I am tired. Help .

January 13, 2009 9:55 PM

Fatiguefilter: I am tired. Help.

Okay, so I'm tired. It is because of stress and anxiety and depression, and I am seeing a therapist and getting medication and eating enough so I'm not hungry and getting to sleep on time. I can think of these things:

1) Increase my medication dose.

2) Increase my exercise.

3) Talk to doctor?

For srs, I don't know what to do.

posted by anonymous to health & fitness (14 comments total)

Exercise is always good for just about everything. Get a good walk or jog in in the mornings, pretty much right after you get up, and make sure you're eating the right kinds of foods (carbs, basically, to give you energy throughout the day, but avoid them at night).
posted by turgid dahlia at 10:01 PM on January 13, 2009

About 20% of people have sleep disorders. Another 20% don't spend enough time in bed. You need 8 hours of sleep; 10 if you're under age 20. If you have a very common disorder called sleep apnea you'll think you're getting enough sleep but that sleep is of low quality.
posted by neuron at 10:09 PM on January 13, 2009

I wouldn't look at increasing medication. Exercise when you're already drained may or may not help. We may be on the same boat, hi, but I think what you're eating may be part of the problem.

It's not a matter of eating enough to not be hungry, but whether what your taking in has the nutritional value and energy potential. If you have energy, you'll get more exercise.

If your eating well and getting exercise, the depression and impressed need for medication should go away. However, I am not a doctor, and am struggling with the proper nutrition part myself. The gist of the advice though is everything I've heard and been recommended by professionals.
posted by hungrysquirrels at 10:43 PM on January 13, 2009

My fatigue turned out to be caused by an autoimmune disorder. I was lucky to have a good GP who, when I complained of fatigue, didn't hesitate to run a boatload of tests on me, including a mono spot, iron levels, antinuclear antibodies, etc. It's so easy to assume it's stress, but I think that should only be the diagnosis after everything else has been ruled out.
posted by HotToddy at 10:49 PM on January 13, 2009

Okay I went through this recently. What helped was... changing my diet (no more junk), exercising at least 3x a week, taking St. Johns Wort 3x a day (I'm not on other meds), forcing myself to stay away from the toxic people in my life, and falling asleep to hypnosis tapes.

I'd never tried hypnosis tapes before and am naturally skeptic... but I downloaded this one from audible.com out of curiosity. Put my earplugs in and fell asleep almost immediately to the tape so I don't even know what it said. Could've been a coincidence of timing, but the next day I paid all of my bills and figured out a simple game plan to cover all of my debts. It was totally freaky how suddenly all of my financial worries seemed to feel like no problem. Sooooo, now I've downloaded a few others and I'm hoping they'll maybe make a difference too. Either way, the tapes definitely do help me fall asleep... I barely have to hear that Glenn Harrold guy chime "relaaaxxxx" and I'm OUT.
posted by miss lynnster at 11:17 PM on January 13, 2009 [2 favorites]

Beware of anxiety. I have a fairly high (though non-pathological as far as I can tell) anxiety level. It leaves me drained at the end of the day, and if I'm not careful, the fatigue will spill over into multiple days. Try and eat some fish or take an Omega3 pill as well as a B complex vitamin with vitamin C and that should help. Also be sure that you are not dehydrated.
posted by The Light Fantastic at 12:26 AM on January 14, 2009

I have Fibromyalgia (aka Chronic Fatigue Syndrome) along with depression and anxiety. I find that magnesium and malic acid (taken together) help tremendously with my energy levels and mood. Unfortunately, I can't take them very often because they aggravate some of my other symptoms. But yeah, if fatigue and depression are your only issues, I highly recommend mag/malic.
posted by Clay201 at 1:12 AM on January 14, 2009

Have your thyroid levels checked. Very simple to remedy if that's the case, so no harm checking.
posted by true at 6:14 AM on January 14, 2009

This is a hard one. I"m still struggling with it. A few months ago I reviewed a bunch of ask mefis on the subject and made up a list of reasons a person could be chronically tired. Eventually I'd like to find numbers on how common each of these issues are, since as the doctors say, common things happen commonly.

