I Remember Me

I Remember Me - Chronic Fatigue Syndrome is a 2000 documentary written, directed, and narrated by Kim Snyder about ME/CFS, featuring the 1984 Incline Village chronic fatigue syndrome outbreak and other similar outbreaks. Motivated to find out more about the illness that struck her in the mid-1990's, Snyder interviews patients, physicians, and researchers around the U.S.

Director and producer

Kim Snyder, who developed Chronic Fatigue Syndrome in the 1990s.

Cast

People with ME/CFS

• Michelle Akers, former soccer player and Olympic gold medallist
• Faye Austin
• Gussie Baker
• Blake Edwards, a film director and producer
• Keith Jarrett, composer of music score, who lives with CFS
• Gerald Kennedy
• Frances Malone
• Pat McCloud
• Martha McCormick
• Stephen Paganetti
• Heidi Pask

Medical professionals

• Dr Daniel L. Peterson
• Dr David Bell
• Dr David Hyde
• Dr Donald Henderson, researcher at Johns Hopkins
• Dr Jay Levy
• Dr Nancy Klimas
• Psychiatrist Peter Manu
• Dr Peter Rowe, researcher at Johns Hopkins
• Dr Robert Shedd
• Dr Alexis Shelakov, Salk Institute Researcher
• Dr William Reeves, author of the 1988 Reeves criteria of CFS, later became CDC Director

Others

• Jan Armstrong, local pastor
• Kelly Blank, relative of someone with CFS
• Eleanor Jefferies, Incline Village Spokesperson
• Jean Pollard, mother of someone with CFS
• Dan Steinmeyer, former Incline Village Spokesperson
• Maryan Wiedenfeld, sister of someone with CFS
• Leo Wotitzky, husband of someone with CFS

Awards

• Winner, Best Documentary Starz Peoples’ Choice Award, 2000, Denver Film Festival
• Honorable Mention, Golden Starfish Documentary Award, 2000, Hamptons Film Festival
• First Runner Up, Audience Award Best Feature, 2001, Sarasota Film Festival

Reviews

• 2001, Roger Ebert reviews I Remember Me

  Excerpt: "I now believe in Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. I was one of many who somehow absorbed the notion that it was an imaginary illness. I am ashamed of myself...
  Snyder begins in Lake Tahoe, where the disease struck hundreds of people. She talks to Dr. Daniel L. Peterson, who first started treating CFS patients there in 1984, has had seven who committed suicide because of the disease, and has no doubt it is real. She also talks to a spokesperson for the nearby Incline Village Visitors' Bureau, who says CFS is promoted by "quack doctors and mostly overweight women." This person succeeds in becoming the living embodiment of the real estate brokers in "Jaws," who don't want anyone to believe there's a shark.
  Yes, Dr. Petersen sighs, investigators from the CDC in Atlanta looked into the Lake Tahoe outbreak: "They came out here and skied and looked at a few charts." The conclusion was that Chronic Fatigue Syndrome was psychosomatic, or hysterical, or misdiagnosed. We are reminded that until the 1950s, multiple sclerosis was also considered a hysterical condition."

• 2002, Maryann Spurgin Reviews I Remember

  Excerpt: "I got a sense that Snyder had failed to do her homework before she made the film...As patients continue to suffer abuse, misdiagnoses, psychopathologizing, lack of medical care, and iatrogenic worsening of their condition, the real story still waits to be told."

• 2003, Leonard Jason Reviews I Remember Me

  Excerpt: "In the course of the four year production, Kim had called me a number of times to get my reactions and seek my advice on her film. During those conversations, I had urged her to consider the politics of this disease and to make the audience care about the central figures. I wonder what more could have been done to make the message accessible to the public...There are so many other stories that might have captured audiences' sympathies. I know of children who are being taken away from their parents because they are being charged with child abuse due to their lack of ability of going to school. Exposing such abuses would have been riveting. I know of many families that have been broken apart due to the spouse's inability to deal with the illness, and showing these types of effects might have generated more compassion for those affected. Thousands of individuals with CFS have lost their jobs, lost their homes and some have even become homeless---and had such stories been portrayed, particularly if the premorbid functioning had been presented in a way to build audience identification, more interest among potential viewers might have been actualized."

See also

• 1984 Incline Village chronic fatigue syndrome outbreak
• 1985 Lyndonville outbreak
• Daniel Peterson
• David Bell
• Peter Rowe
• Blake Edwards
• Michelle Akers
• William Reeves
• Ethical issues
• Medical Abuse In ME Sufferers (MAIMES)

See myalgic encephalomyelitis.

See chronic fatigue syndrome.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) - The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is a U.S. government agency dedicated to epidemiology and public health. It operates under the auspices of the Department of Health and Human Services.

See Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

iatrogenesis Accidental harm caused by a doctor, by medical treatment, or by diagnostic procedures.

myalgic encephalomyelitis (M.E.) - A disease often marked by neurological symptoms, but fatigue is sometimes a symptom as well. Some diagnostic criteria distinguish it from chronic fatigue syndrome, while other diagnostic criteria consider it to be a synonym for chronic fatigue syndrome. A defining characteristic of ME is post-exertional malaise (PEM), or post-exertional neuroimmune exhaustion (PENE), which is a notable exacerbation of symptoms brought on by small exertions. PEM can last for days or weeks. Symptoms can include cognitive impairments, muscle pain (myalgia), trouble remaining upright (orthostatic intolerance), sleep abnormalities, and gastro-intestinal impairments, among others. An estimated 25% of those suffering from ME are housebound or bedbound. The World Health Organization (WHO) classifies ME as a neurological disease.

myalgic encephalomyelitis (M.E.) - A disease often marked by neurological symptoms, but fatigue is sometimes a symptom as well. Some diagnostic criteria distinguish it from chronic fatigue syndrome, while other diagnostic criteria consider it to be a synonym for chronic fatigue syndrome. A defining characteristic of ME is post-exertional malaise (PEM), or post-exertional neuroimmune exhaustion (PENE), which is a notable exacerbation of symptoms brought on by small exertions. PEM can last for days or weeks. Symptoms can include cognitive impairments, muscle pain (myalgia), trouble remaining upright (orthostatic intolerance), sleep abnormalities, and gastro-intestinal impairments, among others. An estimated 25% of those suffering from ME are housebound or bedbound. The World Health Organization (WHO) classifies ME as a neurological disease.