What is fatigue

[Savvy_Darling]

I'm unsure what fatigue is? And is it more than tiredness?

For example I love to sleep, I could sleep all day if I could. I hate waking up early but if I have to I will and after I brush my teeth I'm usually alert and ready for the day. Once I'm up I'm up! I workout 30 mins a day on my treadmill (except weekends- rest days). But I'm worried about the word fatigue because it's associated with many sinister dieseases (the big c). So everyday when I wake up i seriously start thinking "am I fatigued or do I just like sleep?" I feel like I've been waking up everyday feeling like shit about myself because I'm worried I have a problem. I'm 21. I feel like I've always loved sleep and have never really been a morning person.. I'm a night owl. I also heard too much sleep is bad for you and could increase risk of heart disease and mortality. I usually do 9 hrs a day. By 9 hours is when I'm like okay time to get up. 8-9 hrs. But around my lady time of the month I could sleep for longer. I want to start going to bed earliar and waking up at a decent time. I'm tired of not understanding what fatigue is and thinking I have it and then in turn thinking I have a diesease. I don't feel tired during the day to be honest.. If I'm just around the house with nothing to do I feel like I could be tired but I don't know. I remember after my accident at work and when I was hurt all I would want to do is sleep because I was depressed. But I don't feel like how I did then.. I just feel like I love sleeping and if I don't have anything planned for the day then id rather just sleep. Is there something wrong with me? :shrug:

[Sam Winter]

for me my problem has never been that i'm a fan of sleep but it is simply i can't fall asleep till late(i have my mental health worker picking me up at 9:30 in the morning and i'm still awake right now at 01:06 and you can be sure i'll stay awake until like 2 nearly 3 am,
i have big problems with getting out of bed but like you i can do it if i have to,
i don't think its anything serious, i'd say maybe you just like sleeping or maybe your brain has asociated boredom with sleep x

[Savvy_Darling]

Oh man I don't even wanna tell you my usual sleeping times.. Up until recently they are horrible!! I can't go to sleep until lik 8am and then I sleep till 4 or 5pm. Yes I know horrible times. It seems to worsen when I'm bad with my anxiety too. This isn't during the weekend though.. Because I usually have stuff to do then so I'll wake up at noon and be able to go to sleep by 3am. I don't know how to go back to normal people sleeping habits! I know I should restore proper circadian rhythm which I never knew was a thing until recently. It's your internal clock and it should be that you go to sleep when it's dark & wake up when it's morning. Id like to do that but I'm such a night owl. So you don't think this is fatigue? That word has me so confused as I don't know what it would feel like. Thanks for your reply though! :)

[Fishmanpa]

Wow... fatigue. I thought I knew what fatigue was. I thought it was just being really tired. The kind of tired that couple of days worth of sleep would cure.

I had no idea. When I was in cancer treatment, I was told I might feel fatigued by the radiation and chemo. The fatigue I experienced would need a good year or so of sleep to even touch it. In fact, 2 and half years out I still feel a touch of that fatigue. The kind of fatigue I cannot even begin to put into words.

In "general" however, fatigue is an overall feeling of being extremely tired both physically and mentally. I can imagine that constant anxiety would be extremely fatiguing. I know that when I was dealing with depression, I had a much milder feeling of fatigue compared to the cancer treatment.

Positive thoughts

[Savvy_Darling]

So basically if I was fatigued.. I wouldn't be sitting here wondering if I am or not. I only feel mentally fatigued when it's that time of the month. Could you have depression and not realize? I know I was bad with it back in January last year when my accident happened. I was extremely upset. I hated life. I didn't find enjoyment. I couldn't eat. I was in a very bad place but can say I don't feel like that way anymore. I'm just very anxious often. But maybe I still am dealing with a much lower grade depression. Not exactly sure. But maybe that's why I like sleeping. There's still very much I'd like to improve with my life and I'm still not in the place I'd like to be but I'm on my way.

[Fishmanpa]

So basically if I was fatigued.. I wouldn't be sitting here wondering if I am or not. I only feel mentally fatigued when it's that time of the month. Could you have depression and not realize?

Absolutely! After my 1st heart attack I suffered from some depression. Having been in a marriage with someone who was severely depressed, I recognized the symptoms and sought help. I probably wouldn't have recognized it had I not known about it. I would have thought I was just feeling a bit down.

Positive thoughts

[MyNameIsTerry]

Comparing tiredness to fatigue is like comparing feeling low because something has gone wrong to depression or someone feeling nervous to an anxiety disorder.

Fatigue is more exhaustion. You will know if you have it, you won't want to do much of anything hence why it's so often seen with things like depression. You sounds completely normal to me, just that you enjoy sleeping and this is a good thing since so many people don't or don't find it refreshing so feel rough for many hours after or even all day. Like you say though, fatigue can be mental, physical or both. You will know when you experience it or at least recognise something stronger than normal tiredness. Doing the housework can be like running a marathon, or trying to concentrate on your work can be like trying to understand something Stephen Hawking would struggle with!

Depression needs understanding. People often just refer to it as depression but that's like calling all anxiety disorder, anxiety. Depression comes in different forms and they all have different criteria's. Above this they sit in a larger category of Mood Disorders. Some of these MD's have quite similar characteristics but many have mania elements since the category includes the various forms non unipolar disorders (e.g. bipolar forms). We use the WHO manual over here though, you use the DSM, so there will be differences in criteria's that your doctors use compared to ours.

You know from what you went through how depression feels. The first time, like with anxiety disorders, you may feel it but not know what it is or what it means. After that your experience may help you work out if you are, it depends how much you are looking at your symptoms as depression can mean not even caring about that and just sitting suffering.

Also, remember that Serotonin has been observed as being low in both anxiety and depression disorders. So, this can mean someone with depression can experience anxiety and vice versa. That doesn't mean you have depression and anxiety, it can mean you have one with a bit of the other, medical professionals diagnose primary disorders and don't add in comorbid ones unless they are sufficiently different or strong enough to warrant a separate diagnosis. So, with your Serotonin going up & down you may have mood swings or experience periods of low mood. This doesn't mean you have depression though.

The thing is there is depression from a medical point of view, enough to warrant categorisation or addition to an existing diagnosis, or it can be a symptom level thing. However, we also have the layman's term too which will be used very widely and bares no resemblance to a disorder e.g. my BF dumped me, I'm so depressed. No you aren't from a medical point of view, your mood is low. With anxiety you could experience the same but true depression, as a disorder or even a symptom, is a stronger deeper experience that needs addressing. Going out with your mates or having a night in watching some films (to quote 2 stereotypes of women in that situation :winks:) isn't therapy level work.