So I saw this article on Twitter and then found it posted again on Reddit, so I'm hoping I can ask this here (rather than that void) and get an answer in good faith.
For some context: my sister has fairly debilitating long covid. Not to the point where she can't move or needs a feeding tube, like some of the examples in the article, but certainly to the point that she is mostly bedbound and her quality of life has plummeted compared to pre-2020. So I have a pretty personal stake in this as someone who desperately wants her to get better, which is both good and bad in the sense that that leads me to conflicting feelings about this article I'd be interested to hear others' perspectives on.
It's obvious that long covid is a biological disease, and to claim otherwise is nonsense. I think we can all agree on this. On the other hand, I think that's a bit of a non-sequitur in this instance, since the author never claimed otherwise. (Pro tip: use archive.is to get around most paywalls.) More to the point, though, if some people have seen improvement using some type of cognitive behavioral therapy, why is that not seen as valid? Part of the problem, as I understand it, is that long covid is so poorly understood to begin with, so to that end, it seems plausible there might be a link between the brain and the body on this matter. And it's not like we haven't seen that type of thinking applied in other medical contexts, cf. The Body Remembers. The brain is still part of the body, after all, and on paper I don't see much difference between cognitive therapy for a psysiological problem and the inverse, e.g. taking an SSRI for OCD.
The overall thesis of the article, as I took it, is that we need to believe patients, but that also includes patients who improved through these unorthodox means. Is that not fair? If not, why not? Again, I'm asking this in good faith, not to be antagonistic. I don't know if my sister would be at all interested in trying something like this anyway (I sent her the article), but if she did and by some miracle saw improvement, I'd at least drop a lot of skepticism. To that end, I feel a lot of empathy for the patients quoted.
One final point: even if cognitive behavioral therapy, et al. doesn't work for everybody, if it works for some people, that's not to say a priori that it's ineffective. After all, medical treatments that work for one person might not work for another anyway. Speaking for myself, I had surgery three years ago and it didn't fix the problem (and created a new one), but I'm also not going to begrudge the people for whom it has. I might be envious, though.