• Welcome to Phoenix Rising!

    Created in 2008, Phoenix Rising is the largest and oldest forum dedicated to furthering the understanding of and finding treatments for complex chronic illnesses such as chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS), fibromyalgia (FM), long COVID, postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS), mast cell activation syndrome (MCAS), and allied diseases.

    To become a member, simply click the Register button at the top right.

BBC-article distinguishes clearly between having ME and being burnout.

Kalliope

Senior Member
Messages
367
Location
Norway
This was an interesting read from BBC by David Robson telling about Anna Katharina Schaffner, who, after having suffered from exhaustion, decided to explore its history with her book "Exhaustion, A History".

The article describes the phenomenon as something rather common for today, but also of its history, the difference between depression and burnout, neurasthenia etc.

While reading the article I was waiting for ME to get mentioned, and sure enough it was. However, the passage surprised me:

"...Nor should burnout be confused with chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS), which involves prolonged periods of excruciating physical and mental exhaustion for at least six months, with many patients reporting physical pain at the slightest activity."

I take it as a sign of movement forward in society concerning understanding ME as a disease. :)
 
Last edited:
Messages
13,774
"Anna Katharina Schaffner"

I seem to remember thinking her work was pretty rubbish. Difficult to see how anyone could do a worthwhile job of a 'history of exhaustion' though.
 

Hip

Senior Member
Messages
17,824
My hunch is that burnout may be just a milder manifestation of ME/CFS, possibly triggered by the same viruses such as coxsackievirus B and echovirus that are associated with ME/CFS.

When the enterovirus that triggered my ME/CFS spread to family and friends, there was noticeable personality change in most people — changes which to some degree resembled burnout syndrome.

The main symptoms of burnout are more or less all found in ME/CFS (but ME/CFS has many more symptoms tat are not found in burnout).

The three main symptoms of burnout syndrome are:
Emotional exhaustion: People feel drained and exhausted, overloaded, tired and low, and do not have enough energy. Physical problems include stomach pains and digestion problems.

Alienation from (job-related) activities: People find their jobs increasingly negative and frustrating. They may develop a cynical attitude towards their work environment and their colleagues. They may, at the same time, increasingly distance themselves emotionally, and disengage themselves from their work.

Reduced performance: Burnout mainly affects everyday tasks at work, at home or when caring for family members. People with burnout are very negative about their activities, find it hard to concentrate, are listless and lack creativity.

Source: 1

It's interesting that emotional overload occurs in burnout syndrome, because we see very similar emotional overload and emotional sensitivity symptoms in ME/CFS.

The stomach pains and digestion issues of burnout are probably a direct result of an enteroviral infection; a lot of people who caught my virus developed chronic recurrent stomach pains.

And the sudden appearance of cynical attitude is something I noticed in many people who caught my virus.

And lots of people with my virus started having memory problems, and word recall problems.
 

barbc56

Senior Member
Messages
3,657
While the type of burnout you reference may be seem prior to me/cfs, how many people have these burnout symptoms yet rest and recover.

Wht would it be CFS/ME verses other diseases that may cause the same symptoms before becoming full blown?

I think they are not the same and if they are it would be in a tiny percentage.
 
Messages
3,263
For me, the term "burnout" refers to something very mental. Usually related to giving your emotional all to a job, vocation or cause, and just feeling like you can't any more. Often associated with a sense of disillusionment (although maybe not always). It resolves with relief from the task/job and a change of scene. A nice trip to Europe, perhaps. Its got absolutely nothing to do with CFS or ME. Unless people accidentally mistake real CFS for mere burnout.
 

Kalliope

Senior Member
Messages
367
Location
Norway
I don't think putting burnout, chronic fatigue, neurasthenia etc into the same category as ME would do anyone any good. Here is a google-translated interview (from 2013) with a Norwegian doctor/historian who wanted to look into the history of chronic fatigue. But as she doesn't clearly distinguishes between ME and other diagnosis (neurasthenia), I really can't see what we can learn from this..


ME at all times?
Also in the 1800s, people were chronically fatigued, but the disease was called neurasthenia.


Siw Ellen Jakobsen
journalist

The condition neurasthenia was featured as a response to "the spirit" and modern life be lived for just over a hundred years ago.

Kristine Lillestøl is medical doctor, but also a historian. In addition, she studied comparative literature. This unusual combination made that she currently sits immersed in ancient medical journals, patient records and medical textbooks.

She tries to find out the most about the disease neurasthenia. The disease has been described in the medical literature since the 1800s.

The heyday of the last century.

The symptoms were numerous. But some went again: general fatigue, pain that wandered through the body, and sleep problems.

Neurasthenia was described in the medical literature as early as the 1800s.

The condition neurasthenia was then described as typical of his time, as a response to the zeitgeist and modern life they lived for just over a hundred years ago, tells Lillestøl.

It was the American neurologist George M. Beard who in 1869 launched the diagnosis. He believed that neurasthenia was due to "loss of nerve energy". This was due in the modern civilization rapid development.

