Spondylitis Association of America Forums General Discussion Young Adults - The 20-Something Club Debilitating fatigue :(

Hello I'm new here! My name is Kaytea and I'm an almost 20 year old diagnosed with spondyloarthropothy. Scoliosis, and raynaud's. I found this website while googling treatments for chronic fatigue. Does anyone else experience this? I'm almost always tired! I have good sleeping habits, eat a pretty good diet, exercise when I can, but yet I'm always feeling exhausted and can't think clearly. I'm in college and work, and this fatigue is causing problems. How do you all handle? Thank you

Hi Kaytea - welcome - though I'm not a 20something I saw the topic & thought I'd pop in. The fatigue is caused by the active inflammation going on in your body ... to manage the fatigue you need to get the inflammation under control with medical treatment. Sleep, exercise, and diet are important but they are not enough when dealing with something like SpA. Since your current treatment plan (whatever it is) is likely not doing enough, you need to talk to your rheumatologist about making a change.

Thank you for popping in! From what I've heard not a lot of people my age have intense fatigue from AS or autoimmune illnesses, so this might not have been the right place to ask this Is there inflammation if you feel no pain? I have pretty bad muscle stiffness and pain in my shoulders from the scoliosis and can wake up really stiff in the morning, but as far as lower back pain I really don't feel much. I made an appointment to see a new rhuemy this next week, my one was awful. Thank you!

Yes, you can have inflammation without pain, at least I know you can in other related diseases... my daughter has Crohn's and even when she is asymptomatic her inflammatory markers can be super high, if her medication isn't doing well.

Are you positive the morning stiffness and pain are from the scoliosis and not SpA? Morning pain and stiffness lasting over 30 minutes can be a symptom of inflammatory pain - but could be caused by other things too I'm sure. One good clue is if your pain responds well to anti-inflammatory medication like NSAIDs; it may take a high dose, though. For ibuprofen the anti-inflammatory dose is 800 mg 3x/day; for naproxen it is 500 mg 2x/day. That may be worth trying if you haven't already. Of course anti-inflammatories can have analgesic effect on pain that is not inflammatory in nature so this isn't foolproof but it can be useful info.

"Lower back pain" is really a misnomer; some spondies do have pain in the low back from inflammation in the lumbar spine, but the hallmark symptom is SI joint pain which is more like the back side of the pelvis. Still you can have spondylitis without SIJ pain. It's good you are going to work with a doctor to sort things out! Hopefully this new rheumy is more on the ball!

Welcome Kaytea,

I am also not a twenty-something, but my daughter (with Spondylitis) is and I and I also have 2 teenage boys with Spondyloarthropathies. I am very surprised that you have heard that intense fatigue is not common in people in your age group who suffer with this and other autoimmune diseases. All three of my kids experience intense fatigue when their disease is flaring. For them, fatigue is sometimes more difficult to deal with then pain. The best thing that we have found to combat fatigue is effective disease management. For our family, Remicde seems to be the answer. What has your doctor recommended to treat your Spondy?

I'm also surprised that you've heard fatigue isn't common for us youngin's with autoimmune diseases like AS. I don't think I've ever heard someone list off their inflammatory arthritis (whether RA, AS, USpA, PsA, etc) symptoms without including fatigue, regardless of age. I feel my fatigue is primarily caused by inflammation from my psoriatic arthritis because it's worst when my arthritis is really flaring, and vastly improves with effective anti-inflammatory treatment, but my fibromyalgia may also contribute to the fatigue.

Though I have scoliosis, it's minor enough that my various doctors concur that it isn't causing me any symptoms, or if it is, they're pretty insignificant in the big picture of everything else going on. With that in mind, I can't comment on whether scoliosis can cause morning stiffness, but as Jen mentioned, it's a hallmark symptom of spondylitis.

One thought. Have you been tested for Vitamin D deficiency? I don't know if treating my deficiency really helped my fatigue or not because so many other meds were being adjusted simultaneously, but I think it's likely that it helped at least a little.

Hi Kaytea- I concur with the other posters here about fatigue and inflammation. I can always tell when my 17-yr. old son is having a flare up because he will come home from school and fall asleep. He is an Energizer Bunny normally, and almost never sits down. However, if his inflammation flares up, he is exhausted. Fortunately his Humira controls his disease very well and he has been doing great with no recent major flares.

I'm 26 and have more than one autoimmune disease, and I'm often very fatigued. You might want to get tested for a B12 deficiency just to be sure it's not that as well. I was close to deficient, so now I'm on a supplement. That and/or Enbrel have been helping.

If I absolutely need a pick-me-up at work, I try to go with something natural like green tea and not Cokes or coffee.

me too. its pretty common....unfortunately.

but welcome ;0)