Boosting Your Energy

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• An excerpt from this report

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Benjamin Franklin once wrote that nothing in this world is certain but death and taxes. But surely fatigue should be added to that list. After all, who has not felt dog-tired, sometimes for long stretches, at one time or another?

Often fatigue is to be expected: You’re recovering from the flu, or, like too many Americans, you haven’t been getting enough sleep lately. Maybe, like so many people, you’re simply trying to do too much, and the resulting stress—a major contributor to fatigue—is wearing you down.

But in some cases, fatigue is a sign that something is amiss and should be brought to the attention of your doctor. For example, fatigue is one of the main symptoms of a number of conditions, including depression, congestive heart failure, anemia, hypothyroidism, and diabetes, all of which require medical attention. Often fatigue subsides when these conditions are treated.

Fatigue, like death and taxes, may indeed be an inescapable part of life. But that doesn’t mean you have to take it lying down. This special health report provides you with the latest information about fatigue and offers strategies to help you regain the physical and mental energy you need to enjoy life to its fullest.

This Special Health Report was prepared in consultation with David M. Dawson, M.D. Professor of Neurology, Harvard Medical School and Anthony L. Komaroff, M.D. Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School. 50 pages. (updated: 2005)

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Here's an Excerpt from this Fatigue Special Health Report

It’s a nearly universal lament of people over age 35: They don’t have as much energy as they did when they were younger. One of the most common complaints is that they can’t stay up as late as they once did and still function normally the next day. People also notice that they’re not as strong as they used to be or that their muscles don’t move as quickly.

Although increased fatigue is not inevitable with increased age, there are certain age-related factors that make you feel weaker and, in general, less energetic. For one thing, your circadian cycle advances, making you want to fall asleep earlier at night and wake up earlier in the morning. Indeed, the most important influence on sleep rhythms is aging.

Insomnia becomes more common as people get older. For reasons that are not understood, older people spend less time in deep sleep, the type of sleep that is considered the most important for restoring your energy. With less deep sleep, you wake up more often in the middle of the night. And the more often you wake up at night, the less rested you feel the next day.

The amount of deep sleep people get each night at age 30 is about half the amount they get at age 20. After age 30, the decrease in deep sleep and the increase in nighttime awakenings continue. Not only do people wake up more often in middle age, it takes longer to fall back to sleep. By age 65, people spend less than 5% of sleep time in deep sleep, compared with about 20% when they were in their 20s. In addition, melatonin levels decline with age and virtually disappear by old age. Because melatonin helps you feel sleepy at night, its decline can make it harder to fall asleep. The reductions in melatonin and in deep sleep help explain why insomnia becomes more common with age.

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