When fatigue becomes chronic, it’s not simple tiredness where you feel better after a good night’s sleep. Or where you just need a nap and you’re back to normal again. This is when you wake up tired. Everyday. And it can be hard to admit this level of fatigue so people push themselves through the to-do list to feel better.

Women having this experience often go to their doctor who checks them for iron deficiency anemia, which is a good thing to rule out. I’ve seen many women who are “borderline anemic” and then given high dose iron infusions. High-dose iron may help, but it doesn’t end there, and there are in many cases better treatment options. Let me explain.

Here I will go over five causes of chronic fatigue that I see regularly in my clinic:

1. inflamed or struggling liver
2. adrenal deficiency/fatigue affecting the thyroid
3. copper deficiency
4. poor production of ATP – feeling like your battery is never fully charged
5. electrolyte deficiencies

1. Inflamed or struggling Liver

Our livers can get stressed and inflamed for a variety of reasons which may have nothing to do with alcohol (though alcohol will certainly make liver issues worse). A prime example of this is NAFLD, or Non-Alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease. Hepatitis can certainly be a culprit and what people may not know is hepatitis can be non-viral, as in AIH, auto-immune hepatitis. If we break down the word hepatitis we get hepa, the latin word for liver, and itis which is Latin for inflammation. So all this word really means is inflammation of the liver and it’s entirely treatable with acupuncture. Fantastic.

An inflamed liver can cause pain in the upper right quadrant of the abdomen. Other symptoms include:

• swelling of the upper right quadrant
• metabolic syndrome. The liver plays a role in glucose metabolism so a compromised liver can cause abnormal blood sugar levels and low energy. In Eastern medicine, this is identified as Liver/Spleen Disharmony.
• a yellowish tinge to the skin caused by the liver not detoxifying the bilirubin in the blood so it builds up and creates jaundice (which can be either a bright yellow or pale yellow tinge to the skin and eyes)
• sleep disturbances such as waking up feeling unrefreshed, as well as insomnia and/or night sweats during the liver hour (1-3pm) .

What’s interesting is that our body has a circadian rythym where the liver does the bulk of it’s detoxification between 1-3am. This is when all the blood flows through the liver and the liver cleans up the inflammatory molecules found in the blood. When the liver is burdened, it doesn’t do it’s work properly so the blood becomes more toxic and inflamed. The blood then takes these inflammatory markers (cytokeines) to all the tissues that it nourishes (which is almost the whole body). We can even see this on our faces after a night of poor sleep, we wake up with a slightly greyish complexion, which is because our liver didn’t finish cleaning our blood. An inflamed liver can lead to inflammation of the brain, leading to brain fog, fatigue, and low vagus nerve function. And it goes both ways. Eastern medicine has long understood that even stress alone can cause liver inflammation.

Liver inflammation can cause a profound fatigue, which may be subclinical, meaning that the labs come back “normal” but we don’t feel normal and we still have symptoms. This is where acupuncture can really shine, in stopping the progression of liver inflammation and restoring energy and vitality. I have seen it many times. This type of treatment can:

• invigorate the Liver with energy (electrical stimulation is amazing for this purpose) so that it has ample energy for repair and it’s main function of cleaning the blood.
• balance blood sugar
• clear inflammation or what’s called “Heat” in Eastern medicine.
• reducing nervous system dysregulation from stress to improve liver function

2. Adrenal fatigue leading to low thyroid

The adrenal glands sit on top of the kidneys and one of their roles is to produce both adrenaline and cortisol. When diastolic blood pressure is low, it’s an adrenaline issue, meaning the adrenal glands are not producing enough adrenaline. When systolic blood pressure is it’s a cortisol issue; the adrenals are too burnt out from over-producing cortisol under stress and now they’re quiet quitting.

The adrenals and the thyroid are best friends. When the adrenals are burnt out, they are no longer offering much support to the thyroid and this leads to hypothyroidism. This situation is quite common during perimenopause-menopause transition when the adrenals take over production of estrogen when the ovaries are no longer doing this job. This is a natural process for every woman and it’s not a concern unless the adrenals are weak and in many cases they are after the high stress lifestyle that many modern women have been living. This creates a hormone deficiency with many menopausal-type symptoms such as vaginal dryness, hot flashes and even joint pain because of estrogen (which is anti-inflammatory) is low.

