The perils of electro complacency

Very long term readers of this blog will remember that over ten years ago I went through a few years when I was quite seriously electro sensitive. In other words I reacted badly to electromagnetic radiation – the lifeblood of our phones, our computers and our on line inter-connected world.

Spending time in a ‘normal’ environment, heavily saturated with wifi, telephone masts, GPS satellite beams, smart meters and blue tooth, not to mention Alexa and her fellows had she been around,  would exhaust me, give me an aching chest, and an upset stomach, I would feel uncharacteristially depressed and would have difficulty in remembering the words I wanted to use.

Had I not known what was happening and removed myself from this environment, I would have gone on to have heart palpitations, my blood pressure could have gone mad and I would gradually have become so ill that I could not work or function at all.

Coincidentally, although they were obviously related, I became intolerant to titanium. It was indeed being in close contact with new large iMac (which includes titanium in its shiny silver casing) while in ‘direct line of fire’ of a bunch of phone masts that had finally tipped me into serious reactions. Titanium is also widely used in medical devices and dental implants so a titanium sensitivity can have more serious consequences than merely having to avoid ‘silver’ casings.

Sadly, all too many electro-sensitive people do not understand soon enough what is wrong with them and either do not or cannot remove themselves out of the reach of electromagnetic rays. As a result they become increasing ill, finally  taking refuge in off grid huts in remote uninhabited environments where they can escape the radiation. The film Electric Malady available to view very soon follows one such young man, living alone in this hut in the forest. He is absolutely not unique.

Fortunately for me, I was able to remove myself from the environment – by effectively turning our house into a large Faraday cage within which I was protected from the radiation – and in which we only use wired connections. Gradually, by dint of staying out of high EMR zones, using chelation and a number of natural therapies and by treating myself with oxygen, I got better – but continued to live an electrically and electromagnetically ‘clean’ life. No wifi, no smart meters, no blue tooth, no Alexa. Since I had worked from home for many years anyhow, this meant that my working environment also had very low radiation levels.

(For a much longer description of the condition and the measures that I took to manage it, see this article on the Foodsmatter site.)

As a result I have been able to lead an almost totally ‘normal’ life for nearly 10 years. I do still protect my living enviroment. My new house is cats-cradled with ethernet cables to allow me to connect anywhere in the house so that I do not have to use wifi, walls shared with wifi-using neighbours are painted with carbon protective paint, I do not have a smart meter and only ever use  mobile phone on speakaphone. But I otherwise go everywhere and do everything that everyone else does. To the point that I do not even think about radiation on a daily basis.

Step forward the law courts and a new Macbook Pro

In around October last year I started a volunteering job as a Witness Supporter at Highbury Magistrates Court. This is a rather crumbling 1960s brutalist building just by Highbury and Islington station. I was doing one day  week which theoretically lasted from 9am till 3.30pm although we often knocked off rather earlier.

Soon after I bought myself a new Macbook Pro laptop (with a shiny silver case) to use around the house when I wanted internet access outside my study. I just plugged into my ethernet network and logged in via my ethernet connections. Worked like a dream.

Before Christmas I noticed that I was getting a bit of low level ringing in my ears, especially when sitting in the living room with the laptop on my lap watching something on iPlayer. Initially I did not think anything of it – and when it continued and actually started to get rather worse, I put it down to age as I know that tinnitus at some level is quite common in those of pensionable age.

Then around the middle of last month I noticed that the tinnitus/ringing was significantly worse on the two days after I had done my one day a week volunteering but then gradually improved over the next few days. Although it was not a symptom that I had suffered from, I did know that tinnitus could be a symptom of electromagnetic sensitivity – and I started to wonder. I also noticed that my memory for names, and even words (which had never been that great) had got significantly worse – and that certainly had been one of my symptoms.

This was the first time in 30 years that I had spent the significant part of a day in someone’s office rather than my own at home. Could that be relevant?

I dug out my elderly  radiation meters and took them down to the courts – one for ‘dirty electricity’ (the radiation caused by multiple devices plugged in and out of an electrical circuit) and one for background radiation. Given the number of devices that were plugged into the system and the age of the wiring in the building, the dirty electricity was not too bad – but the background radiation levels were very high.

And then I remembered my gleaming new laptop. Did its shiny silver case not contain significant amounts of titanium? Yes, of course it did. And I had been all but taking it to bed with me. What an idiot!

The way back

So, the laptop is shut down, back in it case, and tucked way out of harm’s way in a deep cupboard – and I have, regretfully, resigned from my volunteering role at the courts.

The tinnitus is still with me but much better. It remains intrusive when I am tired or when the house is very quiet but after a good night’s sleep or when out tramping over Hampstead Heath it is scarcely noticeable.

Once more, I am very fortunate that I recognised what was happening in time before I re-sensitised myself too badly. But I am also very stupid in that I had allowed myself to forget that although I was so much better, electrosensitivity does not go away and at – if the circumstances are right – can be re-triggered at any time.

For more information on ES and support groups checkout:

• The ES section of the FoodsMatter website – the material is now quite old but all still totally valid.
• ES-UK – a support and campaiging group with a good selection of links to other organisations
• Phire – an information and research site directed mainly at medics
• Environmental Health Trust – a Canadian research and support group headed up by long term ES campaigner Dr Devra Davies