The Sunflower Conversations

ME / CFS with Hollie Christian Brookes, Yawn

• Hidden Disabilities Sunflower

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This episode was recorded on Instagram Live.

Hollie Christian Brooks joined us to discuss her new play "Yawn: A Chronically Fatigued Play", which draws from her personal experience with ME/CFS to educate audiences about non-visible disabilities and create new connections with the community.

We discuss everything, from symptoms and periods to self-discovery and the power of the Sunflower.  

  • ME/CFS often develops following viral infections like glandular fever, with Hollie’s diagnosis coming after years of recurring symptoms.
  • The fatigue associated with ME/CFS differs from normal tiredness in that it cannot be alleviated by sleep and often includes flu-like symptoms, pain, and cognitive difficulties.
  • Hollie created "Yawn" as both a personal healing journey and a way to connect with others who understand the isolation of chronic illness.

"Yawn" is designed to be accessible and inclusive, with concession tickets available for anyone who self-identifies as having a disability.
 
 If you are experiencing any issues discussed in this podcast, please contact your healthcare practitioner.


You can connect with Hollie on Instagram @yawn_play and find links to purchase tickets in her bio. 


Hosted by Chantal Boyle, Hidden Disabilities Sunflower.
 
If you enjoyed this podcast, please leave a rating and review.