Acupuncture in this scenario is used to support the kidney-adrenal system, using electrical stimulation to bring a large amount of energy to this system to revive it. It works amazingly well and I used it to turn my own life around.

3. Copper deficiency

A deficiency of copper can cause deep fatigue in several ways:

• when copper is low, iron reserves in the body get locked up in the organs and is then unavailable to blood cells. This causes the blood tests to show anemia. But this is not the full picture. The iron may be in the tissues of the body, just not in the blood. And this is where increasing copper in the body allows the iron to move back into the blood. Copper is also used in the production of hemoglobin. Some people are put on high-dose iron infusions which have quite a number of side-effects (such as water retention) while also not providing the full return of energy. Adding in copper can reverse the blood test picture.
• low copper inhibits ATP production and ATP is the main energy source of the cells.
• copper is a critical component of red blood cell formation. Without enough copper, the result is exhaustion, numbness and muscle weakness.
• copper plays a huge role in supporting the body in removing heavy metals from the body such as cadmium, mercury, lead, etc. This means if we have a lot of heavy metals in our body (think mercury dental fillings, both now or in the past), our need for copper is higher.

Other symptoms of low copper include:

• immune failure (because copper is needed to make white blood cells)
• brain fog
• poor focus
• loss of balance
• brittle bones
• high blood pressure
• high cholesterol
• aneurysms

My best advice for getting enough copper is to make copper water using a copper vessel. This is a simple, pill-free solution that is done by filling up a solid copper container with water for about 12 hours before drinking it. What I use daily is a one litre copper water bottle that I fill with water before I go to bed so it absorbs the copper for 12 hours, then when I drink it the next day it provides nearly 1 gram of copper per litre.

4. ATP Production

ATP is adenosine triphosphate which is like the battery pack of the cells, the energy made by the mitochondria. This energy is then used in essential processes such as muscle contraction and nerve impulse conduction.

Many studies show that people who suffer from chronic fatigue also have low ATP production. They make less ATP than their body needs. The result is low energy. When cells are stressed (think EMF, chemical toxins), their need for ATP is much higher. Copper deficiency can also lead to low ATP production.

The solution here is microcurrents which are a gentle form of electrical stimulation using specific hertz waves that nourish the cells with the right frequency which helps them produce ATP. In this way microcurrents nourish the cells in a similar way as food or herbs, which is very essential considering many of us have issues with absorbing nutrients from food and herbs. Microcurrent therapy benefits ATP production by delivering low-level electrical impulses in the microampere range that mimic the body’s natural bioelectrical signals, thereby increasing cellular energy levels by up to 500%. 

At Kingsville Acupuncture, we use microcurrents regularly.

5. Electrolyte deficiencies

Our bodies are electrical. The heart pumps this electrical energy into the blood using a sodium-potassium pump. Sodium and potassium are essential electrolytes that regulate the heart’s electrical activity and muscle contraction through coordinated ion movements. These two minerals are critically important. In fact when people are in the ICU, the IV fluid bag they are hooked up to contains 9 grams of salt.

The heart is nourished by sodium and potassium. When these two are missing and fatigue is chronic, a person can become like a wilted plant. Adding in electrolytes can revive one’s energy. When electrolytes are deficient, people can be drinking lots of water but it doesn’t quench the thirst because they’re not retaining the water. They just end up peeing it out. In other words electrolyte deficiency can cause dehydration because the water is not being held in the tissues.

An excellent way to supplement electrolytes is using a high-magnesium electrolyte powder added to drinks or water. A couple of brands that are high-magnesium are: Phour salts and Vega Sport hydration. Other similar formulas would also work.

So there you have it, five common reasons for chronic fatigue.

If you energy is sub-par, please reach out at 519-800-4903 and book a free consultation so we can get your energy and your life back to normal.