ME from stress ?

In a recently released OMF video (sorry, I don’t have it at hand at the moment) featuring Ron Davis, Ron says that ME can be caused by stressful events, such as giving birth, a car crash, or other stressful situations. He also talks about it being caused by EBV and mono and other viral infections but this is more commonly known.

I had never heard about stress causing ME, especially not in the form of what Ron is referring to. Is this a new theory or did I miss something ?

 

I think ME/CFS, defined by SEID criteria, have occurred by stressful events. I think it is on the CDC's ME/CFS website.

His metabolic research with Dr. Navieux also found stress events could result in a CFS diagnosis but I don't know which criteria he used. Even if he used Fukuda, the researchers are pretty good with diagnosing but, I don't think stressful events can result in ME. Remember, ME/CFS can be severe but it may not be ME as defined by ICC.

The researchers are using SEID or CCC as far as I know and were using Fukuda.

 

I think you may be misconstruing what is meant by "stressful event". A stressor in medical terms includes a lot more than just psychological stress even if it does also include that.

 

Like I said, he gave giving birth and a car crash as examples.

 

From The Nightingale, Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (M.E.) Definition:

 

Perhaps the stress event is the final trigger, taking an individual with established (but not yet fully evident, or diagnosed) ME, to a substantially more severe level?

Stress events demand energy to cope with them. So it would make sense that the event might worsen ME. If ME had not been considered prior to the event, then the stress event will seem to cause ME.

 

Well, my stress event was a precautionary pencillin injection that destroyed my bowel flora for an infection I didn't even have (syphillus). I then came down with a viral infection a few days later because my immune system had been totalled. I then had multiple other stress events (too rapid withdrawal from an anti-depressant that jolted my autonomic nervous system and a toxic triple drug combination of antibiotics while malnutritioned) that shifted me from one disease severity to the next and none of them were infectious even if the antibiotics were for a parasite that was probably irrelevant.

Even prior to those penicillin injections I already had immune system problems (probable undiagnosed mild MCAS and eosinophilic esophagitis).

I think many would have considered the viral infection the onset but I don't agree at all.

 

I think prolonged stress could be part of the mix. It's the combination of factors which to me may determine how things play out.

Both my daughter and my aunt had prolonged stressful situations and indications of low immune function. The description above is very accurate for them but different triggers.

Stress causes gene expression changes to facilitate a response. Fight or flight is part of our survival process, it' s innate.
Prolonged or perhaps high load stress may perhaps make some of these permanent, or altered for long enough for some people to affect others up.or downstream. There are a lot of others.

Lots of online non scientific info has prolonged stress altering immune function, sticking it in Th2 expression. I don' t know how much hard evidence there is for this, but it does kind of make sense that if you are constantly prepared to fight tigers, that the bacterial response would be primed.

Unfortunately a lot of emphasis on stress has skewed the debate and research funds for interventions. This is a huge problem.

 

If it is this video,

Ron refers to stressors, "..like an auto accident, surgery, childbirth, anything that is a major body stressor can cause this disease [ME/CFS]", watch from 6:05 mins for that section.

 

I would think the idea is if your stressed but in early ME your burning extra energy and causing more PEM meaning more rapid acceleration of the ME. Plus if your not diagnosed you would not know that you need to stay in your energy envelope because you don't know what an energy envelope is yet.

That said if this is what he meant he apparently phrased it wrong.

 

I have seen people with extremely traumatic births say they stayed sick following. Neither crash or birthing are purely psychological forms of stress either. For me it’s not new, this is as recognised as slow onset forms whilst infection is more common.

 

I feel like I’ve seen this phrasing repeatedly in both patient groups and in the criterias.
I think this definition potentially includes a viral infection as stress, but then also accidents or very body demanding situations.

I have also seen the same phrasing applied to some autoimmune diseases (though am not qualified to assess), and fibromyalgia is a big one where the papers and patient orgs call out things like car accidents, etc. (I find it believable that many other types of illnesses that have worsened periods might also be worsened temporarily/proportionately by things like car accidents, pregnancy, injuries, etc., it at least doesn’t seem like a stretch.)

This might be relevent:

https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fped.2019.00012/full

 

There are four studies which show a higher incidence of major chronic stress in the year before ME/CFS manifested.

Wessely School psychiatrists no doubt will hold that as evidence that ME/CFS is a condition caused by your own thoughts.

But I suggest that the chronic stress connection to ME/CFS is likely explained by the fact it weakens or modulates immunity (via raising cortisol), which means that any ME/CFS-associated virus you were unlucky enough to catch during the time you were stressed may insinuate itself more deeply into the tissues. Remember that ME/CFS is usually triggered by a viral infection in the majority of cases.

There is also evidence that corticosteroids given during the acute stage of viral infection increases the risk of developing ME/CFS, mostly likely by the same cortisol mechanism.

 

My ME/CFS started three days after taking oral penicillin for two badly infected teeth.

 

Exactly my thought. Or, as @Hip said, chronic stress causes weakening of the immune system, then viral infections happen, you can’t fight back and ME sets in.

@Andy thanks a lot, that’s exactly it !

 

I am sure severe chronic stress has impact. However, I just want to remind folks that so many people have spent years in the gulag, undernourished, doing hard labour, and they did not develop ME. The same holds for those souls who survived the extermination camps. Or the same holds for folks during wartime. So, I don't know, perhaps it has something to do with an already weakened immune system. I really don't know....but it might need several problems all coming together.

 

With respect, there are a couple of issues with this argument. One, we just don't know if those who survived those situations developed ME or not because it's never been investigated. And two, I would suggest that there could be a strong possibility that many who hypothetically did develop ME in those situations wouldn't have survived.

One reason why ME may be seen to be a growing problem may be down to an overall increased chance of survivability, while I have no doubt that it still happens there is nowadays a smaller chance of starving to death, as food is cheaper and more accessible.

 

The stress response is so idiosyncratic, but some input may be genetic/ epigenetic

I have a friend whose sister has ME. She has had this since her mid 20s. They both went through stressful periods following their parent's separation and divorce and subsequent family issues over 20 or so years. I have known her for 23 years.

My friend has not had good health, ( including endometriosis being undiagnosed for years, and then a tumour being missed due to endometriosis diagnosis, luckily when picked up it was benign, but the size of a golf ball). She was very " nervous", a people pleaser and worked in a high stress situation. She was "always ill", and had tried numerous therapies over the years to try to address this when doctors seemed at a loss to help her.

Recently she has delved into her genetics, and amongst other things, has a gene expression which is bad news for stress. This also highlighted issues with the processing of key nutrients. She has taken steps to reduce exposure to stressors ( including taking redundancy and retaining), addressed diet and is now in a much better place.

I do wonder if her sister, who has the same gene issues, perhaps simply got an infection at the wrong time, which combined with the other issues resulted in ME.....

 

I think that stress can reactivate some dormant viruses. It seems to be true of the herpes simplex virus which can remain dormant among neurons. This article explains how it can occur. Apparently, corticosteroids, like cortisol, can open a pathway that allows the viral DNA to "unwind" enough to allow gene expression to occur. This eventually leads to the virus being able to reactivate and replicate elsewhere (if I got all that right).

https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/303898.php

I don't know if this is possible for all herpes viruses, but stress can apparently also reactivate the Epstein-Barr virus.

It makes me wonder what happens if you get some other kind of infection at the same time that this is going on.