The anxiety increased exponentially when my speech and memory deteriorated so much that I would lay awake all night convinced I had an undiagnosed brain tumour.

I had endless tests. In the beginning I still kept dragging myself to work whenever I could but when I returned home I was like an empty shell and could barely move for days. I was embarrassed about feeling exhausted all the time. I felt lazy. So, I pretended I was too busy to speak to people who tried to contact me. I was ashamed of an illness that didn't seem to exist as far as GPs were concerned.

M.E. was finally diagnosed 18 months later. In that time I had lost my business, had to sell my home and was reduced to claiming incapacity benefit of £34 per week. I also had two teenage children who could not work out what had happened to their happy, dynamic, busy mum. My husband rolled up his sleeves and at the end of each day took on all the things I could no longer do for our family after working a long day himself. He never once let me see how scared he was as he watched me sink lower and lower into an illness none of us understood.

At times I descended into chronic depression. I battled fruitlessly with local services and a health model that did not seem to have any real explanation or treatment protocols available. I was, however, determined to find answers. So, I spent borrowed money on trying everything I could. Things that didn't work and there were times when I felt like I would rather die than carry on. I would cry at the thought of what I had lost, not just for the material things, but for the person I had been.

My spark was gone and my energy a distant memory; my life had become small, quiet and lonely.