My battle with chronic fatigue syndrome started in 1977 when I was in Pakistan and got sick with what felt like the flu. After a few days in bed I felt better, but still very weak and one afternoon I fainted in the middle of a busy footpath in Karachi.
I awoke to find dozens of curious Pakistani faces peering down at me. This was the beginning of several years of terrible exhaustion, headaches and a succession of visits to doctors who couldn’t find anything wrong with me.
Back in 1977, most doctors had not heard of chronic fatigue syndrome. There was a fashion for food allergies though and I was initially diagnosed with a whole raft of foods to which I was supposedly allergic. I spent two or three years going down the food allergy path and felt perhaps a little better – for example, my acne cleared up (I was then in my early twenties), but still I felt exhausted all the time and had awful headaches. Basically, I felt as though I had the flu all the time. Some days were a bit better than others, but never anywhere near feeling normal.
Here is an article on a personal story, the underlying cause of CFS and the journey to recovery. Full of vital information.