My recovery process
After watching countless recovery stories, and going through my own, I can say there’s no one-size-fits-all plan for healing or getting better.
Long Covid and ME/CFS are complex illnesses. In this post, I'll simply be sharing everything that helped me and the steps I took. You can decide for yourself whether any of it resonates with you, and leave the rest. 🖤
Step 1: Medical testing
Step 2: Learning
1- What is happening in my body?
2- What this approach isn't
3- More resources to learn
Step 3: Practicing safety
1- Respond well to your symptoms
2- Regulation practices
3- Joy and living life
Step 4: Expanding activity
Step 1: Medical testing
It's very important to make sure that there’s no other treatable medical issue, including vitamin deficiencies. Do the testing according to your doctor’s recommendations.
Once the doctors have ruled out everything and are telling you: “this is Long Covid or ME/CFS, there is nothing more we can do” then it’s fair to give Mind Body healing a chance. It covers very gentle practices that can support your body and mind that can be done on top of medical interventions.
Lifestyle habits
Good nutrition, proper sleep, and some movement can all support your body’s healing, but with this illness the limitations are very real. Just do your best, don't force anything.
I don’t have much to say about diet — changing it didn't make a difference for my symptoms, so I simply focused on keeping it balanced and healthy.
Step 2: Learning
Learning and building the belief that I could recover was the most important part of healing for me.
Finding a possible explanation of the symptoms can sometimes help break the vicious cycle of these illnesses. In my case, it removed 90% of my fear and gave me a huge amount of hope.
1- What is happening in my body?
Mind Body healing suggests a possible explanation of these illnesses: after a threat (like a virus), the nervous system can get stuck into a physiological survival response.
Humans have an automatic survival response to threats. Imagine a tiger is chasing you: in a split second and outside your conscious awareness, your brain triggers stress hormones like adrenaline and cortisol, speeds up your heart, and slows non-essential functions, like digestion so you can fight or flee.
This “danger response” is very useful and can be life-saving in the short term, but it isn’t meant to stay switched on. When it happens, it can create real dysfunctions in all bodily systems: heart rate, breathing, digestion, sleep, energy, mood, and even immunity. This matches the wide range of symptoms seen in Long Covid and ME/CFS. The symptoms aren’t separate problems — they all stem from the same underlying mechanism.
When the nervous system is stuck in danger mode, it sees threats everywhere, even in basic activities. This creates a negative feedback loop:
- The brain triggers symptoms as warnings.
- The symptoms create fear, frustration, despair, and avoidance of activities.
- These emotions are very understandable, but they act as a catalyst: they confirm to the brain that danger is still here.
- And the cycle repeats, creating more symptoms.
I often hear people say:
"I'm not afraid of the symptoms, I just want them gone!"
You don’t even need to feel “conscious fear” for all of this to happen. Other emotions or reactions can feed the loop too.
The key to healing is breaking this cycle by teaching your brain that you are safe. And there are simple tools that can help you with that!
2- What this approach isn’t
If you look into this approach, you’ll likely come across some controversy. Please keep in mind:
- This illness is not psychological — it’s neurological. Nothing in this approach suggests your symptoms are “all in your head”. They’re not.
- None of this is your fault. Your brain has triggered a protective mechanism that’s simply working too hard.
- Pushing through or ignoring symptoms is never the solution. Pacing and listening to your body is required to safely expand activity.
3- More resources to learn
Learning takes time. Each explanation gave me a bit more clarity, and some concepts clicked only months later. Stay curious! Here are a few resources I found especially helpful:
Doctors talking about the science
Books (easy, comforting reads, also available as audiobooks)
- Breaking Free by Jan Rothney (Written by someone who recovered from severe ME/CFS)
- Pain Free You by Dan Buglio (Written by someone who recovered from chronic pain. The concepts described in his book can apply to pain or any other chronic symptom including fatigue)
Low-energy option
You can ask questions to ChatGPT (or another artificial intelligence) about Mind Body healing!
Step 3: Practicing safety
1- Respond well to your symptoms
The key is to not fear them and to allow them to be here. Symptoms are sensations and they're not dangerous. Fear, frustration, anger or despair only fuels the "danger mode".
Notice how you usually react: thoughts like “oh no…”, body tension, shallow breathing... Then, gently shift toward safety: soften your body, slow your breath. The less you fight your symptoms, the quicker they will go away.
You don't need to attend to your symptoms all day long. Distraction is more than welcome. Pick light and enjoyable activities that feel soothing while your body resets. When I was at my worst I couldn't do much, so I practiced letting go and trusting that better times would come.
2- Regulation practices
There are many ways to soothe your nervous system. You don’t need hours of practice a day, just what feels doable and pleasant! Your brain learns safety over time and with repetition, be patient and gentle with yourself. A few examples:
- Breath work (e.g: inhale for 4 seconds, exhale for 6)
- Soothing touch (self massage, self hugs...)
- Reassuring self-talk
- Meditation and somatic tracking
- Focus on your 5 senses (a soft blanket, tasty food, fresh air...)
We're all different. If a practice really doesn’t resonate, let it go and try another one. In my case, gently reconnecting to my body (somatic practices) worked much better than cognitive approaches (often called brain retraining) to deal with physical symptoms. Just notice what feels good for your body and trust that.
