When the Wind Blows

Last night my garden gate crashed intermittently in the galeforce winds. It didn’t quite wake me up but I just had an unnerving sense of it as I slept.

When I got up in the morning I stood looking at the offending gate with a cup of tea in hand. I see the mound of dirt. I see the old gatepost and the new gatepost lying beside it. I haven’t finished digging the hole for the new gatepost. A hole that I started digging over a year ago. 

Photo by Keith Hardy on Unsplash

Looking at the gate reminds me the privet hedges are also running amok. I started with the hedge trimmer a week or so ago but gave up less than halfway through. I’ll have to get them finished before the birds start their spring nesting routines.

The steps at the back of the house have been loosened by the hard frost. They lie in a pile waiting to be relaid.  Another half-finished job.

It’s not bad. None of it’s bad. When you have chronic fatigue you have to get used to half-finished things. 

Half-finished projects. Half-finished thoughts and half-finished conversations. There’s just not the energy for it. 

Chronic Fatigue (CF)

Chronic fatigue (CF) is such a poor name for it. People just assume you must be tired all the time. 

Before I was personally affected by CF, I remember having students come up to me before a yoga class to point out that they had CF. I’d do that ‘compassionate’ thing of telling them “No problem, just do what you can”. 

Seems like a caring approach but, point of fact, it’s not compassionate. It’s not compassionate to not know anything about someone’s condition and yet not ask any follow-up questions. 

We’re all allowed to be ignorant of stuff but we do damage when we assume a course of action based on our preconceived notions. 

I don’t think I did anything wrong necessarily. I’m just grateful for this new insight I now have. 

And what chance do yoga teachers and alike stand when medical institutions don’t offer mechanisms and explanations for CF, over and above psychological factors?

I’ve been offered CBT psychological counselling. I wouldn’t knock talking therapy, it’s great, but I’m unlikely to be able to Cognitively or Behaviourally coax my mast cells into reducing the number of chemical mediators they release.

One of the more surreal medical interventions I was offered was speech therapy (as a means to ‘open up my airways). As if the Krebs cycle was waiting patiently for me to enunciate my vowels. 

The Krebs Cycle - With every breath you take, you set off a long series of actions and chemical reactions that make those rotary motors spin around and around in every living cell of your body like zillions of turbines, windmill vanes, or airplane propellers - Pulitzer Prize science writer Jonathan Weiner

I tried to explain to the chronic fatigue consultant that it didn’t feel like it was a deconditioning’ effect. 

But deconditioning is where he was firmly hanging his hat. 

The medical world hanging its collective hat on a shadow

If, a body is deconditioned the medical advice of titrating exercise very gently until you can slowly handle more and more load (known as Graded Exercise Therapy) makes complete sense. 

If, as I believe, it’s the opposite of deconditioning…it’s ‘over-conditioning’ if anything, then it’s potentially dangerous advice. 

Let me explain in a way I hope makes sense. 

If you’re a runner you’ll understand that ‘tired’ feeling you get in the first 10-20mins of a run. You’ve gone from resting to running and your body hasn’t fully caught up to the demands now being placed on it. You’re not ‘tired’, you’ve only just started your run. You may have 5km or 10km, or in the case of my crazy ultra-running mates possibly another 100km of running to go. 

As a runner, when you feel fatigued you have the option to slow down and let the metabolic activity address the demands at a more leisurely pace. 

Alternatively, you can use mind over matter to push on. In this case, those metabolic shortcomings will have to be paid back in the days and weeks following the race. And you’d best have your diet and sleep on point if that’s the case. 

Photo by Quino Al on Unsplash

With chronic fatigue, you simply don’t have the option of slowing down. You’ve already slowed down to the point of stopping. When you’re lying sleeping and the body still isn’t meeting basic metabolic demands there’s something beyond fatigue going on. 

Just like the runner who decides to push the limits in a race, the body of a CF sufferer will crash and put you on your arse days after you’ve over-exerted 

Both the exhausted ultra-runner and the chronic fatigue patient wouldn’t thank you for suggesting they should exercise their way out of this exhaustion hole. 

Given a few days or weeks, the fit runner will quickly bounce back and can jump straight back into exercise at a good intensity. 

The CF sufferer has no means to bounce anywhere. 

• Will a CF sufferer have a range of mental health problems that the ultra-runner doesn’t have? Absolutely.

• Does this exacerbate the condition? Absolutely.

• Is exercise a great way to deal with stress? Absolutely.

• Will exercise act as a pump for the lymph system and thus improve the quality of the extracellular matrix - that place your cells call home? Abso-fucking-lutely. 

Can I exercise my way out of chronic fatigue?

Fuck no.

Which is a shame. For all the reasons mentioned. 

Physical Activity

Exercice has been my life for as long as I can remember and exercise has always been the answer to what ever problems I was dealing with…just not this time.

This was a rare daytime outing with my pet rock. I preferred going out in the dark hours so nobody asked me what I was doing. If people asked I said i was doing it for charity. What I was actually doing was carrying a rock until I couldn’t face carrying it anymore and then going to bed…but that explanation didn’t seem to be enough for people.

I can’t exercise my way out of this place and I for one am grateful for that. It’s completely humbled and changed me as a person. I’ve had to find strength not of my physical character but a Soul strength. I’ve had to deepen the conversation with myself. I’ve had to deepen the conversation with my family. And I’ve had to deepen my conversation with existence itself.

'I’m not the only one with chronic health conditions and I know women inparticular suffer with diseases that seem to be a wasting away inside. I know many people have suffered silently with chronic fatigue for decades and it’s only been the recent pandemic that’s shifted the conversation. If we’d asked the questions and actually been willing to listen to the answers we would’ve been much better prepared than we were for Long Covid.

Finally if you’re a yoga teacher don’t worry if you feel like you don’t know enough about CF to have those affected in your class. That’s actually a good thing! Not knowing someone’s lived experience is your superpower. It’s the ones running around thinking they know what the'y’re talking about that are doing all the damage.

As ever, look forward to hearing your thoughts in the comments.