Whether you have burnout, chronic fatigue, long covid or simply just have fatigue this blog will help you understand why and what to do to fix it. When you understand how complex your body is it really is amazing. It might not feel like it when you have chronic fatigue but the body co-ordinates and completes a huge range of biochemical processes every single second. Making energy is one of them, in a fascinatingly complicated process. I want to share a little about how it does this and what you can do to help your body make more of it.
I’m going to start at the level of the cell. Every single cell in your body (with only one exception and that is red blood cells) contain tiny little organelles called mitochondria. It is these mitochondria that make your energy, and it is mitochondria that are affected when you lose your energy and feel fatigued. Cells that need a lot of energy like brain cells have thousands of them.
It might surprise you to know that symptoms of many different chronic diseases are associated with energy production problems in mitochondria including symptoms as diverse as fatigue and delayed fatigue, muscle weakness, pain, anxiousness, seizures, low mood and brain fog. Energy production problems involving the mitochondria are also know to be a problem in all chronic diseases including diabetes, heart disease, depression, dementia and anxiety.
This is because mitochondria help to control our metabolism, and all these diseases are associated with poor metabolic health. Metabolism is often thought to be about how quickly you burn off calories and whether you gain weight or not. But in reality it is about much more than this, it is about taking our food, and the oxygen we breathe, and using it to support our body by building protein for muscle or neurotransmitters or hormones, storing some as fuel and in the main producing energy. Our energy is made in our mitochondria where a molecule called ATP (adenosine triphosphate) is produced which is the primary energy molecule that fuels all of our cells and basically makes our biology work. In fact, we produce our body weight in ATP every single day! It gets used up and recycled extremely quickly but when we have chronic fatigue this process is not working as it should be.
Burnout and chronic fatigue are known to be associated with problems with metabolism and there are now several studies that have found metabolic dysfunction and others that have shown mitochondrial dysfunction too.
Our mitochondria are very sensitive to their environment, and they will change their energy production depending on it. Not only do they make our energy in the form of ATP, but they also play a major role in regulating inflammation in our body. Inflammation is linked directly with energy production and when inflammation increases our energy goes down and we feel fatigued. This is because mitochondria not only make our energy but they also produce free radicals, called reactive oxygen species, which are highly reactive molecules that can cause tissue damage. They are produced through the normal energy production process but kept at balance by our own anti-inflammatory antioxidant enzymes. But if this balance tips towards an inflammatory state we start to get problems.
In addition mitochondria help to regulate our response to stress (both mental and physical stress) which helps us adapt and survive. In fact they play a key role in the production of hormones including our stress hormone cortisol. But this ability to help us survive can mean that if our mitochondria decide that the current environment is just too stressful they can turn down the energy production and put us into a kind of hibernation to protectus. This is thought to be what happens with chronic fatigue and we can get stuck and find it hard to get out of this situation.
The good news is that we can do something about it. I often explain to my clients that when we develop fatigue problems it is because the balance of things have tipped the wrong way. To get back to full health we need to tip it back again. We need to both support mitochondrial energy production and reduce inflammation too. We can do this in a number of ways but the most important thing to remember is that you will likely have to make several changes to get the balance back. I often describe it as a layering approach, keep adding in something until you get the right combination. This is also why you will hear people say, ‘I tried that but it didn’t work’, there is usually no one miracle fix, it is more a case of building up your health using several different tools.
Diet is the big one and this is because it can be one of fastest ways of changing your metabolism and therefore how your mitochondria are working. Moving towards a high fat, low carb lifestyle means that you are providing your mitochondria with the fuel that they need. This style of eating is also more nutrient dense and anti-inflammatory so long as you are eating unprocessed, real, whole foods as nature designed.
Secondly our 24 hour body clock plays a big role in our health and our metabolism. Mitochondria are the master controller of our metabolism so getting our body clock or circadian rhythm working for us is crucial too. Your body clock is regulated by light and dark and are a few simple things you can do to help keep it balanced. Get early morning light in your eyes (outside ideally or using a light therapy box if not), avoid blue light from electrical devices in the evening for at least 1 if not 2 hours prior to bed, sleep in a dark room and eat your food during day time and not after 7pm at night.
Thirdly avoid all unnecessary drugs and alcohol (please do not stop any prescribed medication unless you have agreed this with your doctor) because they can be mitochondrial poisons. This is because they can either stimulate or inhibit (reduce) the way cells work. Mitochondria have receptors for certain types of drugs including nicotine and alcohol directly on their membranes and therefore they will have a direct impact. Many people use these substances because they are already not feeling great which is likely because they have some kind of metabolic health problem already. Alcohol use can create problems with both ATP production and raise inflammation levels, both of which we want to avoid.
Because mitochondria are the master controllers of metabolism and all chronic diseases have a metabolic component, these lifestyle changes will not only help improve your energy but may improve other symptoms such as brain fog, low mood and anxiousness too.
I hope this blog has helped you understand how crucial lifestyle changes can be to help your body to make more energy and reduce inflammation. Keep each change small and make sure it has become a habit before you try the next one. Small changes lead to a big change long term whereas big changes sometimes don’t get completed!
I have a comprehensive FREE ebook that explains all of this and more with simple advice and a shopping list to keep you right. You can download it here.
Here are a couple of other blogs that you might like to read on this topic too: