As the choreographer for Strictly Come Dancing, Chris Marques needed to be physically on top form. What the BBC didn't know was at the same time as training celebrities he was suffering from a debilitating disease ME, a secret he kept for a decade.
AT 29 CHRIS MARQUES is an international dance star and has been described as one of the most innovative Latin and salsa dancers in the world. Yet he had suffered with ME, an unexplained flu-like illness, since he was 20.
Chris, who gave cricketer Mark Ramprakash the breakthrough to win Strictly Come Dancing two years ago, never dared speak out about his condition because of the stigma attached to ME, which is often unsympathetically called "yuppie flu".
He would often walk off the show and collapse with exhaustion and would regularly take to his bed with aching joints, “brain fog” and overwhelming tiredness.
Now the award-winning dancer is cured thanks to a ground-breaking approach that acts on the links between mind and body and claims a complete recovery rate of 85 per cent.
ME (myalgic encephalopathy) affects the body’s nerve and hormone systems. More than a quarter of a million Britons, including 25,000 children, suffer from it, some so badly they are confi ned to bed or a wheelchair and are in constant pain.
During the 12-hour “lightning process” treatment, sufferers are taught mental and physical exercises to correct the “imbalances”.
It worked so well for Chris that he claims to have as much energy now as he did when he began his career.
Click here to read Chris's full story