Find out more about the Sunflower by visiting the website hdsunflower.com

Music by "The Emerald Ruby" Emerald Ruby Bandcamp and Emerald Ruby website




So joining me on this Instagram Live, which is part of the Sunflower Conversations, which is a podcast that we have to inform people and educate ourselves about non visible disabilities and the importance of the Sunflower, the role that it plays in society and in our communities. Joining us this evening is Hollie Christian Brooks, who is the creator and writer of a new play called Yawn, a chronically fatigued play. So I am going to attempt to say this the full name, so please I take my apologies if I don't get it correctly, but Holly lives with Myalgic Encephalopathy which is not quite right, I know, but it's a little bit of a tongue twister. But that's abbreviated to ME And chronic fatigue syndrome, which is also abbreviated to CFS. Hollie wanted to use her creative performance skills as an education tool to inform others reveal the realities of what it's like living with long term health conditions. So the play is also an opportunity to build a community for individuals living with ME and CFS. So first of all, I'm going to say welcome to Hollie. And then I'm going to give a visual description of what I look like and my surroundings. And then Holly will do the same. So I am female. I have long brown curly hair. I am 50. I am wearing an orange top. I have a white Sunflower lanyard. I support Sunflower lanyard. And in my background I have white shutters, and a green plant. And I'm wearing glasses. So Holly, if you just give a quick visual description and then we can start the questions. Absolutely. So yeah, I'm Hollie. I have a longish, wavy dark brown hair. Im also female. I'm wearing glasses. I have a plain white wall behind me and I have a very bright tie dye top on with yellows and blues and pinks. Thank you. And once again thanks to everybody who is joining. So let's go for the first question. So what is Yawn and what can audiences expect to experience? Yeah. So first of all, thank you so much for having me. And I can see that there's people from literally all over the world tuning in, which is amazing to me in my tiny little bedroom which is where I wrote Yawn. So yeah, thank you everyone for for joining and being interested. So Yawn is. It's a one act play. And it is based entirely on my experiences of becoming ill with ME / chronic fatigue syndrome. And my journey to getting a diagnosis. But it's also more than that. It really tells the story or my story, which is that through having this condition I've learned so much about myself as a person. And what I need not just as a person with me, cfs, but what I need as me as a human being. And so it really shines a light not just on the condition and the challenges of having ME, CFS and hidden disabilities generally, but also you know, that actually in our biggest struggles and sometimes our biggest challenges, they can be our superpowers to really look after ourselves and learn about ourselves and make sure that we are being true to ourselves. So why was it important for you to write it? So you said that you discovered things about yourself that you hadn't. Yeah, absolutely. I think there's a couple of reasons really why it was important for me to write it. The first one is that anyone who lives with a hidden illness or a chronic illness particularly, I'm sure will resonate that it can be a really lonely place. And particularly when you have a condition that's hidden it can feel quite isolating. It can feel like it's only you that's going through it. And so it was really. I started writing it thinking, not really thinking that it would go anywhere but my bedroom. But it was really a chance. More like a personal journal as a sense of kind of healing. Absolutely. It was. It was an opportunity to really process what I'd been through a way to sort of come to terms with it and some of the particularly damaging experiences that I had on my diagnosis journey. But it was also, for me, I think a way of connecting to this kind of new me with it and creating an opportunity where I could connect with other people, other creatives who may also have the same thing or something similar which I have. You know, we've got the amazing Oliver George involved in the project, who is an influencer, if you don't follow him already. I definitely, definitely recommend. He does a lot of amazing videos on chronic illness and CFS specifically. But had I not had the play, I never would have reached out to him, and then I never would have found a like mind. And we've massively helped each other out as peers, you know, not just as actors, but also as chronic illness sufferers. And so it was. It was really partly for me, but also partly I suppose I say a cry for help, but it was more of a, like, I've got this thing. I'm gonna put it out there. Anybody else. And it seems that really resonated. I've got this vision of you know, the life savers. The rings that you have on a boat where you cast them out to sort of, you know, to sort of pull people in and rescue it, in a sense. So it's like trying to, you know, pull people in who need that support. There was a comment here from somebody who said, my family just don't understand. Yeah, yeah, I've been there as well. You know, I can remember. I think we'll come on to it. But I can remember when I first started feeling, you know, super fatigued. Like you know, the fatigue that we talk about in the play that I live with, which is a good night's sleep just doesn't put it right. Which a lot of people think is the answer. And I can remember, you know, my parents, with all the best will of the world, they were like, oh, you just need a couple of weeks of rest and you'll be fine. And they weren't necessarily, you know, they weren't coming from a bad place, but they didn't get it. And I think that is the real challenge of having a chronic illness or a hidden disability is like, only you know what you feel. You