Taking time to smell the roses: Accounts of people with chronic fatigue syndrome and their struggle for legitimisation

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Abstract
This paper examines some of the current themes around the contested illness Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. It is based on a review of the biomedical literature, both current and historical, and draws from interviews with sufferers of the condition. The paper first outlines some of the propositions underlying the current biomedical use of the general conception a of psychosomatic disorder, and then goes on to contrast these with the general themes in sufferers’ personal accounts of the condition. The strategic use of possible historical antecedents by both sufferers and biomedicine further reveals how the chief claim to legitimate the condition is based on a need to describe the condition as a physical disease rather than psychological disorder. Though the issue of legitimisation is a central concern from both perspectives, the paper suggests that what sufferers seek is recognition for their subjective experience in a lived world, and that this will always be at odds with a medical discourse based on the principle of an objective reality to disease.