Fatigue hits me three ways:
Energy – Sloths move too fast for me to catch. Raising a finger is a monumental task. Don’t even think about picking the nose, that would be impossible.
Alertness – you could throw a ball right at my face and I might notice. After I got hit by it.
Willingness – My get up and go got up and gave me a raspberry before traipsing out the door to party like it was 1999. Without me. Ungrateful basta… ah, who cares. Takes too much energy to get riled.
Think of fatigue like pain, there’s different kinds and different intensities. Fatigue can hit you whenever and wherever you are. Getting out of bed can lay you so low that getting back into bed is too much to ask of you, the floor is closer and looks comfy enough. Weeding that garden can be an achievable task until you sit down to admire it only to realize that you’re drooling on your chest and that sound that woke you up was you snoring. Here’s praying your neighbors are nice and didn’t get any video for YouTube.
Your energy is like a $50 bill. You’re playing tourist in a cool city and that’s all you’ve got to spend each day. That needs to cover your lodging, food, trinkets and anything else that comes up. Because you have a magic pocketbook every morning when you wake up there’s a crinkled $50 in there, anything you saved from the previous day has magically disappeared.
Budget your day. I can’t stress that enough. Planning what you’re going to be doing that day and budgeting not only your time but your energy is the only way to make it through a week. I’ve stopped planning weeks ahead because I’m not able to meet those commitments. I’d rather have a dirty tub for an extra few days than feel like a loser because the day I planned to scrub it down was a bad day for me.
Medications
Ah, Mr Pharmacist. How I love thee. Let me count the pills! Here’s my take on what I personally have tried. Your reaction may vary.
Provigil
Very mild. It kept me awake but didn’t instill me with profound energy or willingness. I was mildly more alert than normal.
A lot of people can take this without feeling like they’re on speed. There wasn’t any brain-crawl sensation, no jumpiness, nothing like that.
In my ever so un-humble opinion this drug works best for mild to medium cases of fatigue.
Ritalin
The speed of anti-fatigue meds. My brain buzzed and my heart did an ocassional flutter but generally ritalin was well tolerated. There were some mild emotional disturbances with this drug – I was much more irritable.
A mild dose of speed never hurts for medium to severe cases of fatigue.
Amantadine
This is a low side effect drug. Helps with muscle fatigue ONLY. Muscle fatigue wasn’t covered above because I’d never, until now, experienced it all of a sudden. By all of a sudden I mean there wasn’t any activity that caused it. Your muscles can fatigue quickly or be in a state of perma-fatigue.
My biggest complaint with it is the appetite suppression. For some that wouldn’t be an issue, for me I dislike eating enough as it is. Small hurdle in the grand scheme of things.
