Experts now validate your experience

I hate, just hate, when your experience is not valid unless some 'expert' says it is. You say 'x' helps you? Its a placebo effect. An expert says it, its valid. Shiiiit. You say your tired during chemo- well its just you- you aren't doing something right, if you were doing right, you wouldn't be tired. Now experts say differently? So , yep, your experience is now "true". I hate 'experts'. Your isn't real, Its in your head woman. (Men's symptoms are automatically real, unless they are black men- then they are drug seekers- esp if they smoke weed. Sickle cell? Well, you're still a drug seeker)

Breast Cancer Survivors' Complaints of Fatigue Are Real

By Lillie Shockney, R.N., M.A.S.
Jun 08, 2011

Breast Cancer Chronicles

by Lillie Shockney, R.N., M.A.S.

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A third of the women who are breast-cancer survivors complain during their chemotherapy and radiation treatments that they feel extremely tired. Interestingly, these same women still complain of being chronically tired long after their chemo and radiation treatments have been completed.

Meanwhile, the other two-thirds of survivors don't seem to be so plagued by exhaustion after their treatment ends. (Personally, I believe that all survivors are subject to this tiredness, but only about a third of them bring it up at all and discuss it).

All in our heads?

In any case, since two-thirds of breast-cancer survivors don't talk much about having long-term tiredness, many doctors in the past have taken it for granted that the chronic fatigue cited by some was "just in their heads," or due to "depression" or to who knows what.

But science has recently come to the rescue of these pooped-out patients, in the form of a study published in the March 9, 2011, online version of Pyschoneuroendocrinology. The scientists say that their results offer proof that survivors' long-lasting fatigue is genuine, and not imagined.

Trouble with the ANS

What causes the tiredness? The scientists discovered that the autonomic nervous systems of these women play a significant role. The autonomic nervous system (ANS), which controls things like our breathing, heartbeat, and digestion, is composed of two parts:

• the sympathetic nervous system triggers our fight-or-flight response to danger by energizing the body for short bursts of vigorous activity
• the parasympathetic nervous system deals with the body's opposite (resting) phase, a state probably best known and experienced when we get sleepy after eating a big meal

It's crucial that these two parts of the ANS remain in balance; however, the researchers found that the ANS of breast-cancer survivors who experience chronic exhaustion is seriously imbalanced. The scientists analyzed blood samples of all the study patients at specific time intervals and discovered that those with chronic fatigue had weaker parasympathetic activity, with higher activity in the sympathetic system.

A huge problem

Fatigue in breast-cancer survivors is not a trivial matter. The stress of the whole experience with breast cancer, the side effects from the treatment, and the fear of recurrence can by themselves cause low energy for a long time. Add to all this our new knowledge that an imbalanced ANS can causes exhaustion in these women for up to a decade, and this becomes a huge quality of life issue that must be addressed.

In the meantime, the authors of this study say that exercise is probably the best way to restore the balance of the ANS and lessen cancer-related fatigue during and after treatment.

More research will be done to discover and develop ways to counteract this fatigue problem.