The Simplest Cure for Fatigue

The secret to beating exhaustion is pretty simple: sleep. Another secret to beating exhaustion is also pretty simple: get up. I realize I did not need to go to medical school to enlighten you with these miraculous cures, but think about it for a moment.

Find out if you’re getting enough sleep.

Most of my friends seem to be chronically exhausted. My children seem to be chronically exhausted. My sisters seem to be chronically exhausted. I do not think any of us are getting adequate, quality sleep. Sleep, in our busy, high tech, high stress world, is not only low on our priority list, it is tough to come by when we have the time for it.

At night, there is always one more thing to do; one more email to check, one more show to watch, one more bill to pay. We put off bedtime and then hop under the covers — all hopped up — and expect to fall asleep when our head hits the pillow. Biologically, we need a dimmer, but we try to go from On to Off.

The opposite is true in the morning. We wake up and often wonder how we are going to pull ourselves out of bed and make it through the day. We moan, we roll over, we snooze.The best treatment for this is just do it. Get out of bed, brush your teeth and that severe exhaustion you were just grappling with, often vanishes.

At nighttime, think of sleep as a gradual process and a wind down from the day. In the morning, think of waking up as a time to rip off the bandaid. The more we treat sleep as a necessity for our health and less like a nuisance or a luxury, the better we will feel.