Sunday, August 05, 2007

Newsflash:  CFS can make you too tired to blog

I’ve never been diagnosed specifically with CFS, but the way I’ve started to sleep for 20 hours a day, I’d have to think that the diagnosis is a possibility.  The extreme fatigue has been happening for the last two or three months, and it happens for a few days, then I get a bit of a break, and then it starts again.  I’d say that I sleep 20 hours a day at least three days a week—that’s pretty horrifying.  And it’s not just me, my partner is in the same boat.  We even wondered if we had carbon monoxide poisoning or something, but all our pets, even the tiniest birds, are perfectly healthy and lively, so the problem just lives in us.  For people who wonder what chronic fatigue feels like, it’s not just a sense of being dragged down or unenergetic.  It feels like being drugged, as if someone spiked your coffee with sleeping pills or cold medicine and you’d rather weep than be forced to keep your eyes open.  I have days where I go around and feed the pets in a rush because I can feel myself slowly collapsing, and I know I need to finish feeding before I can fall into bed.  Yesterday I went to bed at a reasonable time and I fell asleep normally and when I woke up, fourteen hours had passed.  I don’t even bother to fight it anymore, because there’s no remedy.  Provigil did a great job clearing normal FMS brain fog, but so far nothing can defeat CFS.  My doctor has offered me stimulants like dexadrine, but I worry I’d end up exhausted and jittery, and I can’t bear the idea of being any more of a disaster than I already am.

The worst part of the fatigue is the way it affects my work.  I love working, and I love my jobs, and I really fear losing them when I have two or three consecutive days of being incapacitated.  I hope the fatigue is a phase, and it will pass, maybe when the cooler weather arrives.  We’ve only used our swimming pool one time this year, because it leaves us so sleepy that we need a nap.  And if we’re napping, we can’t be working, and we need to work just about every waking hour because otherwise we’re sleeping.  I have no right to complain about my life, as I live with someone loving and kind, and I have a nice home, and I have food on the table and a family who loves me.  However, all that aside, parts of my life really suck right now.  When I started this blog, I didn’t realize that the “tired” part of the title would end up becoming such a prominent part of my life.

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 08/05 at 05:17 AM
Tired Girls • (6) Comments • Permalink
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