Live Well With Chronic Illness

Live Well With Chronic Illness Trauma-Informed Health Coach, supporting people with chronic illness to live their best lives!

Wishing all my clients and connections a very happy, peaceful and comfortable Easter.I hope the Easter Bunny is kind to ...
03/04/2026

Wishing all my clients and connections a very happy, peaceful and comfortable Easter.

I hope the Easter Bunny is kind to you! 🤗

Mindfulness is about more than meditation.It’s about cultivating certain inner qualities, what Jon Kabat-Zinn calls Mind...
24/03/2026

Mindfulness is about more than meditation.
It’s about cultivating certain inner qualities, what Jon Kabat-Zinn calls Mindfulness Attitudes, that shape how we relate to ourselves and to life.

This month, I’m exploring some of these attitudes and how they can support us when living with pain and chronic illness.

Compassion

When we’re stressed, overwhelmed, or angry, our capacity for compassion naturally shrinks. This isn’t a failure, it’s biology.

In moments of threat or stress, the brain’s survival system kicks in. The amygdala activates our fight-or-flight response, prioritising protection over connection. When this happens, the critical inner voice often gets louder, and kindness towards ourselves and others, slips into the background.

Mindfulness practice gently helps us shift this balance.

Through mindfulness, we can start cultivating self-compassion, learning to meet our own experience with care rather than criticism. As the nervous system settles, compassion naturally expands outward to others too.

When we intentionally “switch on” compassion, the body releases calming, supportive chemicals such as oxytocin and serotonin, natural antidotes to stress. These help calm the amygdala, quieten the inner critic, and create the conditions for greater emotional and physical wellbeing.

Over time, this compassionate response becomes more accessible and mindfulness becomes even more effective with regular practice.

A gentle reflection
Ask yourself today:
“How can I show myself a little more compassion right now?”

If you’d like to explore this further, I’m taking bookings for my next virtual, live 8-week Mindfulness course, starting this month.
Email livewellwithchronicillness@outlook.com to find out more or book your space

This week I’ve been sharing why I use mindfulness to help me cope with my chronic illness.One of the main reasons why I ...
18/03/2026

This week I’ve been sharing why I use mindfulness to help me cope with my chronic illness.

One of the main reasons why I love Mindfulness, is that it teaches us to be kind to ourselves! How difficult is that?! Especially when we live with pain and suffering. So many other ‘self-help’ tools like exercise, meditation etc put expectation and pressure on us, and add to the burden of self doubt and the sense of ‘failure’ that we feel. But the last thing we need is another reason to beat ourselves up! Mindfulness is inherently kind, and teaches us how to practice self-compassion, kindness and forgiveness. So, you aren’t perfect? No problem! Neither am I! Mindfulness says that’s OK.

If you would like to find out more about how you can learn Mindfulness and other wellbeing tools to support you with chronic illness, then you can book a place on my new 8-week Coping with Chronic Illness Course, which starts on 19th March.

To find out more and book your place, click the booking link in the comments.

Enter Discount150 when booking to reserve your place for the discounted price of just ÂŁ150 for the whole 8-week course!

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/living-well-practical-tools-for-coping-with-chronic-illness-tickets-1984178982750?aff=oddtdtcreator

This month, I’ll be starting the next intake of my Mindfulness for Chronic Illness course.Today, I want to share a littl...
17/03/2026

This month, I’ll be starting the next intake of my Mindfulness for Chronic Illness course.

Today, I want to share a little about why mindfulness can be such a powerful support when living with chronic illness and pain.

When you’re managing ongoing symptoms, uncertainty, and the mental load of daily life, it’s easy to feel overwhelmed. Mindfulness offers a different way of meeting these challenges; staying rooted in presence, kindness, and self-compassion.

Mindfulness isn’t about “clearing your mind” or making symptoms disappear. It’s about learning to be with yourself as you are, right now.

Rather than fighting pain, fatigue, or difficult emotions, mindfulness invites curiosity and compassion, helping you change your relationship with the situation you are in.

How mindfulness can help

Reduces stress and anxiety
Worrying about the future is exhausting. Mindfulness brings you back to this moment.

Supports nervous system regulation
Breath awareness and compassionate body attention can ease tension and build resilience.

Helps with pain management
Research shows mindfulness can change how pain is experienced by the brain, often reducing its intensity.

Encourages self-compassion
Instead of frustration or self-blame, mindfulness helps cultivate patience and understanding.

