why am I so tired?

I haven't blogged for a while. This is mainly because I am very tired.

Why am I very tired?

Well, let's see if we can work it out.

I have MS. Part of the symptoms for that are having a decent helping of fatigue, which can manifest itself as an all over the body, general musculature weakness, and a foggy brain that just can't do joined-up thinking much.

It could be that, but an episode of the MS fatigue generally has a side helping of clumsy and wobbly with it, which I don't have at present.

Probably not then.

About fifteen years ago now, I had a stroke. I recovered from the more obvious and worst effects of it (paralysis, lack of speech etc.) after eighteen months or so, but the doctors told me I might need a lot of rest after activity as my body might well get fatigued very easily now.

Definitely add to the list of suspects.

Although that didn't stop me from taking the health warning on, giving up alcohol and smoking, dropping 25 kilos of weight, and rediscovering my love for cycling.

Another possible culprit then is that, for about three years on and off, I've been dealing with having a heart condition that keeps throwing me into a irregular heart rhythm (AF), raises my heart rate to a silly level (150-160 bpm at rest), and umm... fatigues my body.

This has happened very recently too.

Interesting.

To battle the AF condition, I've been taking a beta blocker, which has side effects listed as perhaps getting cold hands and feet (check!) and suffering from increased fatigue. After a week's spell in hospital a couple of weeks ago, and having an operation (which didn't work), the AF is still there, but the dose of the beta blocker has been trebled.

Distinct possibility.

I'm very tired and haven't blogged for a while. Currently, I manage to stay awake from about 9 am until about 11 am (managed to get this post written then), then need a sleep (very soon now). Lunch at 1 pm, then an after-lunch nap until about 5 pm. Dinner, then go to bed about 9 pm.

I don't know exactly why I'm so tired.

But I have a few suspects.