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Fatigue
Friday 6th May 2022
What is fatigue?
Fatigue is described as a lingering tiredness that is both constant and limiting. Fatigue causes you to have exhaustion which is persistent, relapsing and often unexplained. The feeling caused by fatigue is similar to what you experience when you have flu or have missed a lot of sleep.
As well as being physical, fatigue can also be mental or both physical and mental at the same time. It is reported that most adults will experience fatigue at some point during their life. It should be noted that fatigue is in fact a symptom and not a condition. It is caused by a combination of social, psychological, lifestyle and general wellbeing issues rather than being caused by an underlying medical condition.
The symptoms of fatigue
The symptoms that fatigue can cause are vast and range from being mental to physical to emotional and can commonly include:
Headache
Dizziness
Blurry vision
Hallucinations
Poor concentration
Moodiness & irritability
Sore or aching muscles
Muscle weakness
Chronic tiredness or sleepiness
Appetite loss
Slow reflexes
Slow responses
Impaired decision making
Impaired judgement
Reduced immune system functionality
Short-term memory problems
Impaired hand-eye coordination
The causes of fatigue
Fatigue can be causes by many factors however the common factors of fatigue are:
Workplace related causes
Lifestyle related causes
Medical causes
Emotional concerns and stress
Treating fatigue
Due to fatigue being a symptom and not a condition, it is something that you can feel and describe. For this reason, the first step in reducing or eliminating fatigue is understanding what the underlying reasons for it are. If your fatigue is having a negative impact on your quality of life or causing you distress then you must speak to a health professional. Asking yourself questions or being asked questions will help you to determine the underlying cause(s) of your fatigue. For many people, fatigue gets better over time on its own as a result of some simple practical lifestyle changes.