The diagnosis quickly spread to Europe. Contemporary doctors were in no doubt that it was a real disease. And they were clearly curious condition.

Similar to ME

Along the way, it has become increasingly apparent for Lillestøl that the symptoms described in the historical literature, similar to the symptoms of chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS). But she would not say that it certainly is about the same disease, there are also differences....
(See more at: http://sciencenordic.com/chronic-fatigue-syndrome-across-time)
 
Last edited by a moderator:

Invisible Woman

Senior Member
Messages
1,267
The thing about looking back at the history of exhaustion is that you are looking through a lens of someone else's perspective or understanding. All you have to go on is their writing and opinions. What you are really looking at is attitudes to conditions that have exhaustion as a symptom.
 

Hip

Senior Member
Messages
17,824
For me, the term "burnout" refers to something very mental.

The symptoms of burnout may be mental, but that does not mean the causes are mental. The cause could be something physically amiss in the body, such as a chronic infection throwing a spanner in the works of the central nervous system.

The problem with many psychiatrists and psychologists, as we know, is their over-eagerness to ascribe psychological / psychosocial causes to mental symptoms (ie, they say the cause is something unhappy in your life), and their tendency to overlook possible physical, biological causes of those mental symptoms.

Just as in ME/CFS, if you are studying burnout syndrome, you need to look at the possible physical, biological causes, such as viral infection, etc.



Usually related to giving your emotional all to a job, vocation or cause, and just feeling like you can't any more.

So you are suggesting a psychosocial etiology to burnout syndrome? I think we need to be looking at possible biological causes.



It resolves with relief from the task/job and a change of scene.

I don't think burnout syndrome has been well studied, so I doubt the long term course of burnout syndrome has been examined much.

I can tell you from my own experience of my enteroviral infection (likely coxsackievirus B4) spreading to 30+ people, that even a decade after people contracted my virus, there is no sign of anyone substantially recovering from the personality changes induced by that virus — changed that included increase pessimism and cynicism, and easily frayed nerves and emotions. These all appear to be long-term or permanent neuropsychological symptoms precipitated by a Coxsackie B virus.

I think people often do change jobs when they are hit with burnout syndrome; but I don't think the syndrome resolves; it's just that people will choose a new job that has less responsibilities, places less burdens on their mind, is less stressful, and is less ambitious.

So they then appear to be coping better, but I think that's just because they have moved into a much easier job.



Its got absolutely nothing to do with CFS or ME.

My own experience of what a ME/CFS-triggering enterovirus can do when it infects others around me indicates there may well be a connection between burnout syndrome and ME/CFS.

I saw that lots of classic ME/CFS symptoms suddenly appeared in these 30+ people who caught my virus.
 
Last edited:

Kalliope

Senior Member
Messages
367
Location
Norway
The thing about looking back at the history of exhaustion is that you are looking through a lens of someone else's perspective or understanding. All you have to go on is their writing and opinions. What you are really looking at is attitudes to conditions that have exhaustion as a symptom.

Agree. And the funds used for these explorations could and should have gone into biomedical research.

Here are som pieces from a google-translated interview (from 2014) with a Norwegian professor in sociology who has taken an interest in ME. But as long as she doesn't distinguish ME from other diagnosis, I can't see how her work can move things forward for ME-patients, which is so desperately needed.


Before lasted prolonged fatigue was considered as a man disease that society was to blame for. Among today's ME patients women are in majority, and they feel that illness is their own fault.

Today, such ailments goes under names such as ME (myalgic encephalopathy) or chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS).

A common perception is that fatigue mainly has psychological causes and strikes perfectionist women who are not able to live up to their own too tall claims.

It has not always been like this. For just over 100 years ago it was primarily men in upper class with intellectual occupation that came down with this, and neurasthenia, which the illness usually was called then, was a bodily diagnosis with a high status.

- The male neurasthenia diagnosis transformed into the female diagnose ME, says Olaug S. Lian, a sociologist and professor at the University of Tromsø.

- Prolonged fatigue has gone from to be understood as a legitimate disease, a result of gentlemen´s heroic efforts, to get a complete stigmatizing mark; as an expression of lack of efficacy in women, a kind of fault in character, says Lian.

And where the etiological agent before lay in community, they now come in the individual.

- Today medicine apply for explanations on ME in the individual. The ME patient is described as a woman with five-star ambitions and four-star abilities - with character features which makes that they do not master their own life, says Lian.

- When the blame is placed in the patient happens an applying blane and shame because it now is the patient it self, not society, that is the reason for the disease. Thereby also the responsibility to master the disease primarily is on the individual, for example through changes in thinking patterns, suggests Dr Lian.

She believes there is such norms that makes ME patients often feel that the psychological explanation is a load, even if it is not necessarily meant so from the doctor´s side.

The study is funded by the Council Research Council program for health and care services.
 
