“Take care of your body, it is the only place you have to live” ~Jim Rohn
I used to think that fatigue was a personality.
I am a person who can work fourteen hours, sleep five and do it again. I wore my fatigue like an armor. It shows that I am serious. It shows that I have dedication. It shows that I am worth something.
What it really shows is that I am running my body into the ground.
Surgeons who can not treat themselves.
I trained as a surgeon in London. My day began before sunrise. They finished long after it was set. In the meantime, I have made decisions that affect people’s lives while processing caffeine and willpower.
I am good at my job. I find it difficult to take care of myself.
Excitement does not defeat me. I can look at other people’s bodies and see what is wrong. I can diagnose, treat and repair. But I can not see what is happening in myself.
Moment, everything has changed
It was not a drastic collapse. It was a quiet Tuesday. I was walking to see the patient at 2 o’clock in the morning, I felt heavy. My vision blurred for a second. I stood against the corridor wall and waited for it to pass.
It is not an emergency. It’s something worse. It was a sign I had ignored for years.
I am thirty-three years old. My blood test is normal. My colleague said I looked really good. But I know something is off. I just do not know what.
What I found when I stopped running
A colleague advised me to meditate. I laughed. I do not have time to sit still. I have almost no time to eat.
But one morning, more desperate than curious, I sat on the edge of my bed for five minutes before my move. No phone. No project. Just breathe.
It felt meaningless. But I did it again the next day. And next.
After two weeks, something changed. I began to notice things that I was too busy to watch. Tension in my jaw. Shallow breathing that has become my default. The way I eat without tasting anything. How I sleep does not come from rest, but from fatigue.
The deceleration did not fix anything overnight. But it gives me the clarity to ask a better question: What does my body really need?
Look under the surface
As a surgeon, I was trained to look at the damage after it happened. Scar tissue. Wear joints. Blood vessel obstruction. I treated the complications, not the causes.
As I began to read about cell health, I realized that the damage I was seeing in patients did not appear overnight. It has developed over the decades in gradual silence every time the body asks for rest and stress instead.
I learned that each cell needs a specific molecule to produce energy and repair itself. I have learned that these molecules decrease with age. I realized that the fatigue I had was not laziness or weakness. It’s my cells are low on what they need.
For the first time, I look at my own health the way I look at my patients. With curiosity instead of judgment. With data instead of assumptions.
Small changes that make the biggest difference
I did not adjust my life in a week. I made one change at a time.
First, sleep. I was determined to work eight hours, even when it meant rejecting invitations and leaving work. The error is real. The result is indisputable.
Then the movement. Do not punish exercise. Just walk. Thirty minutes every morning before I look at my phone. Rain or light. It became my reset button.
Then food. I stopped eating for convenience and started eating for my cells. More berries. More vegetables. More olive oil. Low sugar. Low alcohol. Not perfect, but consistent.
Finally, silence. All five minutes of morning breathing became ten, then twenty. Meditation is not spiritual for me. It is practical. It helps me notice the stress before it becomes destructive.
What I wish I knew soon
I wish someone had told me that fatigue is not the character’s fault. It is news.
I wish someone had told me that the body does not wait for an easy time to break down. It accumulates damage in the background at night when you do not sleep in the food you skip in the stress you swallow.
I wish someone had told me that protection is not important. It’s boring. It is sleeping and walking and vegetables and sitting quietly for a few minutes. And it works.
Where I am now
Today I have more energy than I did in my thirties. I woke up without an alarm. I exercise because it feels good, not because I feel bad. I eat slowly. I took a deep breath. I sleep well.
I am not a different person. I stopped ignoring what my body was telling me.
The doctor who could not cure himself finally listened. And it turned out the prescription was simple: slow down, take care and take care of the body you have.
If you are running empty now
You do not need a complete life change. You need a good decision today.
Get an extra hour of sleep. Walk without your phone. Eat something colorful. Sit still for five minutes and notice how your body feels.
Your body is talking to you. It has been a while. The question is, are you willing to listen?
Start there. The rest follow.
About Dr. Prarthana Venkatesh
Dr. Prarthana Venkatesh is a London-trained surgeon, award-winning researcher and founder of LongevityLongevity supplements that are built on the therapeutic and scientific understanding of aging. She writes about health, thoughts and interactions of medicine and daily life.
