The brain is obsessed with one thing, your survival. It always tries to keep you safe, particularly when it senses a threat.
A sure way the brain has learnt to protect us is by having us experience fear, pain and if necessary, FATIGUE!
Pain is ALWAYS a result of a sense of threat to our well-being… as is fatigue.
If the brain senses you are not threatened by the fear or pain or are simply ignoring messages, then it has three options.
Option 1: It may decide to make pain disappear as it deems it no longer necessary.
Option 2: It may decide to go the opposite direction and intensify the pain.
Option 3: It may decide to present pain in a completely new location or protect in another form such as fatigue; hence the diagnosis “Chronic Fatigue Syndrome” (CFS).
Whether the brain chooses option 1 which is to resolve pain or options 2 and 3 which are to make it persist or change, is based on the underlying context (as mentioned in the “Horror film phenomenon”).
Be it chronic pain or chronic fatigue, individuals coping with these symptoms who seek healthcare professionals do not wish to be told…
“There’s nothing wrong with you” or
“Nothing can be done; you just have to live with these symptoms.”
Just like pain, fatigue is also a danger signal that warns the body that rest and recovery is needed. Regrettably, sometimes the nervous system generates fatigue when the body does not actually need to rest and recover.
No different that chronic pain, CFS is also a faulty alarm signal. No one should ever question a person’s pain intensity or a persons perceived level of fatigue.
Whether diagnosed as CFS or long COVID or post-viral fatigue, individual who experience a constant unexplained sense of exhaustion sometimes lose hope of ever getting better.
The question should not be, “How can I get rid of this fatigue?” But, “What is this fatigue trying to protect me from?”
No different than those living with chronic pain, those coping with CFS also need hope… a belief that they can and will get better!
This 2023 paper suggests that CFS is associated with the dysregulation of the nervous, immune, gut, and hormonal systems. They also suggest that these dysregulations are all potentially reversible! How? The same way we must address chronic pain.
The best evidence we have suggests that long-term recovery from chronic pain and chronic fatigue happens when the body begins to feel safer again. This means reducing the brain’s sense of danger and increasing feelings of safety—both physically and emotionally.
What creates that sense of safety is different for everyone, but one of the most powerful first steps is reducing the fear and uncertainty around the condition.
What if you wrote a letter to pain or to fatigue? See my VIDEO.