A simple practice to try now
Take a slow, steady breath in… and a gentle breath out.
Notice how your body feels, without trying to change anything.

Mindfulness won’t cure chronic illness, but it can change how you experience it, bringing more ease, self-compassion and calm.

If you’d like to explore this further, I’m now taking bookings for my virtual 8-week Mindfulness course, starting this month.

Email livewellwithchronicillness@outlook.com to find out more or book your space.

Do you have a good relationship with your body? This can be a tricky question for those of us who live with chronic illn...
16/03/2026

Do you have a good relationship with your body? This can be a tricky question for those of us who live with chronic illness. Do you love your body – even the bits that don’t work very well? That can feel impossible. I know I have struggled over the years with blaming my body for ‘letting me down’, or for stopping me from doing what I want. I hated my body and my illness, and I know many people who feel the same. But Mindfulness shows us another way. Through regular mindfulness practice, we can slowly rebuild our relationships with our bodies and find a healthier and happier way of living with them.

If you would like to find out more about how you can learn Mindfulness and other wellbeing tools to support you with chronic illness, then you can book a place on my new 8-week Coping with Chronic Illness Course, which starts on 19th March.

To find out more and book your place, click the booking link in the comments.

Enter Discount150 when booking to reserve your place for the discounted price of just ÂŁ150 for the whole 8-week course!

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/living-well-practical-tools-for-coping-with-chronic-illness-tickets-1984178982750?aff=oddtdtcreator

Do you experience anxiety as a result of your illness?Chronic health conditions are often dismissed as ‘just anxiety’. B...
15/03/2026

Do you experience anxiety as a result of your illness?

Chronic health conditions are often dismissed as ‘just anxiety’. But, while anxiety doesn’t cause the illness, it’s not surprising that people living with pain and illness can feel anxious.

How often do you find yourself worrying about the future, and how you will cope with something because of your illness or pain? How often do you feel fearful of what the future might hold? This is completely normal, everyone who suffers pain or illness has these fears and worries, but it can make living with illness difficult and stressful. Mindfulness teaches us how to remain in the present moment, and that has been shown in scientific studies to reduce anxiety and depression and help us cope with suffering better.

If you would like to find out more about how you can learn Mindfulness and other wellbeing tools to support you with chronic illness, then you can book a place on my new 8-week Coping with Chronic Illness Course, which starts on 19th March.

To find out more and book your place, click the booking link in the comments.

Enter Discount150 when booking to reserve your place for the discounted price of just ÂŁ150 for the whole 8-week course!

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/living-well-practical-tools-for-coping-with-chronic-illness-tickets-1984178982750?aff=oddtdtcreator

Another good reason why Mindfulness is a good tool to use to support us with pain and illness?In Mindfulness practice, w...
13/03/2026

Another good reason why Mindfulness is a good tool to use to support us with pain and illness?

In Mindfulness practice, we are not trying to ‘FORCE’ ourselves to feel relaxed or happy! It can be hard when we are in pain or struggling with symptoms to ‘zen-out’. Many other tools like hypnotherapy or meditation seem to require us to achieve a state of deep relaxation, which can be difficult for us when we are struggling. Mindfulness is not about forcing ourselves to feel a certain way, or trying to achieve any specific state – it is about feeling what we feel in any given moment, and working with whatever is present for us. That’s what makes it such a brilliant tool for helping us navigate difficult experiences. Mindfulness doesn’t ignore suffering, it doesn’t pretend it doesn’t exist – it accepts suffering and helps us to live with it.

If you would like to find out more about how you can learn Mindfulness and other wellbeing tools to support you with chronic illness, then you can book a place on my new 8-week Coping with Chronic Illness Course, which starts on 19th March.

To find out more and book your place, click the booking link in the comments.

Enter Discount150 when booking to reserve your place for the discounted price of just ÂŁ150 for the whole 8-week course!

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/living-well-practical-tools-for-coping-with-chronic-illness-tickets-1984178982750?aff=oddtdtcreator

12/03/2026

In 2018 I became severely ill with symptoms no one could explain. Every test came back “normal”, yet I felt anything but normal. I felt exhausted, overwhelmed and invisible. It was one of the loneliest times of my life.

The tools that helped me cope were the ones that steadied my nervous system and protected my mental health while my body was struggling.

Living with conditions like Long Covid, ME/CFS, Fibromyalgia, MCAS, Lyme, PoTS or autoimmune illness is exhausting in every way. You may be battling to keep working, or maybe you can’t work, and you feel as though illness has become your identity.

