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In an interview with BBC news about tiredness and fatigue in Britain, Dr Brian Marien (CBT specialist, who was clinical Lead of Sussex CFS Clinics at the time,) stated that 25% of people in Britain suffer from fatigue. The BBC News programme focussed on the tiredness of commuters.
Well, I had commuted in and out of London for work (though years before before ME, not at the time of onset) and yes, it’s tiring, and clearly a widespread problem in Britain, but not in the same universe as the illness ME.
Fatigue is not all the same. Fatigue is a word that is so generalised and applied to so many diverse states that it’s deeply unhelpful to describe the very extreme conditions in ME as fatigue at all.
Total immobility, being unable to move anything other than eyelids was not at all unusual in the years I was
very severely ME sick. And yes, empty batteries/empty petrol tank is a good analogy.
It doesn't take much now (year 20) to be back in, if not the absolute worst state of Very severe, but flat out horizontal with distinctive pallor, loss of language processing and physical co-ordination (typing is out of the question then). The cognitive dysfunction with Post Exertional states is profound.
The loss of language processing in the first 5/6 years was a very early symptom, and profound.
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