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Have been skimming through the Canadian guidelines on CFS/ME, which are supposedly the best document on the illness and since it's so long thought I would make notes as I go. This is mainly for myself!
I read the short version a while ago, and was quite shocked at how closely I match the symptoms, and even now I keep coming across things and going "Aha! That explains that!". For example, back when the treadmill and I were in better working order I would sometimes try the inbuilt heart rate moniter, and would always have to stop due to extreme puffedness well before I got to even the lowest "good exercise" level, which struck me as odd since afaict being unfit should just mean I hit that rate at a lower running speed, not that I can't hit it at all. And apparently, lowered maximum (as well as raised minimum) heart rate levels is a symptom of chronic fatigue! Along with other non-fatigue stuff I get like a sore throat and muscle aches.
Some of the specific common cognitive issues? Clumsiness, headaches, and loss of mathematical ability. Which I guess explains the "Can think up long rants about racism, cannot do basic data analysis for work" thing. Hmm. It's funny, being better than everyone at maths was this Huge Thing for me for so long, and during my Phd I had to get over the fact that my peers were often better than me, the fact this was at least partly due to health, and that I am now down to only being better than most normal people is..interesting to get my head around. Glad I didn't have an extreme attack like this during my Phd, and that my self esteem isn't quite so fragile now, that's for sure.
Studies of ME/CFS treatments have shown that the more stringent the clinical criteria, the worse the prognosis. i.e.if you're just "tired all the time" you have a good chance of getting better, but if you actually have chronic fatigue your chances are pretty low. Yay.
Treatment starts on page 48.
One of the things it says which I've found to be very true is that exercise needs to be carefully undertaken so that you leave yourself feeling like you could so some more, and it's important to try to make it fairly consistent without overdoing it on bad days.
*and thus I run out of things to say*
I read the short version a while ago, and was quite shocked at how closely I match the symptoms, and even now I keep coming across things and going "Aha! That explains that!". For example, back when the treadmill and I were in better working order I would sometimes try the inbuilt heart rate moniter, and would always have to stop due to extreme puffedness well before I got to even the lowest "good exercise" level, which struck me as odd since afaict being unfit should just mean I hit that rate at a lower running speed, not that I can't hit it at all. And apparently, lowered maximum (as well as raised minimum) heart rate levels is a symptom of chronic fatigue! Along with other non-fatigue stuff I get like a sore throat and muscle aches.
Some of the specific common cognitive issues? Clumsiness, headaches, and loss of mathematical ability. Which I guess explains the "Can think up long rants about racism, cannot do basic data analysis for work" thing. Hmm. It's funny, being better than everyone at maths was this Huge Thing for me for so long, and during my Phd I had to get over the fact that my peers were often better than me, the fact this was at least partly due to health, and that I am now down to only being better than most normal people is..interesting to get my head around. Glad I didn't have an extreme attack like this during my Phd, and that my self esteem isn't quite so fragile now, that's for sure.
Studies of ME/CFS treatments have shown that the more stringent the clinical criteria, the worse the prognosis. i.e.if you're just "tired all the time" you have a good chance of getting better, but if you actually have chronic fatigue your chances are pretty low. Yay.
Treatment starts on page 48.
One of the things it says which I've found to be very true is that exercise needs to be carefully undertaken so that you leave yourself feeling like you could so some more, and it's important to try to make it fairly consistent without overdoing it on bad days.
*and thus I run out of things to say*
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Thank you for that.
(And now I know why my potassium levels are always low.)
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And they think, therefore, that (a) they understand what it's like, (b) it's no big deal, and (c) you can just *poof* exercise, de-stress, and positive-think your way out of it.
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Thank you for that.
(And now I know why my potassium levels are always low.)
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And they think, therefore, that (a) they understand what it's like, (b) it's no big deal, and (c) you can just *poof* exercise, de-stress, and positive-think your way out of it.
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