Last edited:
Messages
3,263
The symptoms of burnout may be mental, but that does not mean the causes are mental. The cause could be something physically amiss in the body, such as a chronic infection throwing a spanner in the works of the central nervous system.
@Hip, then you don't believe that people can "burn out" from their work alone? Entirely due to feeling overworked with no ongoing biomedical illness? I do, we see it all the time in clinical psychologists. They don't have ME or any illness, they've just given all they have to give and can't give any more. They usually go and do something else for a while or go part-time for a while.

What I think we need to do is keep that concept separate from CFS/ME. Its something entirely different.
 

TigerLilea

Senior Member
Messages
1,147
Location
Vancouver, British Columbia
My hunch is that burnout may be just a milder manifestation of ME/CFS, possibly triggered by the same viruses such as coxsackievirus B and echovirus that are associated with ME/CFS.
I don't know that I agree with that. I got very burned out from a job I had, but once I left the company, I recovered quickly. Viruses had absolutely nothing to do with it - I was over worked, worked for a family business with one set of rules for the family, and another set for the employees, and because I was the office supervisor, somehow it was my responsibility when one of the bosses kids screwed up (kids in their mid 20s to early 30s).
 

Hip

Senior Member
Messages
17,824
@Hip, then you don't believe that people can "burn out" from their work alone? Entirely due to feeling overworked with no ongoing biomedical illness?

It's not so much that I don't believe this is possible; it's just that the general public and psychiatrists alike automatically assume a psychosocial cause to burnout, without any investigation into possible organic illness underpinning it. I question this widely-held psychosocial assumption, and would try to encourage more research into organic causes, especially viral infection.

Traditionally lots of mental disorders (eg, schizophrenia, bipolar) have been assumed to have a psychosocial origin, but biomedical research is now showing there are organic, physical abnormalities in the brain and body of patients with these disorders. I think in the future, we will find abnormal mental symptoms and mental disorders are primarily underpinned by organic, biological factors, much more than psychosocial factors.


Often with burnout stories that you hear of, or read about in the newspapers, people in high flying jobs were doing very well, and loved their jobs, and got a great buzz from the stress and excitement of their work. Then often within a very short time, suddenly, everything changes, and the stress they were previously thriving in just a few months earlier now becomes a horrendous burden they cannot cope with.

Outside of extreme PTSD-causing events, my feeling is that someone cannot go from functioning very well and getting high on the stress and excitement of the work, to suddenly not being able to deal with it at all. I think this occurs too fast to be psychosocially-caused. I suggest a much more likely explanation for such sudden burnout is that the person caught a neurological virus, and this screwed up their high performance and high functioning brain.

This study looked into the link between burnout syndrome and infection. It found that those with burnout tended to report flu-like illnesses and gastroenteritis prior to the onset of burnout. So this study provides evidence that infections may be the cause burnout.

I think more research needs to be done on this burnout–infection link.



What I think we need to do is keep that concept separate from CFS/ME.

I am not equating burnout to ME/CFS, although there is some interesting similarity of symptoms. But what I am saying is that burnout is likely caused by contracting a viral infection, and it may be that the same viruses that are associated with ME/CFS (like coxsackievirus B, echovirus and Epstein-Barr virus) will also be found associated with burnout.



I got very burned out from a job I had, but once I left the company, I recovered quickly.

Are you sure you had burnout, and not just disillusionment with your particular employer? I have had one or two jobs that were quite soul-destroying because of the miserable work, miserable environment and miserable people, and I was so happy to leave those jobs, and felt much better when I did, but that's not burnout.

A closely related phenomenon to burnout is nervous breakdown. You come across stories of people who for years were doing very well with their work: with their career going well, or running their own successful and expanding businesses. But then completely out of the blue, they are hit by a nervous breakdown, and can no longer cope with their career, or can no longer hold the reigns of their own business. They inexplicably become riddled with anxiety and/or panic attacks, and their minds are no longer the master of the situation, so suddenly they can no longer cope with the work that some months earlier they had no difficulties at all with.

I think this sudden, out of the blue nervous breakdown / burnout, that can occur almost overnight, is most likely the result of catching a neurological virus, which affects the brain and nervous system. The speed at which nervous breakdown / burnout hits I think is too fast to be explained by psychosocial factors.

If it were psychosocially caused, you might expect a slow gradual degradation in the ability to cope, perhaps appearing over decades. But with nervous breakdown / burnout, people can be fine one month, and then in a terrible state a couple of months later. To my thinking, only the contraction of a neurological virus could explain such a rapid change of brain functioning.
 

TigerLilea

Senior Member
Messages
1,147
Location
Vancouver, British Columbia
Are you sure you had burnout, and not just disillusionment with your particular employer? I have had one or two jobs that were quite soul-destroying because of the miserable work, miserable environment and miserable people, and I was so happy to leave those jobs, and felt much better when I did, but that's not burnout.
I
Trust me, Hip, it was burnout. When a person is working insane hours, not taking breaks, taking work home and working evenings and weekends, there is only so much shit a body can take before it says ENOUGH. And I did that for a couple of years. Yes, it was burnout. Not a virus. Not disillusionment. And it wasn't a sudden occurrence. I had friends for months try to convince me to quit my job because they could see that things weren't right with me.