Traditional Chinese Medicine: The Answer to Chronic Fatigue Syndrome?
“
T
he results of your blood tests are normal. Seems as if your symptoms point to what we call chronic fatigue syndrome. Unfortunately, there’s no known cause for this diagnosis, so it can be tough to treat. I’d like to start you on an anti-depressant. Let’s check back in a month or two and see how you’re doing.” This was the unsettling message delivered by my family doc-
tor when I was 21 years old; I had been sick for almost two years with an incapacitating fatigue that had affected my life in all ways imaginable. Up until that point my doctor had treated me for mostly garden-variety problems: strep throat, annual checkups, and a mild case of anemia. Though I wasn’t comfortable with the obscurity of my new
diagnosis, I was too foggy-brained and exhausted to ask more ques- tions, or look further into it; in fact, I went home and took a long nap. I got the SSRI from the pharmacy the next day, and took it for the next 3 months. I figured it couldn’t hurt seeing that I was defi- nitely depressed about the state of my health - who wouldn’t be? I was living the life of a 21 year old Rip Van Winkle, sleepwalking through most days with a head full of wet cotton balls and a per- sistent nausea that made the healthy foods that I once loved seem disgusting. I had already seen a couple of specialists recommended by my family doctor. They all shrugged their shoulders; one told me to exercise more, even after I told him that I was a life-long athlete who had fallen off the wagon because of this fatigue. So, I returned to my family doctor, who ran some more blood tests, which came back normal. There was no answer to why I was feeling this way – and this made me feel even worse. The SSRI didn’t help. In fact, my health further declined. Final-
ly, at my wits end, I decided to take my mother up on a suggestion that I should see an acupuncturist. I had initially said no, assuming that this system of medicine (which I knew nothing about) wouldn’t be able to do anything for me, as sick as I was. I eventually changed my mind when I realized that I had exhausted all of my more conventional options. I saw the acupunc- turist once a week for six weeks. By the end of the first month I felt about seventy percent better. By the sixth week, I had enough energy to go to the gym, hang with friends, swim in the ocean, and get out of bed after eight hours of sleep. My nausea was gone, and so was my craving to eat cupcakes for breakfast (for some reason, with the constant nausea, the only foods that ever seemed desirable to me were high in white sugar – though I did my best to cap my urges, they were remarkably present).
10 Essential Living Maine ~ September 2014
To sum it up, I saw the acupuncturist for a month and a half. And after almost two years of poor health, I got my life back. The world of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) helped me find a working diagnosis that could explain my constellation of troubling ailments AND offer effective treatment. All of the strange symptoms I was experiencing - the digestive discomfort, generalized fatigue, temporal headaches, hypersomnia, and migrating body aches - well, according to TCM, they were all related. More importantly, these symptoms had a known etiology. TCM provided a different lens through which to examine and make sense of my suffering health.
The Biomedical Perspective of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome
Chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) also goes by the names my- algic encephalomyelitis, post-viral fatigue syndrome , and chronic fatigue immune dysfunction syndrome. Though some informally refer to CFS as “yuppie flu,” it is not a new illness; in fact, medical references to a similar condition appeared as early as the 1860s. CFS is not classified as a disease. The term is used to explain persistent fatigue that lasts for more than six months in adults (and more than three months in children or adolescents). The fatigue ex- perienced is disabling; it is not due to exertion, is not significantly relieved by rest, and is not shown to be caused by other medical conditions. Though currently there is no identifiable cause for chronic fatigue, it is suspected that there could be multiple contributing fac- tors including a hyper-reactive immune system and/or a viral agent (more commonly, Epstein-Barr). CFS is not considered a life-long malady, and most will experience recovery in a time period of one to five years. Most people who experience CFS are between 25-40 years old. It is thought that women experience CFS more than men, though this could be due to a higher reporting rate by women.
The Symptoms of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome
Though incapacitating exhaustion and fatigue is the most prominent symptom of chronic fatigue, it is usually accompanied by neurological, neuromuscular, and immunological abnormalities (including cognitive impairments and recurring bouts of flu-like
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