Obama's Win Causes Fatigue

Today is the day after Barack Obama won the presidential election. All day yesterday I was excited. I was excited to participate by voting for him and I was thrilled to watch him win. I am happy for our country right now. I have never had such high hopes for a political figure. As a history buff and as an American, I was overwhelmed by the progress that our country has made by electing an African-American president. The event was truly historic. I didn't anticipate how emotional the evening would feel to me. I watched the election coverage last night for six hours. I went to bed happy and I woke up feeling like I had been hit by a train. My fatigue was overwhelming today. I was happy that Barack won but I physically felt awful. Today was a good example of how I can be emotionally and intellectually excited, happy, and relaxed and yet I can feel physically miserable because of the crushing fatigue. I think that I woke up feeling worse today because of all of the excitement that I experienced yesterday. My body does not know the difference between good stress and bad stress. Yesterday was a more stimulating day for me. My body probably put out different amounts of hormones, including adrenaline throughout the day. I can't believe that I feel the same crash into fatigue the day after I have a fight with my husband AND the day after my candidate wins an election. It doesn't matter if I am emotionally happy or sad, my body reacts the same.
During the last ten years of being sick, I have had some people, obviously people who didn't really know me, tell me that something happy would cheer me up and therefore make me feel better. My fatigue is not based on happiness or sadness. I am actually an extremely upbeat and happy person. I feel fortunate to still feel happy after all of the challenges that I have gone through and the ones that I still face every day. I used to feel happy automatically but some days I have to choose to be happy. It is my way of not letting my disease control me. The causes of my fatigue are complex and include adrenal insufficiency, hypothyroidism, and neurological Lyme infection. I am not depressed and my energy level does not correlate with my mood. I can have a day where I am emotionally down and yet my fatigue is better or I can have a day, like today, where I am emotionally thrilled but physically fatigued to the point that I cannot get off the couch for the majority of the day. I think that the fact that wonderful events can cause fatigue that is just as bad as the fatigue that I experience after horrible events points to the idea that maybe my fatigue is related to stress hormone levels. My body might perceive a good even as stressful. It just doesn't understand the concept of good stress!!! I hope that my doctors can help me get to a point where good stress no longer causes such extreme fatigue.