Dickson, Adele, Knussen, Christina, Flowers, Paul · Psychology & health · 2008 · DOI
This study asked 14 people with ME/CFS about their personal experiences living with the condition. Participants described feeling a loss of identity and control over their lives, struggling with not being able to plan for the future, and feeling worthless. They also mentioned how disbelief from others made these feelings worse. The study found that learning to accept the illness and adapt to their new life helped people cope better.
This research validates the profound psychological and identity impacts of ME/CFS beyond physical symptoms, highlighting that healthcare providers and society need to recognize these struggles. Understanding how scepticism affects patients' self-perception can inform more compassionate clinical care and public health messaging. The emphasis on acceptance as a coping mechanism provides insights into psychological interventions that may help patients adjust.
This study does not establish whether identity crisis and loss of control are uniquely specific to ME/CFS or common across other chronic conditions. It cannot determine whether acceptance causes better coping or whether people who cope better are more likely to achieve acceptance (direction of causality). The small sample size means findings may not represent all ME/CFS patients' experiences.
About the PEM badge: “PEM required” means post-exertional malaise was an explicit required diagnostic criterion for participant inclusion in this study — not that PEM was studied, observed, or discussed. Studies using criteria that do not require PEM (e.g. Fukuda, Oxford) are tagged “PEM not required”. How the atlas works →
The first block is for the primary paper and is the citation you should use in research work. The atlas-snapshot line only applies if you are specifically referring to this atlas’s reading of the paper on the date shown.
Primary citation
Dickson, Adele, Knussen, Christina, & Flowers, Paul (2008). 'That was my old life; it's almost like a past-life now': identity crisis, loss and adjustment amongst people living with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome.. Psychology & health. https://doi.org/10.1080/08870440701757393
BibTeX
@article{mecfsatlas-dickson-2008-that-old,
author = {Dickson, Adele and Knussen, Christina and Flowers, Paul},
title = {'That was my old life; it's almost like a past-life now': identity crisis, loss and adjustment amongst people living with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome.},
journal = {Psychology & health},
year = {2008},
doi = {10.1080/08870440701757393},
note = {PubMed: 25160579},
url = {https://www.mecfsatlas.com/evidence/dickson-2008-that-old},
}Atlas snapshot reference
ME/CFS Atlas. Generator v1 / Scanner v1.4 / policy v0.1. Accessed 2026-05-29. https://www.mecfsatlas.com/evidence/dickson-2008-that-old
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