What causes chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS)?

Chronic fatigue syndrome, and its painful cousin fibromyalgia, represent an energy crisis in your body, where you spend more energy than your body is able to make. When this occurs, you essentially "blow a fuse." This circuit breaker is called the “hypothalamus.” Just as there are many ways to blow a fuse in your home, there are numerous ways to blow a fuse in your body. These include infections, stress, hormonal and nutritional deficiencies, poor sleep and sleep disorders (such as sleep apnea and restless leg syndrome) and many other causes. The good news is that the "SHINE Protocol” can restore energy production and often make the disease go away.

Chronic fatigue syndrome is one of many interrelated functional symptom syndromes, composed of medically unexplained symptoms, which are “caused” by dysfunction involving the mind/brain—body connection.

To explain the unexplainable and cause, look at the terms used here and then “see the big picture.”

LOOK AT TERMS

• Functional refers to how the body works.

• Symptoms of chronic fatigue syndrome: extreme fatigue that may worsen with physical or mental activity and not improve with rest

• Symptom Syndromes are collections of medically unexplained symptoms. They are also known as functional somatic syndromes and chronic multisymptom illnesses. Nearly every specialty defines at least one syndrome. Examples include RHEUMATOLOGY (fibromyalgia), UROLOGY (interstitial cystitis/painful bladder and chronic prostatitis/painful prostate), and GASTROENTEROLOGY (irritable bowel syndrome).

• Medically Unexplained Symptoms (MUS) cannot be explained by medical tests, because they are caused by dysfunction.

• Dysfunction is disturbance or “malfunction” of how the body works.

• Mind/Brain-Body Connection refers to how the mind/brain and body communicate and talk with one another.

SEE THE BIG PICTURE
MUS and symptom syndromes frequently overlap with one another and are commonly associated with and often attributed to stress, depression, anxiety, and/or panic. Medical and scientific research is showing how the mind/brain and body communicate and both how and why symptoms are generated. One of the most important discoveries is that the "central" mind/brain can become "sensitized" to "peripheral" body pain and symptom signals. So these symptom syndromes are now being called, central sensitivity syndromes.

This author and Thomas L Hudson, MDiv JD (StillHurtingFINDHEALTH.com), propose a new unifying and holistic medical model of medically unexplained symptoms and their related symptom syndromes as chronic disease, explain both how and why they occur, and show what people can do to help themselves and work effectively with their caregivers.

DISEASE IS DYSFUNCTION, AND SYMPTOMS ARE THE EXPRESSION. The cause of medically unexplained symptoms and pain can be understood as disease/dysfunction, regardless of whether the symptoms are widespread (e.g., the fatigue of chronic fatigue or the pain and fatigue of fibromyalgia) or localized to a specific area of the body (e.g., the abdominal pain and bowel dysfunction of irritable bowel syndrome). 

Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) affects about 80 percent of the urban population. A syndrome is not a disease but a combination of symptoms that are most likely to manifest themselves in a group. These symptoms may not have a single cause, like a disease has. There are numerous syndromes like irritable bowel syndrome, premenstrual syndrome, Down's syndrome, etc.

CFS is characterized by the following symptoms: chronic persistent fatigue, muzzy head, headaches, dizziness, muscle aches, insomnia, and lack of concentration. Sometimes CFS is caused by viral infection (Glandular Fever) when extreme fatigue and muscle aches are predominant symptoms. Neck stiffness due to excessive computer use, stress, posture, whiplash injuries, head and neck trauma etc., reduces blood supply to the brain causing all the symptoms of CFS.

Other causes of fatigue include low thyroid function, poor circulation, estrogen or testosterone deficiency, insomnia, low blood pressure, Vitamin D deficiency, anemia, fibromyalgia (inflamed, achy muscles), chronic sinuses (eye fatigue), osteoporosis, excessive sweating, depression, dehydration, diabetes, heart disease, excessive sexual activity, candida infection, and allergies.

Doctors do not know what causes chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS). Some people develop it after having a viral or bacterial infection, such as the flu, but there is no evidence to prove this link. Other theories point to the immune system, the nervous system, glands and hormones and family history. But again, there's not enough evidence to prove any connection.