know, we're not mind readers. We're not with the best one in the world. We can't predict how one another is feeling or anticipate. And that also then adds to that exhaustion because you are the only, you are your only advocate, you're the only one that can really communicate what's going on for you at any given time. And it's a really difficult place to be. And yeah, you know, a lot of people don't get it, but actually in my life I have been very lucky where my family, my friends my partner. After a period of time it became really apparent that something was different. And it's taken time but explaining to them and trying to relate it to them in a way they're never going to get it fully because they're not in my body. But you know, they know what I need to support me and that's all I can really ask from them. And I think the play is being able to, in a fake sense, put yourself and really be like a voyeur of somebody's, day to day experience experiences which it's really then helping to kind of. Oh, right. Or I see, I get it. It's not exactly. Exactly. It's exactly that And it's a kind of got a twofold mission really for me. Like I said earlier, like what, why I wrote it. It was kind of trying to find my tribe, I suppose and find my place as a creative in this new world that I was in. But also like, I didn't know much about ME beforehand. I'd heard it banded around. I didn't really know what it was. And obviously it's only in life when you. When you have these things or someone else does and you encounter them that you really are forced to educate yourself. And I kind of thought, how can I use what I love to do, which is performing and being creative, to educate. And so it's kind of got. It's got that element to it of if you have what I have, please come and let's resonate with one another and relate and support. Is it also to bring friends and family members so that they can then get a better answer? Yeah, absolutely. Do you incorporate at the end where you talk or have questions or is it the play and that's it, you come absorb and then you, you go off and you travel at home? Yeah, at the moment, that's what it is. At the moment it's, it's you know, what you'd expect from going to a theatre performance. It's just a one act just over an hour and then to go away. I'm hoping in the future that we will have more of a kind of workshop element and a kind of Q and A at the end of it, moving forward. I'd love to work with communities and businesses who are interested in becoming hidden disability aware as you work with through the Sunflower Scheme. But yeah, at the moment I think it's just a chance for people to come along and kind of be entertained. That's the other thing. It's not it's not a sort of doom and gloom. I hope it isn't. I don't want it to be. It's very much a, you know, having a chronic illness isn't the end of you. You know, for me it's been the beginning in a very odd way. But I'm hoping that it adds to that layer of understanding from friends, family, strangers who know nothing. Because it's so important to those of us that have this condition specifically, but a chronic illness more broadly, that we can have these conversations and we're not suffering in silence. Amazing. We've got lots of comments here, so I'm just going to read out some of the comments as we go through. There's a writer, performer, director with fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue who's fully with you. Yeah exactly. Get connecting. I feel no one gets you unless they have similar or same or similar condition to you. I guess it's hard for them to understand. So let's find out about your journey because there will be people on here that don't nothing know nothing about me. And that is the role of Sunflower is to inform and educate. So how did your journey with me CFS begin and can you share some of the symptoms that you experience? Yeah, absolutely. So it seemed to happen quite suddenly, but actually in hindsight happened over a long period of time. When I was in my early 20s I had glandular fever and it never really felt like I bounced back fully from that. I would have sort of like just repeat cold and flu y things and then I'd get over them and then I'd be going fine and then I'd be kind of really run down and worn out again. And it was this sort of constant boom and bust cycle, if you like. And had various different infections, went to the doctors with various different problems that all seemed different. Such as you know, like digestive issues dizziness, palpitations. Again, like repeat viral glandy things. And then it was actually an ear infection that was really the catalyst. And that was about three years ago. I remember it really well because it was the weekend of the Queen's funeral. And I was laid up on the sofa watching it. And every time I moved I thought I was going to collapse. I couldn't get my balance. I felt really sick. And I went to the doctors, was treated for an ear infection. But a couple of weeks later, although physically the infection in my ear had cleared up, I was exhausted. I couldn't. Getting out of bed in the morning was like beyond hard work. Showering felt almost impossible. It was like I basically felt like I was carrying dead weight within my body. And I went back to the doctors and said, look, I know the infection has cleared up, but I still don't feel right. And at first I was treated for depression. Okay. Because a lot of the fatigue symptoms, you know, can signal to that. But then after a period of a number of weeks where I was repeatedly going back and saying, really not my normal self. It was probably about two and a half months after I had the ear infection that somebody then went through my history and everything else I presented with and joined the dots and went, actually, I think this could be something bigger. So then I was referred. And sort of from that point it was a I was getting sort of weird and wonderful symptoms coming forward every week. It felt like at one point and I