Anyway, here is my list of the answers most often given on ask mefi to "Why am I so tired?"

Infection
• Mono 7:1000
• Lyme 8:100000

Endocrine
• Thyroid
• Diabetes
• Perimenopause/menopause
• Low testosterone
• PCOS 1:10 (women of childbearing age)

Conditions
• Endometriosis 1:10 (women of childbearing age)
• Asthma
• Depression
• Pregnancy
• Malabsorption in the gut
• Food allergies/food intolerance
• Celiac disease
• Seasonal Affective Disorder (vitamin D, sunlight)

Vitamin & diet deficiencies
• B12
• Magnesium
• Folate
• Omega-3 deficiency
• Iron
• Post-pregnancy vitamin deficiencies
• Vitamin D

Lifestyle modifications
• Exercise
• Sleep hygiene
• Sleep apnea
• Caffeine
• Dehydration
• Disorganization, depressing surroundings
• Meditation, mindfulness, assertiveness
posted by selfmedicating at 6:21 AM on January 14, 2009 [11 favorites]

Your meds could be making you tired. What are you on?

It seems like your meds and therapy need tweaking if you're still depressed. That's where I would start because depression is known to cause fatigue--so yeah, call your shrink. I would also call your regular doctor after you talk to your shrink.
posted by sondrialiac at 6:39 AM on January 14, 2009

I'm Anonymous.

Alright, so going down that list of symptoms selfmedicating wrote, I can say that what might be affecting me might be these things:

Infection
• Mono 7:1000 - I have had mono in the past, though that was a VERY long time ago, and it could be flaring up because of stress; my immune system is compromised because of stress.

Endocrine
• Thyroid - I usually have good thyroid hormone levels, but I could check them.
• Diabetes - my family has a history of diabetes.
• Low testosterone - Doubtful since I have a lower-pitched voice than many women, but it could be possible. Though my sex drive is, to say the least, low.
• PCOS 1:10 (women of childbearing age) - Who knows. My last pelvic exam, about a year ago, was okay.

Conditions
• Depression - Yes.
• Malabsorption in the gut - Possible? Been having the squirts a couple times as of late.
• Food allergies/food intolerance - Possibly.
• Seasonal Affective Disorder (vitamin D, sunlight) - Could go hand in hand with the depression.

Vitamin & diet deficiencies - get all this shit checked.
• B12
• Magnesium
• Folate
• Omega-3 deficiency
• Iron
• Vitamin D

Lifestyle modifications
• Exercise
• Sleep apnea - unlikely, since my sleep is usually not disrupted, but possible
• Disorganization, depressing surroundings

I have some increased stress which I have to cope with for the next year which I cannot change. However, I can probably minimize it by going to my gp, which I will do forthwith. Thanks!
posted by kldickson at 7:28 AM on January 14, 2009

I am on Celexa for anxiety. When I started my course, I had trouble sleeping. After some googling, I found a tip that suggested I take the meds at night, before going to bed, rather than in the morning. It's worked wonders.

I don't know if it will work with your meds, but Celexa takes hours to kick in. So if I take it at night, it doesn't really kick in until the morning.
posted by grumblebee at 8:31 AM on January 14, 2009

What helped me: Ambien, and quitting alcohol and caffeine. It took all 3 but I'm finally getting a decent sleep. Exercise helps a lot too. If you are on antidepressants you might want to switch them up. Some can aid sleep (trazadone).
posted by chairface at 12:30 PM on January 14, 2009

grumblebee makes a good point. wellbutrin, for example, has a tendency to give trouble with getting to sleep, so the recommendation I got is not to take it any later than lunchtime. (personally, I don't ever have trouble getting to sleep, but if I take my last dose any later than 3pm I have seriously weird dreams.) so different meds have different sleep/timing issues, which then vary by person.

definitely talk to your doc, and as a bonus link, here's an article about sleep hygiene, just to review the basics!
posted by epersonae at 12:55 PM on January 14, 2009