The unpredictability, the grief, the loss of identity, the pressure to “just reduce stress” or “think positively”, when that is utterly impossible. I know exactly how that feels.

That’s why I created my 8-week course, Living Well: Wellbeing Tools for Coping with Chronic Illness.

This is not about suggesting illness is psychological. It is about understanding how the nervous system interacts with our physical health, and how we can leverage that to our advantage. Using evidence-based tools to reduce overwhelm, interrupt spirals, support pacing, and build real resilience.

I’ve drawn on my studies from the fields of mindfulness, psychotherapy, helpful thinking skills, somatic therapy and compassion-based approaches to give you real, actionable tools to help you to cope with the challenges of living with ongoing health conditions.

The course offers a safe, non-judgemental space to learn practical, real-life skills, taught by someone who truly understands.

Find out more and book here:
https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/living-well-practical-tools-for-coping-with-chronic-illness-tickets-1984178982750?aff=oddtdtcreator

Why is Mindfulness a good tool to use to support us when we live with pain and illness?Well, one of the reasons is that ...
12/03/2026

Why is Mindfulness a good tool to use to support us when we live with pain and illness?

Well, one of the reasons is that it can be a very short practice. Some of the tools can be 30 seconds, while others maybe take around 10 minutes, so it is very easy to incorporate it into your daily life, even if you live with energy limiting chronic illness, pain or fatigue. There is no stick to beat yourself with here! The last thing we need when we are ill is yet another thing to try and squeeze into our never-ending ‘to-do’ list, or one more thing to do with our limited daily energy. However, just a few moments of Mindfulness practice each day can have huge benefits for us, and the tools I teach are deliberately designed to be achievable for us, even when we live with illness.

If you would like to find out more about how you can learn Mindfulness and other wellbeing tools to support you with chronic illness, then you can book a place on my new 8-week Coping with Chronic Illness Course, which starts on 19th March.

To find out more and book your place, click the booking link in the comments.

Enter Discount150 when booking to reserve your place for the discounted price of just ÂŁ150 for the whole 8-week course!

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/living-well-practical-tools-for-coping-with-chronic-illness-tickets-1984178982750?aff=oddtdtcreator

11/03/2026

If you live with chronic illness or pain and you've tried Mindfulness Practice before, and found it difficult,

then it might be because it hadn't been adapted to make it accessible for you. It's important to recognise that Mindfulness is not suitable for everyone, and if being in the present moment feels difficult for you, then it is sometimes better to find an alternative wellbeing tool.

However, it is also the case that standard mindfulness practices can feel overwhelming or difficult if we have breathing issues, or severe, unpleasant symptoms or pain.

Traditional breathing practices and body scans need to be adapted, and people with pain and illness often need to build up to these much more slowly.

There are many ways of practicing mindfulness and still getting the benefits of practice, but it’s important to be doing it in the right way and with the right guidance.

If you want to know more about how mindfulness can be adapted for pain and illness, then come along to my free webinar on 12th March at 5.30pm to find out more.

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/using-mindfulness-for-chronic-illness-free-webinar-tickets-1984299533320?aff=oddtdtcreator

10/03/2026

Living with chronic illness is tough. It’s tough physically, and that’s why we need proper medical care to support us. But it’s also tough mentally and emotionally, and that’s the part that often gets forgotten.

This is not ‘your health condition is just anxiety’, because sometimes that’s just a convenient explanation when the real answers aren’t immediately clear.

But, the actual reality that living with persistent, unpredictable pain and symptoms is brutal. And we experience an emotional rollercoaster every single day – frustration, grief, fear, exhaustion, shame, loneliness, and yes, anxiety. Anyone would be anxious in this situation, when we have become unwell and no one can give us any clear answers.

If you are looking for some tools to help support you to cope with the emotional fall-out of living with chronic health conditions, then I’ve created a free webinar for you.

I’ll be explaining some of the science behind what Mindfulness is, and how it works to help us when we live with chronic conditions. I’ll also be busting some myths, and explaining what it isn’t too!

And I’ll be sharing a bit about my new Coping with Chronic Illness course, which will be starting later in March.

Join me on 12th March at 5.30pm UK time to find out more. Booking link for the free webinar in the comments.

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/using-mindfulness-for-chronic-illness-free-webinar-tickets-1984299533320?aff=oddtdtcreator

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