Mitochondrial Disease, Metabolic Fatigue

Mitochondrial disease is a fundamental cellular failure where your body cannot produce the energy required to sustain basic physiological and neurological functions. The cells of my body fail to produce energy at a rate that sustains my day to day. 

Because my body is straining to keep up, my body carries four times the baseline level of lactic acid of a control subject. Lactic acid is the chemical compound that makes your muscles burn and ache after an intense workout. Living with four times that amount means muscle soreness, physical pain, and nervous system degradation as a constant. For nerds, the electron transport chain is not very good! 

Mitochondrial disease creates profound metabolic fatigue. Because my brain cannot turn off environmental sensory processing, it consumes massive amounts of cellular energy just trying to keep up with the world. When energy demands exceed what my cells can produce, my brain forcibly shuts down to catch up, causing me to crash and fall asleep about every six seconds before waking back up. When I exhaust myself, I do not recover at a normal rate whatsoever. I am very prone to spot fatigue. 

I do not treat medical management as a moral failure or push anti-medication purism. Thank God for medication. Taking narcolepsy medication is what keeps my brain from crashing every six seconds and allows me to function. In my practice, we view pharmaceuticals, medical technology, and accommodations as essential tools for survival, autonomy, and quality of life.

Explore related focus areas across my work:

• Chronic Illness 

• Living with Disability 

• Becoming Disabled 

• Pain 

• Tourette's / Tic Disorders

• Accommodations & Inaccessible Systems 

• Invisible Disabilities 

• Physical Disabilities

• Case Management and System Navigation/Advocacy