Fatigue

boots_babe

Is there any possibility you could have anxiety? I'd never had this but found myself being constantly exhausted, even having to have naps in the day.

And eventually found I was diagnosed with anxiety completely to my surprise.

Ultimately you should probably go see your GP as they will be best placed to help - good luck.

NeverEnough

Fatigue is a very general symptom unfortunately and causes can range from innocuous to very serious. If your GP has not already done some blood tests and you have the means to do so, you could consider a private GP consultation and tests - BUPA, Nuffield,BMI and other private hospitals often have private GP services on site and you can have tests /xrays/scans etc at the hospital as well. Just bear in mind this is not cheap- a full body CT Scan will set you back £1700!
Hopefully it is nothing serious, but we very recently had the same experience with our GP who missed a cancer diagnosis in my partner - luckily we have medical insurance and pushed for private referral and its all been swiftly dealt with.

coffeehound

I had a prolonged fatigue episode some years ago so will post it in case it's of any use.

Up until age 33 I was pretty active: lots of physical activity at work plus gym, swimming and running. Bad factors were also present though: chemical exposure at work, pollution from the road I lived on that routinely exceeded EU limits, light pollution in my bedroom meant it was never dark (something that is a risk factor apparently), increasingly stressful work situation, deteriorating diet, too much coffee, too much alcohol.

I began to struggle to get out of bed in the morning and started being late for work. Needed to sit down to rest often. Mental function went noticeably downhill. One evening I went to the gym and couldn't do the leg weight-lift exercise that was previously a breeze. Muscle tone had completely gone. I walked out of the gym and never went back.

Things continued to get more difficult at work over the following months until I (stupidly) resigned. Went home and slept near continuously for weeks, getting up just once or twice a day for the loo and to eat a snickers or something. GP did a blood test which came back with nothing. After that he offered me antidepressants and painkillers. Literally, that was all the NHS had to offer,

The fatigue continued for the following six years. Although I wasn't sleeping all day, I did still needed an afternoon nap on top of a long night's sleep and had zero energy for physical activities beyond walking. I enroled on a university course but struggled to get up and make it in for lectures and exams. The staff thought I was a complete waster. Mental function was also still badly affected and I couldn't think clearly. I had also developed a bad back due to loss of muscle tone.

Finally scraped a diploma and gave up on going for the final year of the degree. Went back to live at my parents' place because I couldn't do anything. While I was there I started reading up on the causes and treatments for fatigue. The underactive thyroid possibility came up a lot so I bought this book

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Your-Thyroid-How-Keep-Healthy/dp/190514010X

Reading through it, I realised the hypothyroid diagnosis didn't apply to me. However, the chapter on Adrenal Fatigue was a revelation; it fitted like a glove down to the smallest symptoms and signs. Then bought this book

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Adrenal-Fatigue-Century-Stress-Syndrome/dp/1890572152

This gives a detailed plan to follow including diet and supplements. This claimed to begin to work within two months. I took diet and supplement advice from both books and spent about £60 on various supplements and foods and began the programme. Two months came and went without the slightest improvement.

I was hugely disappointed and thought I'd been taken for a mug by those pesky alternative and complementary medicine charlatans. However I carried on with the plan just to get rid of the supplement stockpile and to not have it mocking me from the bathroom cabinet every time I opened the door.

At around the three month point, things began to happen, and fast. Muscle tone returned overnight and with it the longstanding back pain disappeared. Much more energetic and mentally positive. Things continued to improve for some months after.

That was seven years ago now. Although I've never quite got back to serious aerobic exercise I'm not dogged to anything like the same extent with fatigue or sleepiness now and have done things like hill walking without issues.

just_trying

Thanks for the above post, you obviously took a lot of time to write it.

I've been reading up on this and I'm waiting for other blood tests now, will be next week but there is your parathyroid, think that's right, to consider. From what I've read not related to thyroid but if this glands aren't working right, the symptoms seem to be similar to thyroid, though not connected.

My vitamin d is zero, so other tests required calcium etc. Main symptom extreme fatigu along with others . May help someone.

LadyMorticia

Hey OP.

Have you ever had Glandular Fever? I had Glandular Fever which I never got better from and was diagnosed with ME in 2009. Fatigue is just one symptom though, and even though it's a defining characteristic, it's sometimes not the worst one.

Did your blood tests include Coeliac?

To be honest, fatigue can be caused by so many things - thyroidism, POTS, ME, food intolerances, deficiencies etc that I think GPs don't know where to go if the tests come back normal.

liam2010

Elizabeth_Braun wrote: »

I would just like to confirm that I most certainly DID have ME and not a mental health issue - as did the others I knew who also had been cured with MT. MT sees ME/CFS as a real, organic illness, not some form of depression, even though it's treatment is a non-medical one in that it doesn't involve drugs, surgery or anything like that. None of us got better because we never really had the illness in the first place. And we didn't just improve, we were cured!

