vtdigger.org, 10 March 2015
Editor’s note: This op-ed is by Matt Fisken, a freelance energy adviser, permaculturist and stay-at-home dad who lives in Hartford.
Now that the show “Breaking Bad” is over and has been replaced by spinoff “Better Call Saul,” an important and eye-opening story is beginning to unfold. For the first time in earnest, electromagnetic hypersensitivity (EHS) has entered the mainstream consciousness through actor Michael McKean’s role as Chuck McGill, a law partner on medical leave due to this poorly understood and often debilitating affliction.
Some estimates suggest that 3-5 percent of the population is already sensitive enough to electricity or radio frequency (wireless) signals for it to disrupt their daily lives. Often times, these people are diagnosed with something else altogether like depression, chronic fatigue, multiple sclerosis, ADHD, autism or some other disorder.
Because we have so thoroughly surrounded our lives with electromagnetic radiation, it isn’t easy for people to escape these exposures long enough to actually feel normal. Disease becomes the new normal and connecting the dots is like solving a Rubik’s Cube. It might be compared to being stuck in a bad relationship or an addiction accompanied by hopelessness that health and happiness is unattainable.
Like many ailments, it’s tempting to believe that EHS won’t happen to you. I probably wouldn’t have considered it either until it became painfully clear that my otherwise good health was intermittently deteriorating when I spent too much time in radiated spaces, primarily the office in which I worked. Abandoning an otherwise enjoyable career is hard enough for people with illnesses that our health care system knows how to treat, but a growing number of people for whom EHS is alienating from the world have few places left to turn.
Read more »
Editor’s note: This op-ed is by Matt Fisken, a freelance energy adviser, permaculturist and stay-at-home dad who lives in Hartford.
Now that the show “Breaking Bad” is over and has been replaced by spinoff “Better Call Saul,” an important and eye-opening story is beginning to unfold. For the first time in earnest, electromagnetic hypersensitivity (EHS) has entered the mainstream consciousness through actor Michael McKean’s role as Chuck McGill, a law partner on medical leave due to this poorly understood and often debilitating affliction.
Some estimates suggest that 3-5 percent of the population is already sensitive enough to electricity or radio frequency (wireless) signals for it to disrupt their daily lives. Often times, these people are diagnosed with something else altogether like depression, chronic fatigue, multiple sclerosis, ADHD, autism or some other disorder.
Because we have so thoroughly surrounded our lives with electromagnetic radiation, it isn’t easy for people to escape these exposures long enough to actually feel normal. Disease becomes the new normal and connecting the dots is like solving a Rubik’s Cube. It might be compared to being stuck in a bad relationship or an addiction accompanied by hopelessness that health and happiness is unattainable.
Like many ailments, it’s tempting to believe that EHS won’t happen to you. I probably wouldn’t have considered it either until it became painfully clear that my otherwise good health was intermittently deteriorating when I spent too much time in radiated spaces, primarily the office in which I worked. Abandoning an otherwise enjoyable career is hard enough for people with illnesses that our health care system knows how to treat, but a growing number of people for whom EHS is alienating from the world have few places left to turn.