Chronic Fatigue Syndrome is notoriously difficult to diagnose since there is no underlying marker or pathological test that can be done to identify it without a doubt as being ‘Chronic Fatigue Syndrome’.
And just because you are always tired or suffer from constant or chronic fatigue does not necessarily mean that you suffer from CFS.
Let’s do a quick rundown of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Symptoms so that you can see whether you suffer from any one, or more, of these symptoms.
Symptoms of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome:
Symptoms are divided into 8 groups. Medical practitioners would consider diagnosing someone with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome if:
- All other testable diseases with similar symptoms have been ruled out
- If 4 or more of the following symptoms have persistently been present for 6 months or more, and have not manifested themselves individually prior to those 6 months.
These symptoms are:
- Fatigue - tiredness, unexplained and persistent mental and/or physical exhaustion
- Post exertional malaise lasting more than 24 hours at a time, in other words, feeling inappropriately tired after exercise, not being able to recover from exercise even in mild formats
- Sleep dysfunction - not feeling refreshed and rested after sleep, or suffering from insomnia or having other disturbed sleeping patterns
- Pain - generalized muscle pain, joint pain without swelling or redness, headaches
- Impairment in concentration, ‘brain fog’, reduction in mental processing power.
- Autonomic Nervous system related problems such as bladder problems, heart palpitations, shortness of breath, nausea, lightheadedness.
- Temperature fluctuations, sensitivity to food, weight changes (loss or gain)
- Immune system manifestations such as sore or tender lymph nodes, sore throat, recurring flu-like symptoms.
If you are suffering from any of these symptoms for a period longer than 6 months, it would be a good idea to see a medical practitioner who is familiar with the symptoms of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome.
The difficulty comes in if you HAVEN’T yet suffered for longer than 6 months, since then it might be difficult to persuade a doctor to take your symptoms seriously.
If you definitely feel that something is wrong, that you are suffering from tiredness, constant flu-like symptoms and brain fog, but do not think that you can take these symptoms to a medical practitioner at this stage, then you might want to check out two natural solutions for tiredness and for stress, since both of these might just help you cope with these nagging persistent symptoms and maybe even overcome them: