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MECFS; Unraveled

Is it really "all in your head?" Let's take a look at the physiological processes that take place during MECFS. 

What Is It?  

(ME/CFS) is a multi-system illness, caused by a breakdown of homeostasis; a fundamental physiological principle that ensures balance, safety and stability within the body. A breakdown in homeostasis produces a state of disease by causing changes in many different aspects of the body’s physiology.

MECFS is classified as a neuro-immune illness, which means there is a dysregulation of both the nervous system and the immune system, causing widespread issues, and resulting in debilitating symptoms.

 

MECFS Symptoms

  •  Muscle weakness
  •  MCAS – persistent allergies
  •  Headaches
  •  Joint pain
  •  Brain fog
  •  Light, sound and touch sensitivity
  •  Non-Restortative sleep.
  •  Post Exertional Malaise
  •  Exercise Intolerance
  •  Swollen lymph nodes
  •  Flu like symptoms/feverishness
  •  Dizziness
  •  Gut problems
  •  Nausea
  •  Depersonalisation/Derealization
  • POTS, NHM
  • Seizures
  • Electrical shocks/nerve pain
  • Wide-Spread Inflammatio
  • Fatigue /musicle pain

 

Why Is It? 

Every person carries a bio-individual allostatic load (the capacity for wear and tear on the body). As an individual is exposed to repeated or chronic physical, emotional, mental, or environmental, stress throughout their lives, this load becomes more burdened.

A condition called “Limbic Kindling” primes the brain/body for MECFS through one of three pathways:

Pathway # 1

  • Repeated neurological exposure to a sub-stress-threshold stimuli (one that does not produce immediate problems), eventually leads to a persistent hypersensitivity to that stimuli. 
  •  The more the stress is perpetuated, the more easily the nervous system can be triggered, and the more exaggerated the stress response to that particular stimuli.
  •  Over time, hypersensitivity to the nervous system develops and more triggers develop. In this case, the onset of MECFS is insidious and slow developing.

Pathway # 2

Pathway # 3

  •  A singular event that is WELL beyond the threshold for stress, (a virus, a physical or emotional trauma) can result in the nervous system going completely haywire.

  • In this case, MECFS onset is sudden and hard-hitting.

  • A combination of both patterns occur. Unrelenting exposure to lower-threshold stress for years, causes chronic activation of the central nervous system & hyper-arousal.

  • The final triggering event, such as a virus, physical trauma, or severe emotional trauma, pushes the body beyond its allostatic load, and the nervous system loses homeostasis, resulting in MECFS.

 

Where Is It? 

The body uses three biological systems for the maintenance of homeostasis:

The nervous system, the endocrine system and the immune system.

These systems communicate using electrical and chemical signals.

Let's take a closer look at each of these systems. 

 
 

 

# 1

The Autonomic Nervous System 

The Autonomic Nervous System (ANS) has two main divisions: Sympathetic “fight or flight” and Parasympathetic “rest and digest”, which have opposing effects on the body. The ANS is key in automatically and rapidly responding to life’s demands, maintaining homeostasis by regulating bodily processes such as:

  •  Blood pressure
  •  Circulation
  •  Heart rate
  •  Breathing rate
  •  Body temperature
  •  Sweating
  •  Digestion
  •  Metabolism including regulation of blood sugar
  •  Balance of water and electrolytes, including urination
  •  Sexual response
  •  Pupil response

Sympathetic dominance is often common in MECFS, and the inability for the Parasympathetic branch to come “online” after a stressor perpetually exhausts the body. Hyper-arousability of the brain through limbic kindling, means that the stress response is also more also easily activated; eventually by almost nothing at all. The effects of an exaggerated stress response are far-reaching. 

#2

The Central Nervous System  

The Central Nervous System (CNS) performs an important role in homeostasis, processing and integrating information that comes from all the different systems in the body, and sending information back to the body, so these systems can adjust their behavior, in order to try to cope with different stressors. 

 

The CNS is involved in sensory processing.

  • light
  • sound
  • taste
  • smell
  • pressure
  • temperature
  • proprioception
  • pain

 

#3

The HPA Axis

The Hypothalamic-Pituitary-Adrenal Axis (HPA Axis) is one part of the Neuroendocrine system, where parts of the nervous system and parts of the endocrine system operate together to regulate processes of the body and maintain homeostasis. It tends to work more slowly and has a longer impact than the immediate ANS response.

  • Factors which influence hypothalamic function include:

    •  Illness
    •  Sleep/wake cycle
    •  Stress
    •  Levels of cortisol (from the adrenal glands).

  • The HPA axis is responsible for regulating many systems including:

    •  Cardiovascular system
    •  Immune system
    •  Reproductive system
    •  Central nervous system
    •  Metabolic system

#4

The Immune System 

The immune system is a network of structures, cells and processes whose primary role is to protect the body against attack in order to maintain homeostasis.

The immune system has a Th1 and Th2 system, and together they have a role to play in our healing, growth, cancer prevention and reproduction.

 

The Immune System Is In Charge of: 

  • Recognizes and defends against bacteria, viruses and antigens
  • Neutralize harmful substances from the environment
  • Fight non-infectious diseases (i.e. cancer)
     
  •  Involved in normal responses to physical activity like exercise
  •  Fight repeated infections more effectively
  •  Creates cytokines to increase or decrease inflammation

 

#5

Metabolism

Homeostasis is further maintained through the chemical processes of metabolism which serves 3 functions:
  •  To convert fuel into energy
  •  To create the building blocks of proteins fats and carbohydrates
  •  To eliminate waste.

  • Metabolic reactions can be either anabolic (building up) or catabolic (breaking down) processes.

    One of the main metabolic pathways is the creation of ATP, the chemical currency of energy. ATP can be made with (aerobic) or without (anaerobic) oxygen.

  • Mitochondria in a healthy person are constantly adapting and communicate with other structures to produce the appropriate amounts of ATP for the demands of the body.

    For those with MECFS, the body metabolic processes are malfunctioning, and those sick with the illness will reach an anaerobic zone extremely quickly. 

 

How Is It? 

 

How do all these systems interact with each other in order to create the illness known as MECFS?

Let's take a look below at how something that I call “The Mangled Ball Of Yarn” is created and sustained while we are sick. 

  • The ANS (autonomic nervous system)

    •  is hard wired to the immune system, and this can contribute to activating or quieting of the inflammatory responses in the immune system. ​

  • The Immune System (in reverse...)

    •  produces cytokines that can have a direct influence on the activity of sympathetic and parasympathetic nerves in the autonomic nervous system.

The HPA Axis...

  •  is involved in regulating immune responses

And again the Immune System (in reverse...)

  •  produces cytokines that can influence HPA axis function.

But that's not all...

There are  more connections such as...

  •  The HPA Axis is activated in response secondarily, to the ANS primary response to stress. You cannot heal the HPA axis with a hyper-rousable stress response. 

  • Metabolic processes are influenced by the circulation responses that are dictated by a functioning or dysfunctioning ANS.
  • Mitochondria play a key role in regulating immune system activity. 
  • The immune system and HPA axis are both involved in the processes of pain sensitivity.
  •  

All of these systems are interconnected.

This is why MECFS recovery must be understood and approached as a homeostasis reset.

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