Louise Meyer, 31, has been running on empty for months. She gets to bed by 10pm and doesn’t seem to have any trouble sleeping, yet every morning when her alarm goes off she hits the snooze button again and again until finally she drags her still-tired body out of bed. She can’t remember the last time she felt anything even vaguely resembling a spring in her step, and has simply accepted her low-energy state as part and parcel of modern life. But do we really have to sacrifice vitality in order to keep up with our demanding careers and busy social lives? According to the experts, the answer (thankfully!) is a resounding no but you probably will have to make some lifestyle changes to regain your joie de vivre.
THE MIND-BODY CONNECTION
As Sigmund Freud hypothesised some hundred years ago, the body serves as a map to the unconscious. To understand what is happening in the body, one needs to first understand what lies in the psyche, says clinical psychologist Bea Potgieter.
“If you are constantly tired, you need to stop and examine your life because your body is sending an important warning signal that something is not right.”
According to psychologists, emotional pain, resentment, anger, bitterness, hurt, fear, guilt and feelings of unworthiness can all have a negative effect on your immune system and general health. Many physical symptoms, including constant fatigue, have a psychological origin and will not be successfully treated if the underlying causes are not identified, says Potgieter. “Most people are not aware of the psychological conflicts residing in their psyche, but they are probably acutely aware of their physical aches and pains. If they are unable to make the connection between the two, the consequences may be severe.”
CONSERVING OUR EMOTIONAL ENERGY
How we feel emotionally regulates how much energy we have at our disposal, says Stephanie Vermeulen, clinical psychologist and author of EQ: Emotional Intelligence (Zebra Press). “Think about those mornings when you wake up in a bad mood. How productive are you during that dayu? How able are you to persuade other people to co-operate with your ideas or plans? Probably not very, and this can set in motion a chain effect that continuously drains your energy,” says Vermeulen.
Our default condition as human beings is to be relatively happy most of the time, and happiness is a state that fills us with energy.
“When we feel happy we have more than enough energy to create the life we want. But when we feel unhappy, it’s as if our energy implodes and the constant tiredness makes us withdraw,” she adds.
When this low-energy condition continues for some time we may label it depression, and if we don’t review our decisions and habits alone or in therapy we will struggle to get out of this draining rut. The good news is that this low-energy state has its purpose too because fatigue forces us to slow down, allowing us to address the issues causing our unhappiness.
According to psychologists, one of the main emotional issues causing fatigue is poor self-esteem. “Feeling that you are not good enough generates high levels of anxiety which consume a great deal of energy,” explains Vermeulen. “People with low self esteem tend to keep themselves very busy, running from one task to the next, in the hope that they will look competent and no one will notice how inadequate they feel.” This is an exhausting cycle that is bound to catch up with you sooner or later in the form of fatigue.
Constant tiredness is often an unconscious resistance to continue with your life as it is, and is also a call to face all your self-imposed responsibilities, believes Potgieter. “If you constantly give in to the pressure to succeed and strive to prove your self-worth at the expense of your real self, this conflict will eventually show up in the state of your health.”
PHYSICAL CAUSES OF FATIGUE
There is, of course, a lot more to fatigue than emotional drains. According to Dr Graham Gordon who runs a fatigue clinic in Cape Town, up to 90 percent of the patients he sees are suffering from some form of infection that is wearing down their system and eroding their energy stores. “Patients come to me saying that they’re not happy with life. That they have no energy and feel exhausted all the time. That they’ve seen various doctors, and even psychologists, but no one has really been able to help. In my experience, the vast majority of these people have some form of low grade infection that may have been lingering in their system for years.”
The question Dr Gordon asks every patient is: “When were you last seen alive?” How far back would you have to go to find a radiant, energetic, healthy you? Usually people can think back to a specific time when, says Gordon. The thing about parasites is that they don’t want to kill the host. It is not in their best interests to knock you out completely because they need to keep feeding off your system so often the symptoms are so subtle you’d never notice them.
Except that they’re draining your energy levels, and you’re struggling just to get out of bed in the morning.
This kind of ongoing fatigue is definitely not normal, says Gordon, so don’t accept it as your lot in a fast-paced, highly stressed life. “Stress has always been a part of the human condition, and we are adequately equipped to deal with it. I believe there must always be something more specific causing your fatigue, and with a little patience and medical detective work, you may be able to pinpoint the cause and regain vitality.”
RISK FACTORS FOR PARASITIC INFECTION
> Diabetes “An increase in blood sugar makes a very friendly environment for parasites,” says Gordon. “Women with high blood sugar are more likely to suffer from urinary tract infections (UTIs), and these can eventually lead to kidney infection which causes major fatigue.”
> Travel This is a very common cause of infection, and if you experienced a bout of gastro on a trip to Thailand, or any other tropical destination, be wary. If you are still experiencing an occasionally loose tummy, even months after your holiday, you may still be carrying a low-grade infection and this could be the causing your tiredness.
> Water sports Triathletes are particularly at risk, as swimming in dams exposes you to many parasites lurking in the water.
> Surgery “It is an unfortunate reality in South Africa that our hospitals are not always as clean and hygienic as we would like them to be, and operations can present an added opportunity for infection,” says Gordon.
OTHER MEDICAL CONDITIONS THAT CAUSE FATIGUE
> Underactive thyroid Studies in the US indicate that up to one in five women will develop hypothyroidism at some point, and an early symptom is fatigue. Other warning signs include weight gain, muscle and joint pain, dry skin and hair, forgetfulness and mood swings.
> Anaemia This blood disorder is due to a lack of iron and women are particularly at risk because of menstruation, says Gordon. Symptoms other than fatigue include weakness, pale skin, a fast or irregular heart beat, shortness of breath, dizziness, cognitive problems and headaches.
> Sleep disorders, such as sleep apnoea, mean you don’t breathe properly at night. “People with sleep apnoea can stop breathing for 10–30 seconds at a time while sleeping, and this can occur several hundreds of times a night,” writes physiotherapist Sammy Margo in The Good Sleep Guide (Random House). “The unsuspecting person may think they’ve slept through the night when in fact they have woken up 500 times or more to resume breathing.” Symptoms of sleep apnoea include feeling groggy when you wake up; waking up with headaches; gasping or holding your breath during sleep; loud snoring; waking up in a sweat; difficulty concentrating at work; and waking up often to go to the bathroom.
“People with low self-esteem tend to keep themselves very busy, running from one task to the next, in the hope that they will look competent and no-one will notice how inadequate they feel”
CHANGING OUR EMOTIONAL HABITS
“All behaviour either conserves or wastes energy, and if we don’t change unhealthy emotional habits we only exhaust ourselves further,” Vermeulen explains. Allocate five percent to every behaviour below that exists as a bad habit in your life. Add these percentages up and subtract the total from 100. The remaining percentage provides an indication of how much energy you have at your disposal.
The lower the percentage, the higher your level of exhaustion. And yes, some people end up in the minus category they are at the brink of breakdown and in desperate need of changing their emotional habits to regain energy, happiness and vitality. Habits that drain energy:
PHYSICAL
> Addictions — smoking, alcohol, drugs, gambling
> Ill health
> Insufficient sleep
> Lack of exercise
> Lack of relaxation
> Poor eating habits
EMOTIONAL
> Controlling other people
> Dependency (others controlling you)
> Emotional outbursts (Fear, Fights, arguments)
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