was like, is this, is this ME / CFS? Is this anxiety? And it turns out that, yeah, it pretty much. It pretty much was. So the symptoms that I kind of live with. Yeah. So ME basically is the nerve center of everything that's going on in your body. Yeah, absolutely. It is debilitating fatigue. At different levels there are grades. To ME, you sort of have mild, moderate and severe is generally how it's understood. Typically I'm in the mild to moderate category. So But yeah, it's this debilitating fatigue that asleep just can't refresh you from. And I suppose I'm going to go into my symptoms. But the key thing, I think, to remember about ME / CFS and that I allude to at the end of the play is that everybody's experience of this condition is very different. You know, what I. The symptoms that I have and that I feel will be wildly different to somebody else's experience of me. But for ME, hard for. Makes it hard for diagnosis. Somebody's up. It really, really does, because do they. Do a blood test to confirm the diagnosis? So as far as I'm aware, there isn't a blood test to say you have ME. But I did have a blood test that had proof of past viral infection of what's called Epstein Barr, which is the glandular fever. Okay. Umbrella. And so on that basis matched with my history, they were able to sort of say that's probably what caused it. There is a known link between glandular fever and ME. And obviously in that time as well, we had Covid in the pandemic, and I was hit by Covid about three times. So it all kind of led to where we are now, really. But yeah, symptoms wise, it was the fatigue. Really really bad aches and pains in my legs. Like Feeling like I'd basically run and been stood on my feet all day when I might have only been stood for about five or 10 minutes, which I still get now. When you have flu, is it that kind of aches? Yeah, I get a lot of flu. Like, particularly. I am. When I get particularly run down, I feel, you know, particularly fatigued. I can feel like I'm coming down with a cold. My glands will swell. Ill have a runny nose, scratchy throat. Yeah heart palpitations, dizziness. Periods, nobody really talks about how it can impact that side of things, you know, particularly for women. And the stats from the M.E. Association as far as I'm aware, do show that more women have it than men, particularly in this country. So it's affected my hormones and menstruation and things like that, which nobody really talks about. Is that the frequency or the flow or everything. It really varies. It's more like my hormonal balance. And certainly when the condition I would say, had really got a hold, I suppose when I was in that kind of real, what I call a crash phase, when it first really kicked in it was, yeah, like, the frequency for sure. And like, the period pains are like nothing I'd ever had before. It was really. It's all I don't know the science fully, but it's all to do with, like, the. I think it's the endocrine system and how your nervous system interacts with that. But again, it's not. They know that there is a link, but it's not. Well, sorry about that. Let's get. Sorry, guys, people. Sorry about that. I think it was because the chat's going so well. The time ran out, so let's just get Holly back. Right How am I going to do that? Yawn. Let's get back right in the middle of the flow. So hopefully we'll get Holly back in just a moment. The technology is conspiring against me. Let's invite her again. So far, very interesting. Heart palpitations. I didn't know about that. The effects on the. The menstrual cycle and the hormones. I was going to ask whether or not that might be down to the fact there's not much research has been put into it because of the Because it's women's health. I mean, that's quite a That is quite a bold claim. It's more of a. I wonder whether that is. Why not as much as much has gone into that. Hello. That was because we put it for. Half an hour and then we were chatting, and I'm assuming that's why it ended. I don't know, actually, because it isn't. Half talking for anyone. That was on the other one. I went for as long as. As I could until I got your other invite. But what I was saying was that with all the symptoms and the condition itself, I think that the most difficult thing is that it's by nature fluctuating. So you have one day where it can seem like we're doing really well and it's going really, you know, really great. And then perhaps the next day or even hour by hour it can change. And yeah, just going back to what we talked about earlier, about how we communicate that with others and how that's exhausting. That can be really difficult because people can go, well, you were fine yesterday. And you're like, yeah, but you know, I might have seen fine, but this was going on, this is going on and today I just can't manage it or well, I did feel fine yesterday and for whatever reason. So the unpredictability of it is one of the biggest challenges with it, with all of the symptoms. How do you manage your symptoms on a day to day basis with the fluctuations? Yeah, I think knowing my body and what I need supplements I've found quite useful. Some have not been at all some have been nourishing my body really well with food. There's certain foods that I don't respond very well to anymore. So avoiding those as much as I can. Sleep does help, like, you know, like anybody else. It just doesn't fix the tiredness, which is the difference. But again, you know, sometimes you can get sleep disturbance with it. But making sure that I've got a good routine and I'm really lucky, you know, I work for myself. So being able to be flexible with my hours and being able to step back if something is too much. I think the biggest thing that I've learned from all of it is having boundaries, you know, because you want to, you want to, particularly when you're working, you want to do a really good job and you want to please the people in your life. But it's learning when that's not serving you. And that's one of the