S2E8 Coffee Break with community member Vicky Argyle

Geoff Allix  00:02 

Welcome to Living Well with MS Coffee Break. I’m your host Geoff Allix. We decided to do something a little different in expanding the range of content we produce here at Living Well with MS. Since our community formed the beating heart of Overcoming MS. We are commencing this special series called Coffee Break, which features short interviews with members of the OMS community, talking about their personal journeys, adopting and staying on the OMS seven step recovery program, the challenges they encountered, and how they overcame them, and their tips and tricks for sticking to the path that leads to better health. We hope you enjoy and learn from these brief chats between our regular episodes. And as always, your comments and suggestions are welcome by emailing [email protected]. That’s [email protected]. And don’t forget, if you enjoy these and other Living Well with MS podcast episodes, please leave a review on Apple podcasts or your favorite podcast listening platform. Welcome to Living Well with MS Coffee Break Vicki Argyle, can you tell us a bit about yourself, your family, your life, where you live and anything about yourself that you’d like to share with us. 

Vicky Argyle  01:16 

Thank you, Geoff. Yes, I currently live in South Somerset with my partner who’s a farmer. So a relatively peaceful life. I used to work in London originally and left that in the 80s when there was a sort of downturn in the economy then and moved up south Scotland because I fell in love with the hills and retrained as a therapist up there for about 15/16 years where I married my husband moved back down south and eventually found myself working back in offices, which was rather not who I am. And that was when I got diagnosed with MS and I think it was the stress of living the life that wasn’t me. 

Geoff Allix  01:59 

I wonder if there’s a connection I’m similar so I’ve moved from London. If people don’t know, Somerset’s in the southwest of the UK and I similarly lived in London, I grew up in the southeast, lived and worked in London for quite a few years and then ended up moving to North Devon, which is actually the neighboring county to Somerset. So a similar, I didn’t go to Scotland, but other than that a similar route. So when you were diagnosed with MS that was when you were in Scotland. So when were you diagnosed with MS and that journey? 

Vicky Argyle  02:40 

I was diagnosed with MS after I’ve moved down from Scotland and stopped working for myself and had gone back into working full time in an office which I found quite stressful. 

 
 Geoff Allix  02:51 

So how long ago was that? 

 
 Vicky Argyle  02:53 

 
 Geoff Allix  02:56 

And how long have you been following the Overcoming MS Recovery Program? 

 
 Vicky Argyle  03:02 

I think I was extremely lucky. The neurologist that diagnosed me, didn’t know about the OMS program but had said that anecdotally his patients had recommended hyperbaric oxygen, which he obviously couldn’t in the NHS, went along there and the first load of people that I met were on the OMS diet. So I came across it right at the beginning. Very, very lucky. So when I was diagnosed, well before I was diagnosed, when I had my I don’t know what you call, it wasn’t a relapse, it was the first event. As I came out of it, what I found was I couldn’t deal with things that overstimulated my brain gave it too much to think about. So when I eventually started eating again, I would have a boiled egg, and then half an hour later, I’d have some lettuce and half an hour later, I’d have some raspberries. So I would actually have an egg salad with raspberries for pudding, but not in the order or together, I couldn’t do different textures or couldn’t do different tastes and I just think the whole thing about the nutrition part of the OMS really drew me in when I first started finding out about it. 

Geoff Allix  04:13 

Okay, and what’s your favorite thing about the program? And what do you think has helped you the most? 

 
 Vicky Argyle  04:19 

I think my favorite thing about the program is that it covers pretty much every aspect of your life. You know, everything else that I’ve come across looks, maybe at supplements or the dietry side or perhaps a little bit of counseling for the emotional side, it doesn’t look at the meditative sides, which as a therapist, I had quite a strong, I suppose alternative spiritual aspects to me. So that again was of interest to me. And it just felt it looked at the whole of me and the point that I got this happening, I had felt I’d lost who I was. So to look at something, a program that involved every bit of me, made a lot of sense, but I didn’t manage to do it all at once. I had to do it in stages. But it seemed to offer a lot of ways forward. If I dropped down on one bit, I could pick up on another bit, and somehow put together a patchwork that made sense to me.  

Geoff Allix  05:11 

I do think a lot of people say it’s a diet and, and I always say no, it’s more, it includes a diet, but it’s a lot more than just a diet, there’s a lot more to it than that. I think if that’s a very visible thing to friends and relatives, it’s like, alright Geoff eats different food now. You don’t tend to go out to dinner with people and meditate, so they don’t see that and they don’t see you taking Vitamin D, but they see Oh, right he doesn’t eat cheese anymore so it’s quite visible. So I think that’s probably why but yeah, I do find that a lot of people say its just a diet. No you’re right, I think, yeah, it’s one of the few that’s a whole holistic approach. And what about challenges? What’s your greatest challenge in adopting the OMS program? 

