People Who Are Always Tired

Sun (Christchurch), Volume I, Issue 127, 4 July 1914, Page 6

People Who Are Always Tired

§SIGWS OF ILL HEALTH. WORK A COMMON M CAUSE. PHYSIC! SHOULD BE CONSULTED lu

FATIGUE in a healthy person is usually a sign that work, whether of mind or body, has been carried to the limit of safety. It is nature's warning to atop and give the brain and muscles an opportunity of refreshing themselves. But there are many people who are tired without work. They are. tired always, even when they wake in the morning. . Friends and acquaintances write them down as lazy people and they get little sympathy. They are really deserving of great sympathy, for this constant tired feeling is a sign of something radically wrong. These people are proper subjects for the attention of the doctor, and the doctor' often lias his w r ork marked cure them. 4 . Very few always tired people can themselves discover the cause of tndir condition. It may be only soihe slight imperfection of sight or some easily removable worry. On the other hand, it may be a diseased state of the heart or an almost incurable failing in the digestive system. Anyhow, it is always something real and the constant sense of tiredness will not be banished until the cause is discovered and removed. Caused by Defective Eyesight. ! Sir Lauder Brunton tells of a gentleman who once [came from South Africa to consult him\ with regard to a tumour on the brain. "He had a large business which he had been accustomed to manage with perfect ease, but now, he said, he looked at his books and could understand them perfectly for four or five minutes. Then the whole book seemed to get confused, and he could not add the figures together." He thought his mental powers were leaving him. But it was merely a ease of ageing sight. Owing to the flattening of the eyes a great effort of their muscles was required to focus them. Tiie muscles grew tired quickly and the figures became blurred. The fatigue affected the brain and, spread to the'whole body. Sir Lauder Brunton sent the patient to an oculist,-who prescribed proper glasses, and he went back to South Africa perfectly well.

weakness. The hosts are always tired. "When they* go to bed at night they.are tired, when they rise in, the-morning they are tired, and their coijiplaint often!* that they are always tired.'' What to Avoid. Many so-called lazy people are so because of som# affection of the heart which hinders the proper circulation of the blood. This may result from acute rheumatism (rheumatic fever) in early Hfe, or it may beduato over-strain which dilates the heart, or it may bfe thev result of general delicacy in which the heart is involved* Large numbers of boys and some■ girls who go W for exercise for which they are unfitted suffer in. thiy way. Competitive running, rowing, gymnastics, cyeling: long distances are suitable only for the normally vigor- s ous. When weakly children indulge in them theirhearts are often permanently-injured, and they are more* or less tired all the A rest of their lives. Even in grown-up. people a single very strenuous-week-eud after the sedentary life of an office may result in a long spell of mental torpor and muscular weakness. Worry, anxiety, grief, ami othir depressing emotion* are potent causes of a tired feeling, not only of mind. but of the body/ for fatigue of either extends to theother. Business over-work is another common eause, ancE people who suffer in this way should not commit the error of taking severe muscular exercise as a remedyBest of body as well as mind is the proper measure in* this case. Best, of course, is always called for when. a person of ordinary good health becomes fatigued-,by-work. At this time his muscles and his nerves are, nbV jiearly exhausted. If stimulated they will still work, on. But the feeling of fatigue is a danger signal not be neglected without' penalty. Massage is a great 1 refresher in muscular fatigue, It's effect berna to remove- ; the waste products which are the cause of the tired feel-

ing. Those who purpose taking vigorous exercise during a holiday should first put themselves through a course of training.

This is no uncommon-cause of the constant tired feeling from which many school children and people of middle and old age suffer. The eyes suffer from a variety of imperfections,, and any one of them throws enormous stress on the nerves, causing fatigue of mind and body.

The only remedy for people who s;re tired by harbouring depressing emotions is forcibly to banish them. i When the heart, the stomach, the intestine, or the liver is in fault a physician should be consulted. Itt most cases he can give much relief.

Another common cause is toxaemia —that is, the presence in the blood of matters which poison it. This may have several different origins. Some people become weary without apparent cause about one and a-half or two hours after breakfast. In their case food is absorbed into the blood before it has been completely digested. In this state it may be a veritable poison, and indeed there is a stage in digestiou when if the food is withdrawn from the stomach or intestine and injected into the blood it actually poisons the subjeet of the experiment. Either the stomach, the intestine, or the liver may be answerable for this form of tiredness.

Then low down iu the intestine there are always multitudes of microbes. One species is particularly a cause oi ! bodily and mertal fatigue, that is, the bacillus eoli communis. When these little pests are present in excessive numbers they produce a feeling of constant