Whether you’re working long hours, juggling study and work, or have become a new parent, you’ve more than likely felt the effects of a poor night’s sleep. No matter what the cause, sleep deprivation (especially when it’s prolonged over days, weeks, or months) can wreak havoc on your body and cause more than just grogginess the following morning. You’re not alone. Many clients visit us at Capalaba Natural Health with the same question: “Why am I always so tired?” The answer is different for everyone, but we can help you to find the cause and work with you to manage your stress, lifestyle, and diet to get your sleeping pattern back on track.
Reasons You’re Always Tired
There are a wide range of possible reasons that you’re feeling tired all the time, so it’s important to discuss the problem with a health professional. However, the most common reasons we see in our patients for ongoing fatigue are:
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Diet
Your diet has a huge impact on the way you feel and the way your body functions. When you are eating too much of something or too little of another, all sorts of imbalances and problems can occur.
One example is the consumption of too many carbohydrates, especially refined carbs, which your body quickly processes into glucose. The glucose causes a sudden spike in your blood sugar and a subsequent ‘crash’. This not only makes you feel exhausted, but also produces cravings for another quick hit of energy, leading to a destructive cycle of eating more and more refined carbohydrates and feeling more fatigued.
You could be consuming too much: sugar, caffeine, refined carbohydrates.
Similarly, you could be consuming too little: water, protein, iron, calories.Eating food that you are intolerant to can also cause fatigue, brain fog and drive inflammation which increased aches and pain and in turn make you feel tired. Eliminating Food Intolerances can be a great starting point for overcoming fatigue especially if you also experience some digestive disturbances.
There are numerous vitamin, mineral and dietary imbalances that can cause you to feel constantly fatigued, so it’s best to consult one of our naturopaths to help you investigate your diet.
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Activity levels
If you live a more sedentary lifestyle, inactivity could be prompting your ongoing tiredness. Although the most common reason for a sedentary behaviour or lifestyle is being too tired or too busy, exercising for just 30 minutes a day can boost energy levels and drastically reduce feelings of fatigue.
Even small alterations to your behaviours can make a difference. If you have a desk job you can increase movement and burn more energy by standing rather than sitting at your desk when possible. Walking or cycling to work instead of driving, taking walks on the weekend or joining a yoga class are all great ways to increase your activity levels. Any addition of movement to your lifestyle can help to alleviate your constant feelings of exhaustion.
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Stress
Ongoing or heightened levels of stress can severely impact your energy levels and your sleep. When you have a busy work schedule, university obligations and/or family commitments, you can become burnt out without realising it. This causes constant fatigue and low energy. Stress can also lead to undersleeping or oversleeping, which can both cause you to feel more tired than if you were getting the recommended 8 hours a night.
Stress also affects the adrenal glands which play a large role in stress management and our energy levels. With constant ongoing stress our adrenals often become tired and this can cause increased anxiety, depression and fatigue.
While it is not always easy to just reduce your workload or busy schedule, there are certainly ways to manage your stress so that you aren’t feeling exhausted all the time. Our naturopath, Tony Daniel, can help you with stress management strategies and to nourish your body and adrenal glands so that you can cope with life’s stresses better and that your busy lifestyle is more sustainable.
Do You Have Chronic Fatigue?
If you have suffered from feelings of exhaustion for a long time, are always tired for no reason and have tried to eat right, exercise and lower your stress levels, you may have chronic fatigue. Unlike simply being tired, chronic fatigue is an illness that impacts your nervous system and often results in having no energy for simple daily activities and feeling under the weather when going out or simply moving around.
Chronic fatigue is a complex illness, and there are a wide range of possible symptoms including:
- Inability to concentrate and poor memory
- Sleep disturbances or insomnia
- Headaches as well as pain in muscles and joints
- Increased heart rate and shortness of breath
- Gastrointestinal discomfort including bloating, nausea, diarrhoea and constipation
- Weight fluctuations
- Low blood pressure
- Anxiety or depression
Chronic fatigue has many different causes and manifestations. Naturopathy takes a holistic approach to your treatment. Our qualified naturopath will address all elements of your lifestyle to identify the root cause and develop an individual treatment plan to naturally remedy the issue.
Tony Daniel, our Award Winning Naturopath, has helped hundreds of people increase their energy levels and overcome chronic fatigue’ So if you are tired of feeling tired all the time, let us help you get back on the path to wellness. Call us on (07) 3823 3103 to secure an appointment and regain your energy, vitality, and quality of life.
