Once, when I was still going in to work every day, I told someone I was fatigued. She answered that sometimes she was tired, too. I’m not really talking about being tired, I’m talking about fatigue.
I know. Late Friday afternoon after a really grueling week when I didn’t have the strength to get in my car to go home, when just vegetating in front of the TV took too much energy – those were my good days. More than tired. Fatigued.
Now, some mornings it is hard to get out of bed. Not because I’m sleepy, I am wide awake. But actually pushing myself up, scooting to the edge of the bed, transferring to my chair, getting dressed. Some mornings it is hard to get out of bed.
My window of activity is short – 10 hours, 12 if it’s a good day – and it’s frustrating. I enjoy being up. I seem to have a different level of energy when I’m sitting up maybe just a different perspective, almost as if I am participating in the world. It feels good to be up and around. But I have to go back to bed while I still have the energy to make the effort.
There are many symptoms associated with MS, and no MSer has them all, but most MSers have fatigue. Over 80% of people with MS have fatigue and probably have a hard time getting out of bed. Fatigue is not exclusive to MSers, other people have it, too, but more MSers have fatigue than any other single symptom. MS and debilitating fatigue seem to be partners.
technorati tags: ms, multiplesclerosis, fatigue
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