Gettit #2: Chronic Fatigue, Fibromyalgia, Reduced Sex Drive, and Attention Deficit aren’t diagnoses.  They’re symptoms!

I meet many people who reluctantly wear labels.  They were often given thses labels by doctors, or sometimes, they simply read “some stuff on the internet” and it led them to stamp themselves using their very own undesired labeling strategy.  Chronic fatigue syndrome and fibromyalgia are incredibly common.  The first is a severe lack of energy, the second moderate to severe chronic muscular pain.  They are often satisfied, not with their lives, but with the diagnoses, and they seek answers in medications and supplements. 

Here’s what I’d suggest.  If you’re having trouble producing energy, you’re quite likely having a problem at the mitochondrial level.  The sections of human cells known as mitochondria are the energy centers of the cells, and in that, the energy centers of life (no energy, no life).  If the wall or function of the mitochondria are damaged, energy suffers.  What leads to reduction in mitochondrial integrity? Oxidative stress!  The energy-centers are weakened by poor nutrition, and then when toxins, emotional stress, processed foodstuffs, and polluted air enter our bodies, the energy centers are beaten up and broken down.  There is incredible research, backed by the results I’ve achieved with people through my A.L.I.V.E. protocol, to demonstrate that specific types of exercise, when matched with supportive eating, can rebuild mitochondria.  In fact, by incorporating some of the important elements of a supportive nutrition and exercise program, you can reverse your biological age, rejuvenating the cells of your body.

Fibromyalgia and reduced sex drive are other symptoms of “oxidative stress” and “cellular damage.” And there aren’t any medications that “fix” these problems.  Responsibility is vital, as is preliminary guidance for most people seeking to be responsible and jump off of the wild ride.

I’m preparing myself for the slew of criticisms I’m about to receive from Chronic Fatigue and Fibromyalgia sufferers who will insist these conditions are real.  I want to try to buffer the attack by clarifying.  I know that they’re real.  I don’t question the existence and seriously debilitating nature of these conditions.  I believe, however, the mistake is stopping at diagnosis and turning toward managing the condition through medical and supplemental interventions.   We’ve entered into a world where symptoms are given names and accepted as dis-eases.  I think we should work to erase those labels.  My head hurts isn’t a dis-ease, but a symptom.  So too is “my sex drive is dropping,” “I’m too tired to get off the couch,” and “my muscles ache so much I can’t carry my child.”  I am not presenting anything I have to offer as a “cure,” but I will tell you with absolute conviction, I’ve seen people with these conditions find, not only relief, but complete reversal of the sense of being compromised in any way.

Attention Deficit warrants its own article, and I’ll likely write that article soon, but for now, let’s recognize it as difficulty concentrating.  It isn’t only amped up kids (many of them consuming insane amounts of sugar and caffeine) who are diagnosed with a deficit of attention, but also adults who describe a reduced ability to concentrate.  These, too, are symptoms.  There are of course some cases where neurotransmission in the brain is pathologically compromised, but the explosive diagnosis of this “condition” suggests that it is, at least at times,  lifestyle induced, and if we clean up our internal and external environments, often the symptoms will diminish or vanish completely.

Click Here for Gettit #3 or download the entire piece as a pdf