big things that I've learned in managing my symptoms is making sure that I'm I'm doing everything for the right reason, basically. So putting, yeah, I'm putting your, yourself and your body first. Because it must be. Somebody has commented here, Clara Bella has commented that if you're having a good day and you go out, people think you're fine, but then afterwards you're absolutely exhausted. You know, for days afterwards. And as you said it's other people's perception that I would imagine that can prevent you from putting yourself first and your needs so that you are able to participate probably in more things by, in a sense doing a bit less. Yeah, it can be. And also it can be sometimes balancing that thing of just wanting to feel a bit normal, you know, like just wanting to say yes to stuff and not think too much about it. But so much of having this condition is having to be organized and plan and make sure that when you are doing something, you're not giving too much energy in one place that it might stop you from doing something else. And so it can be a bit of a minefield when you're trying to live in the way that best serves you, but also not restrict yourself in that and. And stop yourself from doing things. And Yeah, it's really hard. I think everyone. You kind of have to be your own judge of it, like, you know what's good for you. And. Well, certainly I've got to a point where I know what's good for me, what's not. And on the days where it's not, if I make that choice, I make that choice. And it's just making sure that I've got a recovery plan in place. And I think not anticipating the worst, that's really hard. Not sort of waiting for the crash to come kind of, you know. Yeah. Like maybe hope's the wrong word, but, you know, trusting that. That I will be okay. And if I'm not, I'll deal with it. Yeah. So yeah. Yeah, I can Yeah, I can. I hear so much with the com. I'm. So I'm in such a fortunate position because I get to talk to lots of Sunflower wearers. And that's a real recurring sentiment that comes through this lady here, Angel's Place. I can relate to this. With perimenopause and undiagnosed AuDHD each day changes and again just trying again to be flexible and step back, but not taking on too much. So what do you think the public perception is of non visible disabilities in particular? CFS and ME? Because I know that. Well, a couple of decades ago there wasn't much known about your condition, was there? And it was referred to as yuppie flu, which is awful. I think. I think the public perception is evolving. I think it's still stuck in the past to a degree. You know, I've still come up against situations where There has been doubt as to why I need specific help out in public or, you know aspersions made about various different things. I think what's been really encouraging is that it is being more talked about. You know, I don't know if people on the live stream will be aware, but a couple of weeks ago there was a massive breakthrough, massive study from Decode ME, which is the research group, I believe they're based up in Edinburgh. And they won't go too much into the scientific detail because I'll probably make a mess of it. But essentially they found there was a genetic link and it was all over the national media and I couldn't remember a time where I had seen ME being talked about on that scale. Channel 4 News 5 Live radio you know, Independent, the New Scientist. It was a story. We've now got as well in Parliament, we've got the All Party Parliamentary group on ME, which is the secretariat for that is the ME Association and Action for ME, the to charities that are kind of running it with cross party MPs. So it feels like there is momentum. It is being acknowledged as a health condition and not just an illness of the mind, which is really encouraging. I hope that Yawn can be a small part in adjusting that public perception. And I think it's like anything, you know, when it comes down to societal tolerance, you never know what somebody's going through. And it's that basic thing of like not judging a book by its cover. And hopefully the more that ME is talked about, the more people get it, the more accepting we are of one another and yeah, it will just continue to be a more positive space for us. Yeah, good. We have to keep the momentum going. So will Yawn be Sunflower friendly and if so, what can Sunflower wearers expect? Yeah, absolutely. So I'm really proud, thanks to your help, to say that we are as a production, we are members of the Sunflower scheme, which is amazing. So my team have access to the training tools. So those that I'm on stage with, those that we're working with behind closed doors and the venues that I'm working with as well I will be able to share those resources with them, which is amazing. I myself am a Sunflower lanyard user as well. So yes, it will be. We have concession ticket prices that are available for anybody with a disability and anybody who self identifies as having a disability. A lot of places You have to quantify that with a piece of paper or a badge or something. But obviously the nature of what I have and what the play is about, we're just not running it like that. So we absolutely will be. And we welcome as many people as possible. Sunflower wearers or not. So brilliant. Yeah. Because there's been a few comments already from. From people saying, you know, waiting diagnosis. And it's that, isn't it? And that's what the Sunflower about in that, you know, it takes a long time for people to get a diagnosis sometimes, if ever. And it's about being inclusive. So that's really a positive decision that you taken. Thank you. Well, it's. That's. That journey is exactly what mine was. And it's reflected in the play just about the sheer length of time and the kind of like, void that you can find yourself in. And you know, I want. I want people to come and watch regardless of whether they have ME, CFS or not or a chronic illness or not. But those that are in the chronic illness community, I want them to come and watch and feel seen. You know, even if the symptoms I have are so different, I would love them to just be like, you know, do you know what? Like your story isn't my story, but I resonate with what you're saying. So. Yeah, yeah, very exciting. We will come on to where it's sharing. I just wanted to ask you about how you, you said you're a Sunflower wearer. How do you feel about it? And are there any occasions that you can recall where it sort of acted as a support to you? Yeah, I mean, I I love it. It has massively helped me particularly in things like airports, transport, things like that where, you know, staff generally are really clued up. They're members of the scheme, they're there to help you. There are certain situations where I still get nervous to wear it if I'm being completely honest. And I think it's just that, that thing of human nature, like, we're a tribe and we don't want to stand out. And So I think there are some situations where it's like, it's in my pocket, but I'm not necessarily wearing it, but I'm increasingly becoming more proud to wear it because I know that. You know, change starts with us, doesn't it? And if I wear it and it helps somebody else and they go, oh, what's that? I became a wearer because of my own family. Like my aunt and my cousin both wear the lanyard and they were the ones that put me onto it to start with. So it is that thing of like through word of mouth and you know, you can help one another. But yeah, it's been, it's a really positive way to signal that I may need help without suddenly having to go, ah I need help. You know, you almost have that kind of like that clue. So yeah, generally it's been really positive. There are some areas where, you know it hasn't been, but it's part of the work you're doing is to, to make the Sunflower something that is educational but also that support. And I hope that your work continues to be as positive as it is and people will just associate and it just won't even be a double take situation in the future. I don't think many people are aware that behind this lovely little sunflower, when businesses join and they become members, we have training, as Hollie's mentioned, that training is to inform people and educate that there are many, many non-visible disabilities and nobody's expected to be an expert in any of them. But actually it's so much more than what you may have perceived disability to be and to just kind of, you know, take a minute, offer support, be polite, be understanding, you know, don't judge aford that kindness to somebody just because they might not look unwell. You just don't know what that person might I think. For me as well, it takes a lot of pressure off. Just going back to the point that we've come back to a few times during this conversation, but about advocating communicating for yourself. The times where it's been a massive support is where it's just been clocked and it hasn't been like a big deal and nobody sort of said like, oh, can I have a look at that? Or oh, you know, they've just gone, oh, yeah. Do you want to put. Because it, it just takes so much pressure off. We don't have to stand there and you've got nothing to prove. It's kind of like, here's my, here's my badge. It's there if you want to look at it. But the fact that I'm wearing it, you know, please, please respect why I'm wearing in the first place. And it takes, yeah, when It. When it works, it takes a lot of pressure off having to sort of be on the front foot communicating. Thank you for sharing that. Thank you. Not at all. So we're coming to the end of our Instagram live. Hopefully it won't cut off again for it to finish before someone's here saying, I started wearing the lanyard at work, but I also have a neurospicy wristband. I get numbers mixed up and when you're at a till and it says declined, I always feel awkward. So that Sunflower is her way of saying, look, just give me a minute, you know, take me a little bit more time to process. So I think that that's really you know, really valuable asset, the Sunflower. So just going back to Yawn, how do you want audiences to feel when they leave the show? Yeah, I think I'll probably jump the gun and touched on this already. I think those audiences who are able and willing to come and watch, who have a chronic illness of some kind, I just want them to feel like that I see them and even if my experience is wildly different from their experience, that there will be, you know, a commonality or at least, you know that I get it. I may not get exactly what you have and you may not get exactly what I have, but we are on that kind of level of understanding, so that there's a sort of representation element there. But I think for audiences who are coming either just because they want a good night out at the theatre to watch a bit of new writing, or they are coming to support the cause. Id like them to not only have a good time, but send them away thinking, you know and feel like they've learned something. And we, you know, we had our debut performance in May. And the comments that we had were beyond anything I could have imagined, really, for a first performance. You know, we had some amazing ideas and feedback for taking the play further, which, you know, most of which we've kind of taken on board and looked at how we can tweak. But a lot of the feedback was around how it was entertaining and educational and it was relatable. And that's all I can really hope for is that I use my story to hopefully help someone else in whatever way that might be. Well, I'm looking forward to it. So, you know, we're getting lots of people asking, well, where is it? When's it? Where is it? Yeah, where is it playing? And you know, how can people purchase tickets? And there was a comment from somebody saying if they're not anywhere near where it's playing, will there be an opportunity to watch it in another format? Yeah, absolutely. So we're playing at the Mission Theatre in Bath on the 25th and

