Many people living with chronic illness experience fatigue (Farragher et al., 2020). Fatigue has been closely linked with inflammation (Rio et al., 2024), and many chronic illnesses involve inflammatory processes. Because fatigue cannot be objectively measured (with a blood test, for example), it is often disbelieved and minimized. While there is no standard definition of fatigue due to the individualized nature of the experience, commonalities do exist (Rio et al., 2024).

The experience of chronic illness fatigue is often described in metaphors (Rio et al., 2024). Some people describe it as a wall that can’t be moved. Others say it feels like the body is burdened with heavy weights. Still others say it feels like the type of exhaustion one has with the flu. For many, an analogy of their fatigue to a worn-out battery feels apt. Like a tired battery, their energy level never resets to 100 percent, even after rest/recharge. Further, like a faulty battery, they lose energy quickly, draining to 0 at a rapid pace.

It is difficult to communicate fatigue to others, especially when so many people respond, “I’m tired, too!” It is true that healthy people—like healthy batteries—use energy and become depleted. But their experience of tiredness is qualitatively different than that of people who experience illness-related fatigue. As most of us know from charging our electronic devices, a working battery provides a vastly different experience than a tired, old battery. Telling the worn-out battery to drink some coffee or push........

© Psychology Today