[savemylife]

This is my current diagnosis, for those who might have been following my story from over a year ago (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1399450). I've been wanting to publish an update to this story on HN, but I'd been hoping for better news first.

My last doctor (a very good, well-known Rheumatologist in my area) spent a long time working with me. After months of trying everything he knew, he put it to me like this:

* You have Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. Name sucks, but that's what it's called right now.

* What you have is real, it's not "in your head".

* A typical outcome is that you will start to feel better when you turn 50 or 60. In other words, my best outcome is to hang on for another ten to twenty years and hope that I feel better then.

I've been dealing with this since college, but this is the year that I finally had to admit I was failing, and had to quit my job.

[ScottBurson]

You don't mention looking into the EBV/HHV-6 possibility. I urge you to investigate it immediately. Here's Dr. Martin Lerner's Web site:

http://www.treatmentcenterforcfs.com/

He recommends a collection of tests which could confirm a diagnosis of EBV or HHV-6. (My doctor and I agreed to skip the tests because my symptoms were not nearly as severe as yours and the tests are not quite as reliable as one would like; it seemed simpler just to start me on valacyclovir and see what happened. But for a more severe case like yours, the tests are probably a good idea, I would think.)