"Chronic Fatigue Symdrone"

When Dorothy proudly pronounces the name of her illness: Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, I had to laugh a little, also felt a bit of sadness. As a long-term "unknown illness" patient I know exactly how she feels. Patients with an illness that bears a recognizable name would much more easily win others' understanding and compassion. Without a sounding name, you would just have to struggle through a painful/endless path alone and even endure being mistreated as a mentally ill person.

This fact to me is a perfect example of the arrogance of medical institutions and the blindness of their followers (sadly is overwhelmingly the majority of the human population). Who gives the name of illnesses? Medical institutions. Who decides you are ill or healthy? Doctor. So if doctors can't find what's wrong with you, you must be mentally crazy...

Susan Harris, the writer of Golden Girl, suffered such kind of illness and that's why she could so vividly speak out through her character for millions of unknown illness patients.

I enjoyed this show and still think it's way better than so many contemporary junky tv shows.

Caffeine and sleep

 Finally, my body seemed tired of caffeine. About one month ago, I stopped craving coffee, drinking tea instead, and several days ago, I stopped craving tea, drinking water instead (how boring it is!). So for several days, my body has been caffeine-free, totally. What's the consequence? I slept well, naturally. I felt sleepiness in the nights and went into sleep about a half-hour after lying down. This had never been the case during my entire adult life. 

Never before I was able to cut off caffeine so completely. I drank either coffee or tea. Though I learned that caffeine was not good for sleep ages ago, my direct experience never proved that theory to me. This time is different, my body rejects caffeine. Something changed inside my body. And what it is and what was the cause, I still do not know. 

Life is full of mysteries. 

Serious Improvement!

My appetite has been extremely poor for almost a month, but my energy has been excellent! Physically I am able to handle lots of activities, walking 1.5 to 2 miles each day, play a little bit tennis, and some house chore. Mentally, I am still not able to read too much, let alone writing.

My recent improvement is largely due to playing tennis. I bought solo tennis and almost play every day, each time just about 10 - 15 minutes. I have to use my arms a lot, which was what I lacked during the past years or decades! This exercise finally balances my body movement, improves my blood circulation. I almost felt the benefit of it in a couple of days' after playing tennis. 

Also, I started wearing sleeveless shirts during outdoor activities, which makes me receive lots of sunshine. My sleep is better! Of course, melatonin! 

So looking back, my strategy worked! First, diet and sleep, let my body recovered from extreme lack of nutrition; second, mild exercise like stretch and walking, little by little, to increase bloody circulation; third, expanding my exercises to full body, to build muscles (which I lost during my chronic decades!). 

Physically, I am feeling quite well, about 80% recovered. I must congratulate myself. 

Another milestone!

Yesterday, I did something in credible: started from 3pm, I walked over 1.5 mile, then went to boating with a friend, came back almost 9pm. I had minor crash at night, a real "minor" crash. years ago either one of these invents, or even half of it, would knock me down for days, even weeks. So I have reason to believe that my health just made another step forward.

Finally, after 53 days

Today, my back pain finally disappeared. 53 days total. First 20 days pretty much bedridden, after that, even though I could walk and do things, but I couldn't sit. it took another one month for me to be able to sit without feeling the pain.
Interesting thing is, during the recovering, my body seemed to be working on some detoxification, which somehow related to my back pain. The detoxification also led to my weight loss - a totally  unexpected result. Good for my heart.

Back Pain, Not So Soon

another 12 days since last time I wrote about my back pain. It's not gone yet. I was able to stand, walk, but not sit. Today I could sit with difficulty, but still not cured yet.
The previous two times back pain problem, both were much worse, but soon after I was able to stand, pain was gone quickly, as matter of a few days. This time, though condition was not so deadly, recovering is very slow. My "diagnose" is too much toxic element stored inside my body. The vegs diet actually helped. However, I found massage helped the most.

A brief timeline:
09/05, the day the symptom started.
2 weeks later, I was able to got out of bed and walk. After that point, condition has been stayed the same for another 2 weeks, until I found vegs diet helped.

About to End

 25 days,  finally my back pain is about to be gone. I was able to bike to store, with minor difficulty. Also I have been able to walk 40 minutes each day since a few days ago. Still cannot sit.

Back issue

Third time I got into this problem. Less serious than previous 2 times, but SEEMS to be recovering  much slower . Upon today, two weeks past I still couldn't stay out of bed much.

Milestone

I really don't remember how many "milestones" I made during my Chronic illness history since over a decade ago. Every time after I wrote done the improvement I made, I almost unexceptionally fell into another pit of symptom attack, sometime a relapse. But clearly, again, recently I am experiencing the physical energy that I had not enjoyed for longtime.

Not only I can have more physical activities, I am also able to talk more without suffering much shortness of breath, which was the main symptom I had for the past decade (forever!).

While my physical energy increased, my mental energy started going toward the opposite direction. I often feel "brain fog", memory lost, and difficult to think, to read and even to write. I quit writing (even in Chinese) anything serious over two years ago. I only hope, just like my physical energy, my mental energy would recover in near future so I could enjoy my intellectual life as I did before.

Nonetheless, I learned to accept. I try my best to feel content with whatever I have so far. "As good as it gets".

Consequence

Well, it turned out I spoke too soon in my previous post. I said I was fine, but fact is, for 5 days after biking, I've been suffering from extremely muscle sore and weakness, feeling debilitated most of time. Today I realized this fatigue came from my weakened muscles.

For years my focus was on my heart, and I did mostly cardio exercises. After this "test" - the bike tour I mentioned in previous post, I found that my heart was certainly improved, but my muscle seemed much weaker than before. Of course I always knew I needed some muscle exercises but my heart problem always always seemed more urgent. It's good that I finally improved my heart, and now it's time to improve muscles!