Whilst I completely understand that the MT approach can indeed sound 'quacky', having been through it myself, I can say without doubt that it isn't at all quacky in reality. The problem is that the role of emotion is poorly understood and frequently it's role in good physical health is overlooked.

Someone said that MT isn't seen by most as a cure, but I doubt that 'most' means people who've actually done and completed the programme. It's possibly mainly those who won't try it and who are sceptical about anything claiming to be a cure when the medical world labels ME/CFS/FMS as 'incurable' (i.e. there's no drug or surgical procedure for it). When I did the treatment 10 years ago, it was a 100% success rate amongst those who completed. There were some who didn't and there were some who had poor therapists who didn't teach them properly and so there were clients who had severe relapses. One of these was very public about her experiences and gave the whole thing rather a bad name (although she used a different 'version').

I don't want to get into a long debate about MT. Suffice to say it worked for me and for several others I know, all of whom, yes, had genuine fatigue illnesses. If anyone who needs help is interested, a web search will give you the info you need. There are also a couple of useful books around.

Anyway, Andrew, I'm so sorry you've had so many years of poor health and I hope you find some relief soon.

The fact that they even told you it has 100% success rate just shows you they lie

I did it myself before then and i felt a lot worse, it’s a load of !!!!

Pollycat

Just to point out that the post Liam has quoted to disagree with was posted on 19th May 2016.

Primrose

I thinks GPs have an abbreviation for it = TATT (Tired all the time) and its a very difficult one to solve.
Have you tried cutting down carbohydrates like bread and potatoes, and sugar?
What is your bedroom routine like if your sleep is bad? Could you try something different like a warm bath and some gentle yoga type stretches before bedtime and earlier nights.? Is your bedroom too hot, stuffy, with not enough fresh air? Are you able to clear your mind of work worries before you go to sleep?

Try all these changes first for a while but if they’re not working, then it’s time to see your GP for a check-up.

Cyclizine

Fatigue is an incredibly common symptom - a GP will likely see at least a couple of patients a day who present with tiredness. It has a multitude of causes, from physical to psychological, some potentially serious and some benign. The job of a good GP is to make a differential diagnosis and then refine this with appropriate examination and investigations and potentially refer onward to a specialist.

With all respect, jumping in with "test me for everything" is not good practice. Firstly, most tests are not clear cut: there isn't a value that says you definitely have or don't have a condition. Normal values are quoted for 95% of the population - if you do 20 tests (and if you do even a simple full blood count, electrolytes, liver and bone profiles, you've done around 30 tests already) then you'd expect one to be wrong simply by chance. This gets worse the more tests you do. Secondly, tests are not without risk. Good examples being CT scans - a chest/abdomen scan has a risk of fatal cancer of 1/250. Thirdly, are you prepared for further tests if a simple test comes back positive? The whole point is tests need to be interpreted in the context of symptoms.

A often quoted phrase in medicine is: "Common things are common". Common causes of fatigue are, in no particular order: anaemia, depression, underactive thyroid gland and social factors (poor sleep hygiene, stress etc). I'm sure specific tests for the physical conditions have been done. I do not want to get into an argument about CFS/ME as it is a massively emotive subject with a lot of opinions on all sides. My gut feeling is that it is a wrapper for a variety of conditions and I would never underestimate the impact that these conditions have on people, whom I come into contact with almost daily in my job.

As with all medical conditions, there can be significant psychological overlay - I am not saying "this is all in your head", but it is well recognised that mental health has a significant impact on physical health. We have a poor understanding of the way the myriad of neurotransmitters work and interact and I would not be surprised if the root cause for at least some of these conditions lies here. It is interesting that some of the only effective (by means of proper clinical trials, not just anecdote) treatments involve psychological therapies, antidepressants (which modulate neurotransmitters - not for their antidepressant effect) and graded exercise (which increases stimulatory neurotransmitters). I am not surprised that Mickel Therapy can be effective for some people, it is essentially a form of CBT that can be done over the phone or on Skype!

Cyclizine

Primrose wrote: »

I thinks GPs have an abbreviation for it = TATT (Tired all the time) and its a very difficult one to solve.
Have you tried cutting down carbohydrates like bread and potatoes, and sugar?
What is your bedroom routine like if your sleep is bad? Could you try something different like a warm bath and some gentle yoga type stretches before bedtime and earlier nights.? Is your bedroom too hot, stuffy, with not enough fresh air? Are you able to clear your mind of work worries before you go to sleep?

Try all these changes first for a while but if they’re not working, then it’s time to see your GP for a check-up.

Just want to say this is an excellent post. Sleep hygiene is key.