Waking up tired

Fatigue was the first symptom to visibly suggest to my co-workers that something was wrong with me. I knew I had MS, but after three bouts of optic neuritis MS had been silent for a couple of years.

Late night social events were the first casualty, but within two years I had to give up teaching night school at a local college and needed to structure my business travel itinerary to be less rigourous. The grinding fatigue continued to worsen, the more I fought it the worse it seemed to be.

After living over three decades with MS I now know that you need to roll with the punches, but in my mid-thirties I was just angry and determined to beat this disease.Only when I hit the point of sleeping a solid 10 hours and waking up exhausted did I make a major lifestyle change to accomodate this unrelenting disease.

When I accepted the need to live around the requirements of MS I started to regain some control over the quality of my life. My productive hours were shorter than before but each hour was more productive because I was not perpetually tired. I had my life back, albeit a reduced life compared to my pre MS years, but six quality hours are far better that nine mediocre hours in a day.

2 Comments

1. Ah, that simple yet devastating word.To those with M.S. of course devastating! I was so tired for so many years and it got worse and worse. Of course I went to my Dr. and said I know I shouldn’t be THIS tired.He did all the usual bloodwork and thyroid etc. but not anything significant. I even had odd symptoms unexplainable by him but no real reaction. I was left feeling it all in my head. I continued working full-time, often watching the clock go hourly by and waking up like you said more exhausted than when I went to bed.After finally being diagnosed (in emergency mind you by an internist)and finally seeing a neurologist to confirm, the fatigue continued but my working full-time did not, nor part-time. It took as you also indicate everything to try and remain active to some degree. That was 1991. Fatigue remains today among other medical issues of course my greatest challenge. Hope this helps to validate your issue. Diane

   Comment by Diane - April 13, 2008 @ 1:00 pm

2. Nice to hear that I am not the only one to have lost most of my day to ms. Looking back, the stress in my life brought me too early to this point, but it is what it is and I’m alive.

   Comment by Marg - April 18, 2008 @ 4:18 pm

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