The Fatigue is Killing Me

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hippie4lyfe

Joined
Jul 1, 2008
Messages
422
It has been months and months of horrible fatigue, better and worse a bit at times, but I am generally so tired and afraid to even leave my house, and I can't make plans. I don't understand why this is happening and doctors have no clue, they said maybe it is still a side effect of coming off of pred, but I haven't been on prednisone for 3 months!
 
I have severe fatigue also and am in my house almost all the time.

I can "work" (as in do laundry, clean the kitchen) for no more than two hours a day before I'm completely exhausted. When I was in my twenties, before my diagnosis, I could work outside my home at a real job for 12 hours a day and I did this without any problem.

I have had three C-sections and the fatigue I have now is much more than in those days following the major abdominal surgeries when I'd also have to get up in the middle of the night to care for a week old infant as well as recover from birth and surgery.

This disease is sucking the life out of me.
 
CD the thing that makes me wonder the most is that I am in my 20's! I should be full of energy but I feel like an 80 year old man.
 
I'm in my 20s too and always fatigued. I take SO many naps throughout
the day. I'm lucky if i can get one thing done a day. Very sad. Laundry
puts me out of breath. And the joint pain really makes me feel like an 80
year old. Stupid Crohn's! :voodoo:
 
hippie i am on 6-mp too and always wondered if fatigue was a side effect. I sleep anywhere from 13hrs-19 hours a day, and even when I wake up I still feel extremely tired. I'm only 19 and sometimes i feel like i'm 82! Walking up the stairs makes me dizzy and the simplest thing wear me out.
 
Get yourself a jar of Coconut oil. It bumps up your metabolism and may help you gain a little energy. It also is antibacterial so that should help some also.

Hope you get better soon.

Dan
 
monroe its now our mission to find it if it may be a side effect.

d bergy i have a jar of it, my family uses it, but im gonna try it now thank you.
 
I am the exact same but I am not diagnosed yet. Fatigue has been a major thing for me as I feel like an absolute freak for craving the sleep I need (15-16hrs a day). Doctors don't even seem to listen to this as a symptom. It really really affects my life. I need to sleep all weekend to try and get me through the following week at work:eek2:

Caz x

PS Will try the coconut oil!
 
caz i know what you mean, the doctors are just like hmmm ok, they dont say anything. i drink gatorade, water, it helps a bit but it comes and goes.
 
I thought my fatigue was just an inescapable part of Crohn's, or that it stemmed from the amount I'm working, but.. I was wrong. My latest bloodwork shows that I am severely anemic... despite my taking multi-vitamins. I'll be looking at various iron supplements this weekend. When was the last time you had your bloodwork?
 
I have bloodwork all the time, I was anemic but I take iron now. Take ferrous gluconate, it is organic and the most absorbable. I mean, talk to your doc about it but thats what I was told was best for me, and it fixed the anemia.
 
When my iron was low, they gave me venofer. They stick an IV in your arm and you get this lovely brown liquid pumped into you. Plus I take a multivitamin too.
 
Kev said:
I thought my fatigue was just an inescapable part of Crohn's, or that it stemmed from the amount I'm working, but.. I was wrong. My latest bloodwork shows that I am severely anemic... despite my taking multi-vitamins. I'll be looking at various iron supplements this weekend. When was the last time you had your bloodwork?
Click to expand...

I thought the same thing. Then I found out that I was anemic. It took months before the iron supplements kicked in. Don't get me wrong I still am tired, but it is wwaaayyy better than before. I can work a regular 8 hour shift, but I have to take naps when I get off for sure. If I work too much during the week I end up sleeping all weekend.
 
Kev said:
I thought my fatigue was just an inescapable part of Crohn's, or that it stemmed from the amount I'm working, but.. I was wrong. My latest bloodwork shows that I am severely anemic... despite my taking multi-vitamins. I'll be looking at various iron supplements this weekend. When was the last time you had your bloodwork?
Click to expand...

I thought the same thing. Then I found out that I was anemic. It took months before the iron supplements kicked in. Don't get me wrong I still am tired, but it is wwaaayyy better than before. I can work a regular 8 hour shift, but I have to take naps when I get off for sure. If I work too much during the week I end up sleeping all weekend.
 
do you guys think that when u eat something thats hard to digest that maybe it makes u dizzy or weak since its touhg to digest?
 
