Fatigue Be Gone! A Guide

Viveca Stone-Berry and I connected by chance through one social network or another. Neither one of us can remember which. But what I remember is catching on immediately with the title of one of her blogs “Fatigue Be Gone”. I recently emerged from iron-deficiency anemia so, anything sporting the words “fatigue” and “gone” immediately gets my attention. I had fallen victim to extreme fatigue and it took me almost a year to figure it out. What was this inexorable fatigue? Was I depressed (it felt like it but didn’t really…)? Was I overwhelmed, overtaxed, overstressed? Was I sleep-deprived? Not likely, I was sleeping all the time. I had traveled overseas and attributed my fatigue to the brutal flights, 9 hour time difference, and the go-go-go pace of the trip. And then I went back to my hometown of Montreal for an extended visit, where there I attributed my fatigue to the high humidity, to relaxing too much… It took me a long time to figure it out. It became obvious that something was wrong-wrong when, after a while, I couldn’t make it through the day without taking a four hour nap. Not so convenient when trying to run a business and manage a family. So I finally went to see a doctor and found out that I was anemic. My previous perception of anemia was that I would be feeling very weak. But overwhelmingly sleepy? That had not occurred to me.

So, to save anyone else the trouble of trying to figure out why they are so tired, whether all the time or as specific times of day, may I recommend Viveca’s “Fatigue Be Gone! Jumpstart e-Guide. For women who are sick & tired of being tired”. Viveca wrote the guide for precisely that reason: to save anyone else the trouble. She spent hundreds of hours and thousands of dollars only to discover that easy, simple changes often made all the difference. And please note, anemia is just one type of fatigue.

Had I known what to look for myself, as this easy-to-follow guide suggests, I would have saved myself months of frustration while I was feeling like I couldn’t cope, couldn’t contribute, couldn’t function. It all seems like “duh!” now, but had it all been so obvious, I wouldn’t have allowed it to go on for so long.

The Fatigue Be Gone! guide is a layperson’s approach to identifying a group of fatigues. That’s right a GROUP. It was in 2005 that Viveca found that she could no longer deal with her fatigue and decided to investigate. A visit to the doctor ruled out thyroid or hormonal problems but found that she was borderline anemic. But she knew that wasn’t the whole story so she continued to investigate further, uncovering various fatigues: adrenal fatigue (the “hidden” fatigue), anemia, diet fatigue, anxiety, magnesium deficiency, insomnia … did you know that different types of fatigues manifest at different times of day?

My experience is that fatigues “gang up”. When we start to clean house we uncover all kinds of vermin! When we de-clutter our own homes we may start by cleaning the bathroom and it looks good until we open the bathroom cabinet and discover another nest to clean out. Then we look under the sink … It takes time for clutter to accumulate just as it takes time for fatigues to gang up.

Her guide will help you zone in on behaviors and symptoms that can help you identify particular fatigues that may be affecting you that you can then bring to your doc’s attention. She shares her best tip, tools tests and techniques and also recommends foods and supplements that may help with specific symptoms. Again, confirm with your health practitioner.

A rampant cause and hard to diagnose fatigue is adrenal fatigue. Here’s a great article on Viveca’s blog on the subject.

So, if you are tired of being tired, do yourself a favor and follow Viveca’s blog, newsletters or buy the e-guide. At $9.95, it’s less than the three of the triple shot Starbucks lattes that you won’t be needing any more. Get it here. It will all make so much sense when you read it you will wonder why you ever let yourself suffer through yet another afternoon of head nodding.