Fatigue (Post-COVID Service)

When recovering from a period of illness, everyone will experience ups and downs with their symptoms, recovery is never in a straight line. Having fluctuating levels of fatigue will impact your symptoms for example on a good day you may try to do more activity, often trying to ‘catch up’ which results in overdoing it. This can then result in a ‘relapse’ or ‘crash’ in symptoms for the following days. You may have heard this referred to as boomand-bust patterns.

The aim of pacing is to balance activity with rest so that in the longer term, we can achieve stability where boom and bust patterns are reduced to a manageable level over a period of time. This will not be your personal best, but it offers you some stability and your body a chance to recover.

It is important to base the pacing on your individual symptoms. This might allow you to engage in an activity and alter it depending on how you feel. It is not so much about avoiding activity but modifying to prevent boom and bust patterns. It is also important to remember that activity is not just physical activity. It is important to think about the impact of cognitive or emotional activities will have on your energy levels. Imagine that you have a battery’s worth of energy for the day, this level of energy should not drop below 20% by the end of the day.

It can be helpful to complete an activity diary to help prioritise and plan levels of activity across a week. Prioritisation helps to identify which tasks in your day or week are essential or the most important to you. It can be useful to identify which activities are necessary, which activities can be completed at a different time or which activities someone else could support you with.

You may need to seek support or delay activities to other days of the week to help balance fatigue levels. Prioritising activities is a very individual process that may fluctuate over time.

When planning your day or week you should consider when your energy levels are at the highest and try to spread these high energy tasks out accordingly across the week. As well as ensuring you listen to your body and respond to any fluctuations in fatigue and energy levels.

When planning to complete an activity, remember to consider the energy required and think of alternatives to help make a task more manageable. For example, break down the task into small chunks with rest breaks in between or consider a position change. A good example of this: sitting down to complete a task rather than standing such as preparing food for cooking.

A key element of pacing is planning regular rest periods or breaks throughout your day and week after any activity. You may have heard of complete or restorative rest. Complete or restorative rest is for both the mind and body and can be described as putting yourself on aeroplane mode. This involves sitting with no distractions or noise focusing on breathing and resting for five minutes. Some people may find it helpful to complete relaxation, breathing techniques, mindfulness or mediation exercises during this time. This is to ensure all four areas of fatigue as mentioned earlier are rested. These periods of restorative rest needed will vary from person to person, which phase of your recovery you are in and the levels or type of activity you are completing.