Does anyone else have chronic fatigue syndrome

3 years since I got this, and it comes back to haunt me about every 3 months either when I get stressed or do slightly too much. My glands swell up and I feel pretty bad. Does anyone else have experience?

I only had it for a short period following a virus - needed about three months off work. It disappeared after a holiday out on the Yorkshire moors. The peace and quiet and fresh air up there made me pass out for 15 hours a night and after four nights of these extremely long, deep sleeps, i started to find i had more energy.
I had a wonderful doctor who told me to just listen to my body and sleep as much as i needed to and avoid any stress.

Yep I've had it for a very long time, but I know I'm relatively lucky- I know one poor woman who is pretty much housebound with it. Every time I get stressed or try to work hard I get horrible fluey symptoms and a cruching tiredness. Try telling a boss you are allergic to hard work tho!!! I agree with Dangly- reducing stress and listening to your body is the best way to improve, even if it is frustrating at times

Homeopathy did the trick for me.

I suffered from glandular fever then chronic fatigue when I was 21/22 for 2 years, then gradully got better over the next 12-18 months using homeopathy. I still had the flare up of glands in my neck with a general feeling of major yuckiness, which at first happended several times a year for about 7 years, but over the last 5 years it's almost disappered. I've only had a flare up once this year and I know that was due to stress of new job. At times like that I know just to chill out and rest, no running and eat well.

yep

I started this thread in 2003 ... glad there has been some response. This whole year has been awful. Before Christmas I did a 10k pb of 39.27 and then in the January I became so ill. I was reduced to not being able to walk over a few hundred metres without getting physically weak and tired for days afterwards, I had many of the symptons of chronic fatigue and generally became depressed and completely lifeless.

However now, 11 months later, I am finally beginning to get a hold on it all again. My sister and I both suffer from this and we both often discuss what is going on inside of us.

I honestly believe that it is about stress and doing too much... when I get upset or stressed about something, I get physically unwell every time .. my resistance to stress has been so low whilst I have been ill and only now it is beginning to increase again. I think getting better is realising when enough is enough, it is, as someone else said, about listening to your body ...

I really want to get back to running, but it scares me because I really don't want to return to the state that I have been this year; on the other hand, it scares me because I know that to get to the level of fitness I was before I would have to risk training hard and becoming ill even more. I don't know how I will feel racing, but knowing that I can't reach my pb or train how I used to without wondering whether I will get ill....

I thought about swopping to orienteering to take some of the pressure of being fast ... but I'm just not sure.

I managed to walk 5miles yesterday ... I ache sooo much!!!

I think you need to start small... initially at least. Don't aim to get a pb at 10k. How about aiming first to complete a 10k (or a shorter race) without making yourself ill? Maybe you should even wipe the slate clean when it comes to a pb and 'start again'.. I gues what I'm trying to say is you need a goal to motivate you and give you a sense of achievement, but it needs to be a realistic goal.

I agree on going slowly .... but I am not sure how much satisfaction I would get from just running a 10k ... the satisfaction I got was from training to do my best effort and doing it; whereas now I think I will be scared to train hard, just incase ... I know that I shall probably build up my confidence in time when I start running again ... but then it'll always be in the back of my mind: what if I train to the extent I was training before and then this happens again...

I had post viral syndrome in my late teens and was in trouble for nearly 2 years. The solution for me was improved sleep and eating patterns and like you say not getting stressed. I hope you can fight this

GOBI

Rachel,

Have a look at the website of Anna Hemmings see link below:

http://www.annahemmings.co.uk/cfs.asp

and also the link below:

http://www.reverse-therapy.com/

regards

chris

Thanks Chris,

My sister and I have already searched that one out a bit and the associated book which you can buy on the internet was possibly the best piece of writing regarding getting well I have read. This is one reason back in the thread I was talking about stress and it's impact.

One big thing the book said and the website you mention is that you just don't realise that you are getting warning signs when you are... that may sound crazy but when you are a runner you expect to be tired .. and the signs of doing too much may be very small e.g. an increase in mouth ulcers ... should I not run if I have a mouth ulcer?!?!?

As an example after becoming very fatigued; your body is trying to give you all these signs that you are doing too much, but for some reason you don't think of it like that and you just try to carry on. For some reason I was still trying to get into work everyday by 7.30 ... whilst my sister (also with ME) took her sleeping mat to work and went to bed for a few hours everyday to enable her to get by. This is just ridiculous and you really have to teach yourself to say "hey wait a minute, I need to stop this and be nice to me".

I am still yet to work out how to let myself know when I get warning signs when I do get back running ... I think that'll be the challenge because adrenalin takes over and I personally think that masks a lot of the warning symptons... either that or I just can't tell them apart from general tiredness.