Tired most of the time

Well.... As I have written before, I do not know if I have ITP, because they are still testing me for a 1000 other things but it is very likely that I do.

I was wondering if you guys feel exhausted like I am.

My count is 49,000 and since I hit 50,000 I've been feeling super tired, like if I go out of my house a couple of hours, when I come back all I want to do is be on my bed resting (not sleeping, but resting), I wonder if it is a common symptom because the hematologist said that it was weird that I felt so tired. I take the subway, walk a couple of blocks, a 30 minute meeting and then back to the subway to my house and I feel like I climbed the freaking Everest :laugh:

I think it is normal to feel tired. I feel tired all the time, it doesn't matter what my platelets are at. Sorry girl, wish I had a magic pill to give you. I'm looking for a solution as well. If you find one, please let me know

I really don't think this is ITP to blame for being tired. I have counts less than that and feel fine. I've noticed many other saying they were active and fit and having tons of energy and then being surprised to hear they had ITP. In other words, I've not read about any link between platelets and your energy level so I'd look elsewhere for the cause of your fatigue.

Platelets really mostly don't matter to your daily life until you need them for blood clotting purposes. If they get low enough you will have spontaneous issues (ie: the bruising and other bad things that might happen) but otherwise it's likely you won't notice them being low as was the case with me and seemingly many others.

There is actually a lot of conflicting information about this. Until recently, hematologists did not recognize fatigue as a symptom of ITP, but they are starting to report that this is possible. No one knows why.

I do know that there are also many people with ITP who do not feel any different as far as energy levels go. I wouldn't say that everyone with ITP will feel fatigued; many feel just fine. It's possible that there are different autoimmune processes going on with each person, so it can affect people differently. The treatments can also take a toll so that should also greatly be taken into consideration.

This also goes for depression. It is not automatic that everyone with ITP will be depressed. A lot gets blamed on the low platelets = low serotonin factor, but a lot of it also has to do with how we emotionally handle the diagnosis and the management of ITP.

It's scary to think though that ITP is the reason for every symptom. Many times, there could be other things going on that are ignored because ITP is the first thing blamed. There are many reasons for fatigue and I found quite a few over the years when I asked for some simple blood work at appointments. Having low potassium, low B-12, thyroid disorders, etc. can cause fatigue and it's sometimes amazing what you will find when you poke around. Some things are easily fixed. You also have to be careful and actually pay attention to lab results. Some results end up in the normal reference range, but on the low end. If you do some research, you might find that symptoms can occur at these low levels, but it's ignored by doctors because it's not flagged.

I'd say Sandi is right. It could be the cause but probably best to keep looking at others thing also than just assume that when your platelets go up your energy will too. There is a lot they don't understand about ITP so yeah, could be part of the fatigue problem but personally I'd wager it's something else or at least something else in combination with ITP giving you the fatigue.

If nothing else, you will be that much further ahead in understanding your body and health even if ITP turns out to be the major driver.

I experience the tiredness occassionally too and my theory is that, the tiredness is at its peak when the platelet destruction is occuring. For the most part our bodies are making healthy and good platelets in the correct numbers 150K and up but they are being destroyed on a daily basis. To me the energy the body uses to fight itself causes the tiredness

That's possible, but studies show that most individuals with ITP have production problems also.

I was wrong, there is something I read about fatigue and itp:

from:
www.hematology.org/Publications/Hematologist/2010/4965.aspx

I quote:

"Two important issues are fatigue and thrombophilia. Fatigue has now been shown in a number of studies to affect a substantial number of patients with ITP.13 Previously, this had been considered to be steroid-related, but it is clear now that it is an intrinsic part of ITP, more evident in certain patients than in others. "

Since fatigue recognition is a relatively new thing, it would be hard to find articles that support it. You did find one, and I'm sure there will be many more in the future.

Thank you all for your responses.

There's so much I don't know about ITP yet, I think it's fantastic to be able to ask to all of you questions, I don't know anybody with this condition and there's little information in spanish, actually I joined a facebook group of "ITP Chile" almost two months ago and they still don't accept me.... 'cause nobody post there!

I guess I'll search for other causes just in case it's not ITP related

There can be so many reasons for fatigue; it would be impossible to test for everything. I was diagnosed with ITP in 1998 and although I am in remission, I am still coming across issues now and then that can cause fatigue. I also have Lupus though and fatigue is a well known symptom, so I never have any idea what is really going on with me. Just so you know, I have had low potassium, low magnesium low B-12, low Vitamin D, and low ferritin, all discovered at different times over the years. Treating sometimes made a difference and sometimes it didn't.

My hemo once told me that B6 can help with fatigue and at that time, it did help. It may have been placebo effect but I am not usually responsive to that type of thing.