7 Hidden Root Causes of Your Unexplained Fatigue

For people living with chronic pain conditions, the fatigue from the stress of constantly battling the pain can be overwhelming. Yet, many people don’t make the connection between the fatigue and their pain.

At Interventional Pain Center, anesthesiologist and fellowship-trained interventional pain medicine physician Dr. James Stephens offers pain management services for patients in Legacy Park in Norman, Oklahoma, who struggle with both pain and the fatigue it causes. What are the root causes of that fatigue? Here, our expert explains.

The root causes of fatigue

Many things can lead to fatigue, such as working too hard, exercising a lot, or getting a bad night’s sleep. But in the pain management field, the culprit is usually an underlying pain condition – or more than one.

Seven chronic pain problems that can lead to fatigue include:

1. Fibromyalgia
2. Migraine
3. Orofacial pain
4. Arthritis and other joint pain
5. Lower back pain
6. Sciatica
7. Neck pain

Pain can also lead to depression, anxiety, and poor sleep, all of which are correlated with increased fatigue. The pain feeds the mental health problems and keeps you from getting enough good-quality sleep, and the mental health problems and lack of sleep make you more aware of the pain. It’s a vicious cycle.

As an example, fibromyalgia is a disorder that not only causes widespread pain throughout the body, but it also leads to extreme fatigue. And studies show that people with fibromyalgia are 20% more likely than the average person to develop chronic depression or anxiety, which perpetuates the pain problem and the fatigue.

According to researchers, fatigue is one of the most common symptoms reported by patients living with chronic pain, and the severity of the fatigue increases as the intensity of the pain increases.

In addition, not only is chronic fatigue syndrome strongly associated with chronic pain conditions, but patients with fibromyalgia describe a collection of symptoms known as “fibro fog,” characterized by difficulty focusing and performing other mental tasks due to being chronically fatigued.

The same researchers report that “there’s moderately strong evidence for a central governing mechanism that monitors an array of cognitive, emotional, and physiological inputs and produces feelings of fatigue to prevent catastrophic overexertion.” In other words, your brain prevents overexertion of fighting the pain by making you feel fatigued.

How pain management helps

Pain management helps you manage your pain through medications, procedures, exercises, and various types of therapy. Dr. Stephens may recommend one approach or a combination of several to reduce or relieve your pain, or to prevent new pain from taking root.

By reducing or relieving pain, he also helps to reduce or relieve underlying anxiety, depression, and fatigue.

The goal of pain management is to improve your overall quality of life and functioning, such as performing daily tasks, enjoying social activities, and working and/or attending school.

If you’re worn out from your chronic pain, you’re not alone, and Interventional Pain Center can help. Call our office at 405-759-8407 or use our online booking tool to schedule a consultation with Dr. Stephens today.