Unrest: Chronic Fatigue Syndrome
Documentary Unrest and New Realizations About My Burnout Condition
I recently watched a documentary on Netflix called Unrest. The documentary was about Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (ME), also known as Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS).
The documentary sparked a lot of insights in me and brought some new realizations about myself and my own burnout condition.
In this article I’m going to talk about chronic fatigue syndrome and my recent realization that my own burnout might be chronic fatigue syndrome.
What is Chronic Fatigue Syndrome?
Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS), medically called Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (ME) is a long-term condition with a wide range of symptoms. The most common symptom is extreme tiredness and fatigue. CFS can affect anyone, including children, is more common in women, and tends to develop between your mid-20s and mid-40s.
Due to lack of funding in research, we don’t know much about the condition, so consequently the syndrome is very poorly understood and thus not taken very seriously by doctors and physicians.
We also don’t know what are the reasons why people develop it and we don’t have a cure for it.
Chronic Fatigue Syndrom, Immune System and Burnout
CFS and Immune System
Based on individual testimonies, the most common cause of CFS is a weakened immune system.
For a lot of people, their CFS started after flu, viral or bacterial infections, which damage the immune system. A lot of people develop CFS after they get sick and can’t recover for years or they don’t recover at all.
Their immune functioning in those people is so low that it can’t fight infections and can’t recover to full health.
CFS or Burnout?
Although burnout and chronic fatigue can at first seem very alike conditions with similar symptoms, there’s a difference between burnout and chronic fatigue syndrome.
The way I see it is:
- Burnout is at the beginning of the spectrum and is not as severe as CFS is,
- The root cause for burnout is mostly chronic stress, whereas in CFS is mostly,
- Burnout affects most adrenal glands and HPA Axis which are responsible for production of stress and other hormones in the body, while CFS affects mostly the immune system and energy production in mitochondria,
- Both burnout and CFS have a strong impact on mental health.
- Burnout is recoverable and can be conquered, whereas the CFS most likely is not — at least not completely.
- I’m going to explore CFS and compare it with burnout in more detail in the following article, so subscribe so you don’t miss it!
But despite the difference in the two, they are on the same condition spectrum and over time one can lead to another.
This leads me to my recent realization about my own burnout codition.
My burnout could be a Mild, Low-level Chronic Fatigue Syndrome
The documentary about chronic fatigue syndrome made me rethink my own “burnout condition”.
Since I first burned out in 2017, I’ve always viewed my burnout as an injury: something that occured due to my own actions: pushing too much physically, drinking too much caffeine, being under too much stress, having too high expectations and putting too much pressure on myself.
But as my burnout didn’t improve, I started to see my burnout as a “chronic injury”: just like with sports injuries, some injuries can start out as acute and overtime become chronic due to complications and poor treatment and recovery.
The same can occur with health issues: acute problems can overtime become “chronic”. This can be applied to digestive problems, food sensitivities, problems with low energy, exhaustion and even problems with mental health and burnout.
Some of the long-lasting consequences that burnout left me are poorer energy levels and a lower energy budget ( the amount of energy that I can use in my daily life ), ability to handle less stress and life’s demands, chronic gut and digestion problems, diminished ability to recover quickly and properly, the need for more rest and recovery, problems with mental health, etc.
In most cases, burnout can still be cured and fully overcomed. That’s why I named my newsletter Conquering Burnout and have been trying to fix and tweak things to fully overcome it and recover from it.
As I viewed burnout just as an injury, I still considered myself to be “normal”: like everyone else around me, just with a decreased energy levels and some other chronic problems (gut health and mental health).
But that mindset was a caveat in itself and caused me further problems.
It has been almost 6 years since I first burned out and as my burnout conditions and symptoms didn’t improve above a certain point, and even worsened in the last few months, I felt stuck and really guilty that I can’t conquer my burnout.
All in all, I was the one studying burnout, writing, talking, speaking and teaching others about it, that’s why I felt a great deal of guilt and shame that I was stuck and I wasn’t improving.
I felt like I was failing on my journey to fully overcome and heal from my burnout.
Also because I was considering myself to be “normal”, I was setting too high goals and expectations for myself in work, life and fitness, but I couldn’t achieve those goals and expectations, which was another reason for the strong feeling of guilt and shame.
Because of all of this, I felt like a failure…
But maybe I was failing because I set the wrong goals and expectations. Maybe I couldn’t win. Maybe I wasn’t fighting burnout anymore. Maybe my initial burnout condition turned into mild low-level chronic fatigue syndrome.
Autoimmune condition and Flare-ups
Burnout can be overcome in most cases, but chronic fatigue mostly no, at least not fully and completely.
CFS is like autoimmune disease: it’s sleeping and hibernating below the surface waiting to be triggered.
Maybe the stress from my job wasn’t the root cause for my burnout symptoms. Maybe my own actions haven’t worsened my burnout condition. Maybe it’s not working too much or too much that are the cause for burnout
Maybe it’s the chronic fatigue syndrome that is underneath everything and all these things that I thought were causing me to burn out were just triggers of flare-up of chronic fatigue.
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t have a full-on CFS: if I had it, I wouldn’t be able to write this piece or post a newsletter every week. I feel and look okay and “normal” most of the time, but then I have those flare-ups of fatigue and malaise that feel like burnout and chronic fatigue.
Since I’ve been struggling with burnout symptoms for so long, maybe I should come to terms with the fact that probably I’ll never conquer the burnout condition.
Changing my Goals and Mindset
Maybe I have to accept that I’m never going to be fully healthy. Maybe I have to accept that I’ll never have the energy and strength like people around me do. That I’ll never be able to work out heavy and achieve the fitness level that I would like to be (eg. to be able to compete in a competition like CrossFit). I have to accept that these flare-ups of chronic fatigue will be part of my life.
So now I’m switching my idea and mindset from:
Conquering my Burnout ≠ Fully Overcoming and Healing from Burnout
Conquering my Burnout = Living with my Burnout and Reducing the symptoms and flare-ups
This doesn’t mean giving up! This means working towards limiting and reducing the symptoms and flare-ups of burnout and chronic fatigue.
My goal is to go from feeling fine and “normal” 60–75% of the time (like I do right now), to feeling fine and “normal” 90% of the time. I know that that’s achievable for me because I was there already: the last time was at the end of 2020 and beginning of 2021.
I’m planning of achieving that by:
- finding out the root cause of my malaise, low energy and low immunity right now and working on improving it
- fixing and improving my gut health and digestion, which play a huge role in energy production, hormonal balance and general well-being,
- strengthening the body and making it stronger with intentional and well planned strength-based program,
- strengthening my mind and working on my internal pattern
- and resolving unconscious stuff (trauma, fears, etc) that are holding me back and preventing me from healing.
If all of that might not work and I won’t get the result that I hoped, I will consider going on Testosterone Replacement Therapy, or TRT, which can have a huge impact on elevating the quality of life by speeding up recovery and healing and thus improving health and well-being.
Remember: No matter where you are and what you’re dealing with, things are never so hopeless that you to have to give up and surrender. There’s a solutions out there, you just have to believe and find it!
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Love and take care of yourself, forget about worries and enjoy life!
~ Jani