26th September at 7:

30. And then we'll also be coming to London on the 8th and 9th of October at the Golden Goose Theatre in Camberwell, which is part of the Lambeth Fringe Festival. Tickets are available online, so if you go to either of those venue pages, there's links to our eventbrite pages where you can purchase the tickets there. As I said earlier, we've got full price and concession in terms of alternative formats, that is very much something I'm working towards. I'm thinking big, I would like to do a national theatre at home style recording at some point in the future. That will depend on us securing funding which is also the mission for next year. Because with funding I'd like us to take it to more theaters, take it to more communities. Someone's just put up north. Any chance? Absolutely. I've worked up north before in different acting jobs and I love the audiences up there. And yeah, I'd love to come back up there with my own work. But yeah, so it does depend on funding. So that is something that we're working towards further down the line. But it's very much on my radar. And yeah, we're kind of at the point where we've got something that feels quite good. We're doing performances, we want to collect some more, some more feedback, we want to see how it's landing and then hopefully next year we can bid for some cash and and, and go further. That allows you to make it even more accessible, doesn't it? Taking it into people that can't get there for whatever reason that might be. So I think that that would be great. Somebody's here saying, isn't it good to record the play so patients can watch it at home? So I think that's what Hollie's looking at, all of that and how to. Oh, have you got a GoFundMe? There you go. Not yet. No, not yet. Its one of those things where I'm still sort of getting over the fact that the script I wrote in my childhood bedroom is kind of actually happening. So all of these things are massively on my radar. I want to make sure that when we do film it, it's good. Like I don't want to just set up a phone and I want it to be good quality that people, so they feel like they're in the room with us. And again, stuff like that only comes from funding. So if there's a demand where people feel like they would love to donate for us to do more with our play, then let me know and we will absolutely go down that avenue. But I'm also aware from the position that I'm in, you know when you're in the chronic illness community, like, finance is hard and I don't want to expect that off people like me who might be struggling in lots of different ways. So yeah, it's all on the radar. But the more that I'm able to connect with more people like those of you who are connecting with us now and joined in the more that we have that evidence base and we can really go out there and grow our little seed of a show into hopefully something bigger, much bigger community. So, yes, you can connect with Hollie at Instagram, which is yawn_play. And there's a link in Hollie's bio to purchase tickets. And we will also be doing a follow up of this recording. It will be on our podcast platform called the Sunflower Conversations. I'll also put it on to our social media and we'll put links to purchase the tickets there as well. So we hope to see some of that plays and just wishing you all the best with it, Hollie. and really thank you for your time this evening, sharing your personal experiences and, and also for going that one step further, putting it pen to paper and sharing that with, you know, with the world. Thank you. Thank you for having me. It's been yeah, it's been lovely, actually. I really enjoyed it. And you know, like I say, any more support we can get and any more connections, you know it's what, it's what everybody needs in this world, but when you have a hidden disability, it, it hits even more. So it's been really, really lovely. Thank you, Thank you to everybody who joined, joined, jumped off, came back on to our community. And as I say, this will be shared much wider as well. So, yeah, connect with yawn_play and you can send your comments and ideas through to Hollie and then that will help her build a funding case so she can get a bid in for some funding. Good night. Have a lovely evening, everybody. Have a lovely evening. Goodbye.

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