Quick thing on multivitamins is that the health industry presses them but they don't get digested very well. They are hard to digest because most of the time they are made in factories and are not natural. The best way to get nutrition is through eating a well balanced diet. I know it's hard for some to eat a well balanced diet so the second best thing is to take your multivitamins while you are eating so they get dissolved with the food. Don't think that the amount of vitamins in a multivitamins is what you will actually absorb. At best you will absorb 92 to 97% but as Crohnnies we probably absorb much less then that. So we need to increase how many vitamins we eat. Best of luck
 
6MP and Azathioprine (which is metabolized into 6MP in the body) can both cause fatigue as a side effect. When I was on Aza I was soooooooo freakin' tired. I talked to the pharmacist and she said that part of being tired was the fact that by blunting your immune system the little bugs that you normally wouldn't notice, you start noticing them and cause you to be run down. My doctor said that the fatigue effect should subside with long term use but after 3 months it never did before I stopped taking it.
 
Fatigue, I can totally relate to that!! It's been complaint of mine for a while now just last night I was lying on the couch and thinking is this how it's going to be living with Crohns and all of my "get up and go" has gotten up and gone without me? I tend to forget about the whole aneamic factor which I am. I'm currently on Pentasa and Mercaptopurine. Is anyone else on Mercaptopurine that experiences fatigue and achy leg muscles. I have to go to the GP next week for my next prescription of Pentasa but I'm hesitant to bring up the whole fatigue and achy muscles because I know already I'm not going to get a straight answer!!
I've just received an email from a friend whose friend's friend's doctor who is treating Crohns and she was meant to have another op to remove the last part of her colon and the doctor who has recently been studying natureopathy has suggested she boil crushed ginger and cinnamon sticks and drink that in water. Has anyone heard of that?
 
drew the fatigue isnt so much of being feeling sick and run down, its more of im always dizzy and hot and very tired and lazy.

daisy im on mercap and the fatigue is insane, was on pentasa got off of it and it stopped my feeling of going to collapse which is one right step.
 
Thanks for your reply 'hippie' it sheds some light on Mercaptopurine for me. I'm on a self inflicted break of Pentasa but should probably get another script from my GP soon.....
 
Personally, I upped my dosage of 6-mp and eliminated the pentasa as instructed by my doctor, but I should see him again soon because I am still very tired.
 
You might also get your b-12 checked since that is also connected to your processing of iron if I remember correctly. Also if you take a multivitamin, take a capsule with liquid inside or one that is developed to dissolve quickly to assist in the absorption process. A lot of large pills don't break up fully in the digestive process and end up passing straight through only partially digested.
 
hippie4lyfe said:
drew the fatigue isnt so much of being feeling sick and run down, its more of im always dizzy and hot and very tired and lazy.

daisy im on mercap and the fatigue is insane, was on pentasa got off of it and it stopped my feeling of going to collapse which is one right step.
Click to expand...

I had the hot dizzy, lazy and tired feeling when I first got sick. It mostly subsided after 6 months of steroids. I still have days where I can't drag myself out of bed despite my best efforts and if I do I can't even bring myself to shower, it sucks. That hot feeling is horrible. I used to wake up and have to change my shirt, throw my pill off the bed and change the sheets and usually grab another blanket cause they were soaking wet, and that was with a fan and a window AC unit on in the winter time ugh.

I hope you start feeling better soon brother.
 
One, often overlooked way of increasing Iron in your diet is to use a Cast Iron frying pan to cook in.

It will add a little Iron to everything fried in it.

Dan
 
I've been insanely fatigued for the past few months but thought it was from all the diar. My GI has taken me off 6-mp to see if that helps. Will keep you posted on the results.
 
Hey there, My name is Andy and I'm new here. I am going on 20, and was diagnosed at just before turning 18. From what my first doc had told me, crohns itself for some reason causes fatigue to the body. I'm sure all the different meds people are on probably only increase the fatigue because if you think about it, they are all immune suppressors of some sort, and when you're sick because of a low immune system, you're generally more tired right? Sort of just makes me think it is probably related even if they don't list fatigue as a side effect on any of the labels. Prednisone actually helped me originally with the fatigue, gave me such a boost being on the higher doses. Though after 2 years on it, it has started losing its effect all across the board from hunger to energy and even its calming effects on the crohns. I just wish there were quicker discoveries into why all these things are effected, to find better ways to overcome them.
 

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