Tips and Tricks on How to Be Sick

This month we’re going to talk about some heavy stuff that a lot of us experience, especially during the holiday season: we’re going to talk with musician Amy McNally about ways she copes with depression and suicidal ideation, both with formal medical and psychological treatment and in ways she deals with it apart from that. Click through for links to resources on dealing with depression and suicidal thoughts. Musical excerpts copyright Amy McNally, used with permission. Please see for a full transcript of this podcast.

In honor of Dysautonomia Awareness Month, we’re going to discuss dysautonomia and the ways it can present in different people, both on its own and in conjunction with other disorders. What is dysautonomia? Well, it’s a dysfunction of the autonomic nervous system, which tells you nothing unless you know a little bit about how the autonomic nervous system functions and what it does in the body. So let’s take this in two parts - what the autonomic nervous system does, and what things happen when it doesn’t do its job correctly. Please see for a full transcript of this podcast.

What I would like to see is, at the same time that you’re going through rehab, that you’re getting constant reinforcement that it is OK to be a person with a disability or with an impairment. It is not embarrassing to ask for help. You are not a burden if you need something, ever. And what disabled people need is not special. You don’t have special needs, you’re not a ‘special person’ - you are a person who has a specific need around your disability, and maybe that need will change, maybe you’ll continue to rehab and you won’t need that thing anymore. ... Like, we hate these signs of impairment so much, and even mobility aids, and we lust for normalcy to this degree that if you’re not getting better at a really fast trajectory, it’s easy to hate yourself. Please see for a full transcript of this podcast.

We are going to be talking about mental health, why therapy could be helpful to anyone — mental health diagnosis or not — and ways to make therapy more accessible to people with disabilities. For this, the interview will be with a clinical psychologist who, in the interests of full disclosure, I will tell you now has been my closest friend for almost 25 years, Dr. Erica Essary, Psy.D. Please see for a full transcript of this podcast.

This isn’t an episode of the podcast, not really. This is more of a side note and an apology for an unplanned three month hiatus. Please see for a full transcript of this podcast.

In this episode, we are going to be talking about keeping it together. Yes, in the sense of mentally and emotionally weathering life and the world around you, but also (and more specifically) keeping up with all the little changes that happen when a new chronic illness diagnosis or disability happens. You start with problem X, but that leads to some new symptoms that could be problem Y, and so you get sent to a new specialist who sends you for new kinds of tests, or gives you a new medication to try. And then, the medication might have a side effect that you need to control, so that’s more doctors and maybe additional treatments — where does it end? Before you know it, it feels like your life is both a) falling apart and b) completely subsumed by this new diagnosis, like a giant octopus wrapping its tentacles around everything. Please see for a full transcript of this podcast.

In this episode, we are going to be talking about Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, or EDS. There are many types of EDS, but they are considered to be the same family of disorders because they all stem from the same cause: improperly made collagen in the body. Collagen is a protein that forms the latticework that everything in the body gets built upon, but it’s not all the same. There’s 28 different type of collagen across several different genes, and each one has a different effect if there’s an error in the genetic code, resulting in a wide range of possible symptoms for people with some form of EDS. We'll talk about some of the most common symptoms and our top tips and tricks on coping with them. Please see for a full transcript of this podcast.

In this episode, we are going to be talking about autism, also called Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), and what it’s like to realize, as an adult, that not only are you non-neurotypical but that you are, in fact, autistic. Includes interviews with an #ActuallyAutistic man diagnosed as an adult, and a clinical therapist who gives some insight into the diagnostic process. Please see for a full transcript of this podcast.

In this episode, we have a special guest: we are going to be talking with filmmaker Jen Brea. Jen has ME/CFS, and while making a documentary about the progress of her condition from first symptoms through diagnosis and beyond, she did most of that work from her bed. Please see for a full transcript of this podcast.

In this episode, we’re going to discuss a thing we all have to do, but that some of us have real trouble with once our chronic illnesses or disabilities change everything: sleeping. Please see for a full transcript of this episode.

Finding the little ways you can adjust your life to make it easier to cope with new illnesses or disabilities. Please see for a full transcript of this podcast.

An introduction to the Tips and Tricks on How to Be Sick podcast, including a bit about the host & what this podcast hopes to do. Please see for a full transcript of this podcast.