Chronic Fatigue. Help!

Daisy, I just discovered this thread. I am currently struggling with fatigue, which has been a problem for years but seems to be worsening. I used to get very sleepy (falling asleep while sitting upright on a hard wooden kitchen chair) but eventually got diagnosed at a sleep clinic as having sleep apnoeia. I now wear a responding splint in my mouth at night, which brings my lower jaw forward and stops my throat from closing up and smothering me. So now I don't get sleepy, but feel more and more tired, which is not quite the same thing.

I try to prioritise exercise and find that I can usually do ONE thing in the day, but often only one - so if I get out to run or to the gym first thing that gets done and I feel good about it, but then often I get home and crash, do nothing else, and feel bad about that. Overall the effect on my life is pretty disastrous. It sounds as if you have a similar problem.

I recently had a routine blood test which showed some borderline anaemia. This can have all sorts of underlying causes, not just lack of iron intake. I fear it is going to be hard to diagnose / treat but I'm off to the GP tomorrow in hopes. Meanwhile, I'm running so slowly I might as well be walking and I don't feel like doing anything bar reading my library book.

I imagine that like me you have already had blood tests for all the usual culprits - kidneys, thyroid, liver, high/low haemoglobin, ferritin etc. It might just be worth considering sleep apnoeia, which is much more common than GPs imagine. I had to suggest it myself. The sleep clinic loaned me a device to bring home and wear at night to monitor what was going on in my sleep.

There are some more similarities between us. I have a benign tremor, in my R hand only. I can only eat small meals, preferably early in the day, though I don't get quite the dramatic reactions you describe if I eat too much, but it can be pretty uncomfortable.

Good luck!

Hi Daisy, sorry to hear of your troubles. As you've found, advice on exercise in ME is a difficult balance between maintaining your sanity and not aggravating the fatigue too much.

Perhaps that it might be worth experimenting with a heart rate monitor to firstly allow you to determine if your HR during exercise correlates in any way with the degree of fatigue afterwards and secondly (if it turns out that it *does* correlate) to use it as a tool to control/limit your exercise to a "safe zone" of HR.

Maybe something you've already tried. Good luck!

Reiki didn't do the Karate Kid any harm.

Hello all and thanks again for hte thoughts and info...first off, Alexandra - Sleep Aponea - my doc actually considered this right back at the beginning. Guess it's all just part of the medical-lottery? took me by suprise cos I reckoned the one thing that wasn't going wrong was my ability to sleep, but he quashed that small resistance. Anyway, I've been monitored and it turns out I sleep pretty well - only a tendency to nightmares messes with my nightly coma ;o)
HRM, Running-not-so-fool? I've found that route and bought me some technology and find it very very useful - loathe as i am to admit it! Of course, spent the first coupel of weeks with it falling on my face a lot given the overwhelming desire to check on a second by second basis (not smart when off-road....) but now I've got over the geek-appeal I find it most effective in moderating my 'easy' runs since i suffer the common tendency to do these 'too fast'. It's made a big difference to the effectiveness of training...but doesn't seem to have affected life outside my Inov8's sadly. I've put it on sometimes when I've felt a bit 'wired' even when not running and had the slightly unsettling experience of watching my HR get up to 190bpm while sitting in my mates kitchen and then settling down to something much more reasonable once we got out for our run...I've reported this to the doc and it seems to tie in with some recent results:
It appears my adrenaline levels are somewhat elevated. We've done two metabolic tests so far and they've come up with the same result so finally we may be getting somewhere.
Of course, my first question was why too much adrenaline would make me tired....surely I'd be bouncing off the walls instead? But no, if this is the problem then clearly my poor little bod is running on the red-line more or less continuosly and hey, you can only keep this up for so long. Certainly explains the bonkers high blood pressure and why it isn't coming down even on the highest dose of the BP pills....
When I first went (reluctantly) to the docs 3 years ago now I said that I felt exhausted and sick but 'over-switched on' all the time. WHen the physio found I was super hyper-reflexive everyone assumed the problem was neurological in origin. Now it's starting to look like my chemistry might be the problem....it might also help explain why during a 'good period' the only time I feel normal is on or just after a run. The rest of the time is a struggle, but it's do-able. As opposed to the 'bad periods' when all of the time is pretty much impossible.
God I've gone on....anyway, Alex I totally sympathise with the 'doing one thing a day' restriction and believe that making that one thing a run is about as positive as you can get. Just dont' beat yourself up for the rest of the time. You can only do, what you can do.
The reiki experiment is on hold until June when I meet up with my long lost Reiki practioner adn I've been told in the meantime to avoid any kind of body-massage while we get to the bottom of why my adrenal glands are behaving so badly.
Oddly enough - now that the temperatures have finallly dropped to proper Winter levels my energy has risen proportionately. Bloody marvellous. I'm trying not to dread Spring - which is when the last 3 bad patches have kicked off... who knows? Maybe this year it won't happen, eh?
Cheers all, once again,

Thanks, Daisy. Good luck with the spring, and meanwhile enjoy the current cold snap!

Hi Daisy only just seen this thread. I have a condition that also causes CFS plus many other symptoms. Diet & exercise have helped & like Paul said, keeping my insulin stable. I've added a link if you wanted a read?

http://www.ukfibromyalgia.com/what-is-fm.html

Sarah Myhill is an expert in the field .
See if you can get a RBC Magnesium test, either though her or your GP .
It's not a standard test, costs a few quid, but low magnesium is one of the most common problems causing CFS, especially if you've been an active sportsperson before .
http://www.drmyhill.co.uk/wiki/Category:Fatigue

Sunflower seeds have got lots of magnesium I think.