Curing Chronic Fatigue: My Story

Here's something most of you didn't know about me: for the past 11 years, I've suffered from severe chronic fatigue. Yet in the past couple of months, I've gone through a remarkable transformation, and am now at the point where, while I'm not totally out of the woods yet, I feel that I'm on the road to a cure, or at least a normal life. (Right now it's rather difficult to discern how a man in his mid 50s who's been ill for over a decade is supposed to feel.) Hopefully, this post may help some others.

My story as well as what I believe underlies chronic fatigue syndrome is long and involved, and would (maybe will) require many blog posts, so I'll just outline the basics here and perhaps write more later. While I've had a very understanding doctor for the past 8 years, my cure has been by my own hands, accomplished through reading the scientific/medical literature, puzzling things out, and taking the appropriate action. I've read hundreds of journal articles on anything I thought relevant, but for now I'll omit references.

Before I became ill in 1999, I was a super-fit, distance-running vegetarian, which I now believe set me down the road to health disaster. Those who perform endurance exercise are over-represented among sufferers of chronic fatigue. From what I know now about protein and glutathione metabolism, how the gut functions, and a lot more, I believe that vegetarianism will also predispose to this illness.

Chronic fatigue (CFS) is characterized physiologically by oxidative stress and inflammation. Once that is understood, one can try to correct these. One of the main causes or components of CFS appears to leaky gut syndrome, as I learned from Michael Maes. Several of his papers detail how this can be treated. In my opinion - well, almost all of this is my opinion - a paleo style, low carb diet is essential. High insulin levels caused by the Standard American Diet (SAD) wreak havoc on metabolism and cause inflammation, something to be avoided at all costs. In addition, many components of the SAD, such as wheat, cause or aggravate leaky gut.

The proximate cause of fatigue in the case of CFS seems to be malfunctioning mitochondria, the organelles commonly referred to as the cell's powerhouses. Oxidative stress causes malfunction, and in turn the malfunction increases oxidative stress, leading to a vicious cycle from which it's hard to leave. So it appears that the key is to treat both the oxidative stress and mitochondrial malfunction simultaneously. This I've done through diet and supplementation.

The supplements I've found useful, if not required, include n-acetylcysteine, coenzyme Q-10, l-methylfolate, methylcobalamin, iodine, zinc, magnesium, creatine, and trimethylglycine. (Update: Paul Jaminet and others reminded me through comments of some others I inadvertently left out: vitamin D, omega-3 oils, and resveratrol. The first two at least are essential, and resveratrol may very well be. Thyroid normalization is also essential.) You can search these terms for voluminous explanations of each. Several of these are involved in the methylation cycle, and others directly aid mitochondrial function.

I went on a primal/paleo diet about two years ago, and many of the supplements I've taken for a long time - and I've tried many other supplements and meds over the many years of my illness - so one thing I started recently appears to be of key importance (so far as I can tell): whey protein. It's become clear to me that, despite what you'll read in the mainstream, relatively high protein in the diet is all for the good, making just about every physiological process perform closer to the optimum. (The right (high) amount and kind of dietary fats appear to be just as important, but that will have to wait.)

Two months ago I started hitting the gym and lifting weights for the first time since my illness, and I've gained ten pounds of mostly muscle. (I've been quite thin in the recent past, and have a way to go on that score.) I take whey protein and branched chain amino acids at least twice daily, along with my other supplements, and eat meat, eggs, and/or dairy at every meal. I no longer take vitamin R (by prescription, of course), which helped me function during my illness but which I'm now doing well without.

All of this I've outlined requires much more elucidation. Also, keep in mind that much of this is my interpretation, that virtually every authority in this area says that the causes and cure of CFS are unknown, as well as that there may indeed be multiple causes of CFS for which my prescriptions won't work. However, all modesty aside, I feel that I may have discovered something important. The illness which drove me to the edge of disability and, I'll admit, despair, appears to be in retreat.