A few resources to explore more practices:
- The Nervous System Regulation Toolkit (free)
- The Vagus Nerve Deck (physical deck of cards, ~20$ or 22€)
3- Joy and living life
I know it may feel impossible. “How can I enjoy life with these horrible symptoms???” I get it. But joy is the most powerful safety cue for your brain, and it can be found in the tiniest things. Just a few seconds of enjoyment can help, and it builds up over time. Here a few examples:
- Smile while breathing slowly (a fake smile still works!)
- Chat with someone you love (about anything but illness)
- Watch fun or cute videos (for any duration you are able to handle)
- Being in nature and get some sunlight
I had to start with very small things. At my lowest, all I could do was smile and breathe. But little by little, the energy came back and I was able to reconnect with activities I love — yoga, writing, walking, watching comedies…
The flip side of the "joy" coin is to reduce stressful inputs: for me it meant asking for help, avoiding draining people, world news and social media.
When in doubt or too tired, I would do the simplest thing: focus on slowing my breath down and allow whatever was here. Letting go is a true key to healing.
Step 4: Expanding activity
Once I felt more stable and more connected to my body, I started to have a bit more energy. Recovery then became a new cycle:
- When I have energy: I make sure to do things that bring me joy and fulfillment. I try to balance chores with fun, stay mindful and avoid anticipating disaster. Some people need to structure their day at first, others rely on intuition and listening to their bodies — do what works for you! The only thing that matters is feeling safe and confident.
- If symptoms show up: I welcome them without panic. I don't overanalyze or blame a specific activity. They are a normal part of the process, just like being sore after a workout. I slow down, rest my mind and body, and let my system reset.
- The symptoms pass (it can take a few hours, a few days, even a couple weeks), and I come out of this cycle a little bit stronger. Repeat to step 1.
We are all different, but this process can be extremely slow. I know it was for me! It’s also normal for emotions like sadness or fear to come up along the way. Give them space, then gently let them pass. Remembering that progress isn’t linear can make the journey much lighter.
Conclusion
I hope this can help you shape your own recovery plan! I remember feeling discouraged and lost so many times, not knowing what my next step should be.
But here’s the truth: There's no wrong way to do this. If you keep trying things and hold on to hope, you’re on the right path. Be patient and kind to yourself, you're doing your best, and that's enough.
FAQ
Can I recover from Long Covid or ME/CFS?
I am not a doctor, and I can’t promise that full recovery is possible for every single case of Long Covid or ME/CFS. These diagnoses are umbrella terms that cover a wide range of medical realities. Anything directly treatable should of course be addressed.
But over the last two years, I came across hundreds of genuine full recovery stories.
People of all ages and from all countries, with all kinds of symptoms and levels of severity, including those who were sick for decades, and who recovered. There’s no one-size-fits-all plan, the path will look different for all of us. But I do believe that working with our nervous system can help us improve our quality of life, and in some cases, fully recover.
How long does Long Covid or ME/CFS recovery take?
Sadly, it is impossible to say. We all heal at our own pace, and we can't rush our bodies. Some people improve quickly within a few months, while for others it can take one or two years of gradual change.
I know it’s incredibly hard to let go of timelines, but please don’t pressure yourself to get better faster. For many of us, healing means undoing life-long emotional survival strategies. Deep change takes time. I’ve been improving for a year, and I am still on the journey while I write these words. Just because it’s slow doesn’t mean it’s not happening.
What helped you the most during recovery?
It was definitely a combination of things, but letting go and reducing the fear and frustration around the symptoms was the foundation of getting better. Reconnecting to joy, even tiny things, allowed me to ease into each day with a little more softness.
Over time, I realized that the less pressure I put on myself, the more progress I made. When my body stopped feeling constantly under threat, it finally had space to rebalance. The less I focused on the illness, the more I was able to focus on living life, while accepting my current capacity.
How do you know if you’re actually improving?
There are many possible signals of improvement. One of the clearest is increased capacity over time: being able to do more physically (walking, riding my bike, doing chores…), cognitively (working on this blog, solving problems, having complex conversations…), and emotionally (setting boundaries with people, dealing with external stressors, or watching an emotional movie).
But that’s not the only thing. Feeling calmer and more confident during any activity is also a great sign of healing. In the end, it’s not what you do that matters, it’s how you do it. When you can do even tiny things in a regulated state, you are already recovering.
How do you deal with relapses or setbacks while healing?
Setbacks are part of healing, and there is no way to avoid them completely. Recovery from chronic illness is not linear, it naturally comes with ups and downs. Setbacks are extremely discouraging and they can feel like all progress is lost... but it's not the case.
Setbacks are always temporary. The most helpful approach is to meet them with softness instead of fear: slowing down, resting your body and mind, and giving yourself compassion. Navigating this journey is incredibly difficult, but if you keep showing up for yourself through tough times, you are on the right path.
Are you saying that Long Covid and ME/CFS are psychological illnesses?
Absolutely not. These are neurological illnesses in nature. The autonomic nervous system regulates many bodily functions, and when it becomes dysregulated, it can create very real and often debilitating physical symptoms.
These conditions are extremely difficult to live through, and they can generate psychological distress: anxiety and depression for example, can appear as consequences, but they’re not the causes.
What I say on this blog is that we have more influence than we think over how our nervous system regulates. We can’t make the body heal on command, but we can create the conditions in which the body finally feels safe enough to do so.