Vicky Argyle  05:57 

I think, before I became sick, I was vegetarian for probably 25 years and then vegan for a part of that. So I didn’t find the dietary side particularly difficult. I didn’t find the meditative side that hard. I qualify that with, I didn’t find it hard to do it but I needed to do it more regularly than I was. I think what I found most difficult was actually bringing to a close relationships that weren’t working and removing stress out of my life. So I did at the time I was diagnosed, I was living in quite an isolated cottage on my own and I worked full time in a  job I found very stressful. So the first things I had to do was move house to live nearer to people, which I wasn’t so keen on. And then I had to change my job, I had to find a part time role, because when I started doing the phased return to work, I knew when I got to three days a week, there was no way I was going to be able to do any more than that. And they would of needed more, and I wasn’t up for giving it. 

Geoff Allix  06:58 

And how did you overcome that? Were they supportive or did you change your work? 

Vicky Argyle  07:04 

I had to change my work, they weren’t supportive at all actually it was extremely stressful. And that was when I became aware that relationships were a major stumbling block for me in terms of stress levels, that if I’m struggling with somebody, and I’m struggling with the situation that I find myself in with, be it a family member or a friend or something you’re working with, my body will start showing symptoms, particularly in the legs. So I’ve had to work quite hard at changing the people that I relate with on a regular level. And that’s been quite difficult, because not everyone’s been so keen on me making those changes. 

Geoff Allix  07:37 

I find that personally, some things are very slow to have an effect, but stress is almost instant. I can feel it, I get stressed. Physically, it’s a physical manifestation. So we’re recording this in early April in the midst of the COVID 19 pandemic. So have you had to adapt your daily routine to fit in with the realities? I mean, in the UK, we’re living in an almost locked down situation where we’re not allowed to go out very often. So how have you managed that in the COVID-19, affecting OMS and your lifestyle? 

 
 Vicky Argyle  08:21 

I think there have been several sort of main things that I’ve found, I’ve felt particularly curtailed or one of which is the exercise. Because I’ve been using the exercise, we’re learning to gig row amongst other things, because it’s with a team of people and they’re fun, and I feel safe in the environment. So I’m getting to know people from outside, and it’s a full body workout, that’s for sure. So I’m missing the people, I’m missing the exercise, I’m missing the challenge that that brings. And that’s one of the things, I did the OMS retreat last year and one of the things that came up on that was the idea of always pushing yourself a little bit further. So not sort of sitting with what’s comfortable. So I missed the opportunity to push that and I’m finding that quite hard to replace with stuff that I get to do around the house, or in the garden or you know, on the farm. I am, well my partner’s on the vulnerable lists for cancer situation that he had recently. So we’re very much in the self isolation lockdown side of things and so we’ve decided that we really need to get on and start growing more food. So we’ve been just changing the whole of the garden around putting a polytunnel, getting everything together that we can, whether I’ll ever managed to make it grow to be anything that we can use, I’ve got no idea. But it’s using every aspect of myself that would like to otherwise sit around going, oh my god, what am I going to do with myself? So I’m just taking on new challenges, really. And the other thing I’m doing is I’m making sure that I ring people and tell them and speak to them verbally, and making sure that they know how important they are to me, not as a sort of helping me through MS thing but just as people who’ve been part of my life and that feeling of not exactly paying it forward but contacting people who are also struggling a bit, has made me feel better inside me, which helps. And the other thing that I’ve done is there’s a book called The Artists Way. And what it recommends within that, at the beginning is doing three pages of free writing every day, really. So just writing whatever’s coming out of you and getting it out. And so when I haven’t been able to meditate, because I’ve just felt a bit off, just sitting and writing those three pages of more or less nonsense, and then putting them away, just sets me back to sort of default position for the rest of the day. I found that really helpful. 

Geoff Allix  10:33 

Okay, we’ve got a journaling episode coming up at some point. And that’s very similar, actually, it doesn’t really matter so much what you journal, it’s, it’s the actual act of basically, putting down on paper, whatever you’re thinking is what helps. So just finally, do you have any other tips or tricks you want to share with our audience might help with OMS journey? 

Vicky Argyle  11:01 

I think when I meditate, I can hear myself quite clearly in size, you know, how I’m feeling and where I’m at. So when I don’t, or I’m struggling to, I do try and sit very quietly, not exactly meditating, but just thinking, How do my legs feel? Do they feel strong? Do they feel weak? Do I feel too busy in my head? And then look at finding something I can do that will rebalance me and sometimes it’s just a question of actually doing nothing. I have to be okay withdoing nothing that actually all my body wants me to do right this minute, even if it only turns out to be for 10 minutes is do nothing. And then I have a lot more energy later in the day. So this whole re this idea of that I’m missing out on something that I should be doing, I’ve had to put that completely to one side and just think sometimes it’s just a really beautiful sunny day and actually, I’m just gonna sit in it. 

 Geoff Allix  11:51 

Okay, thank you very much and thank you for joining us, Vicky. 

  Vicky Argyle  11:54 

Thank you, Geoff It’s been really fun.