Brain fog, cognitive dysfunction

What is brain fog? 2022 McWhirter, Stone, Carson et al

"Background
The term ‘brain fog’ is increasingly used colloquially to describe difficulties in the cognitive realm. But what is brain fog? What sort of experiences do people talk about when they talk about brain fog? And, in turn, what might this tell us about potential underlying pathophysiological mechanisms? This study examined first-person descriptions in order to better understand the phenomenology of brain fog."

What is brain fog?, 2022, Smyth et al (incl. Alan Carson, Jon Stone)
 
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It doesn't really account for loss of executive function
Or whether executive function itself is damaged, or is okay but is having to work much harder to deal with the consequences of the underlying pathology, and so is operating well outside its normal sustainable parameters?

I am now pretty sure that just about everything we 'know' about ME (and LC, etc) is just the consequences of having to deal with whatever has gone wrong, not the underlying pathology itself.
 
Or whether executive function itself is damaged, or is okay but is having to work much harder to deal with the consequences of the underlying pathology, and so is operating well outside its normal sustainable parameters?

I am now pretty sure that just about everything we 'know' about ME (and LC, etc) is just the consequences of having to deal with whatever has gone wrong, not the underlying pathology itself.

Agreed on this one. Here's a simple 'experiment': when already not a 'good day' (but not bad as I'd got out of the house) I had to be taken to an appointment in the car. There were lots of road works meaning uneven surfaces lots of swinging round and stopping because of one side of road closed for a bit and waiting for turn to pull out and so on. So keeping upright/from falling or pulling anything when swung round, the visual stuff, and so on all made it a huge physical task. I'm sure all of these to do with balance and visual info etc were probably harder for my severity of ME. Every so often the driver tried to talk to me or I did which just sent me over the edge you could feel it in the 'computer says no' sense. I also tend to motion sickness anyway so clearly sensitive to the movement information stuff (an area I have always found fascinating - did you know the eye actual has cells that directly detect 'speed', as well as those where there might be a space-time calculation).

Anyway I got in the car able to speak and was unable to by the end of shortish journey. Not just the shaken up type seeming tired slurry struggle with words, but stuttery struggle. Not too dissimilar to what it seems some of those getting dumped into FND might present with. Fortunately it wore off for being still waiting to go in, and thank goodness having someone who I'd like all those who interact with ME to be trained by (straightforward Qs, quiet, nice, tried to understand the answer rather than come back until you've done it perfectly or hear what they want), given I had an appointment and by the end was somewhat able to function enough for that having had to explain half by showing/talking for the first five minutes that it had been a journey and my speech was affected.

Of course then there is the PEM bit.. and that is where this lot come completely unstuck and seem to be determined to do everything to avoid studying 'the actual disease' to the point of them reinventing into FND. If someone has enough basic braincells and empathy to understand that two-part combination of reactions and symptoms to different things they 'get' the condition. And that is what they are trying to disappear. PEM, proper PEM. The as you get more severe, at the time stuff shouldn't surprise them (tho surprisingly it does) some get it before being allowed to hide behind their brainwashing so they don't need to give leeway. But the PEM, the suddenly not waking up until 1pm even though it was a work day and all the alarms in the world were set and still there is just no function, well that even surprised me when it happened. And I knew what I'd done in the run up and had the condition for over a decade. And I don't think it was hibernation. It's just 'kaput, spent, bust'.

And all that proves something we shouldn't have to prove. If it weren't for idiots who want to think horrible things about others instead of listening to them. But there aren't many other conditions where they had to run 25 marathons in a row and collapse for someone to admit the cause wasn't them doing enough marathon running (except they still don't even with us shockingly).

But it probably is all a side-show. A downstream. But heck all this downstream should be massive impetus for them to take all that funding from all these people and pump it into tose who will find the cell or whatever that's warped or missing or whatever underneath it all.

Except maybe if they'd been any good at wanting to keep proper detail diagnoses and types for people, along with comorbidities then we'd have clues about which bits tend to go [wrong] with whom and that would perhaps provide some narrowing down about what it could or couldn't be underneath it all. So our hell might have been worth something to go through. If only people who knew how the body 'fitted together' could be interested in the proper lived testimony even of just a car journey for someone on a good day vs bad and so on.

And it shouldn't be hard because everyone has had flu and nearly everyone has had a time where they haven't had ideal conditions whilst being that sick and how awful it was. So they are utterly stupid for thinking that doing that to someone would cure them. I mean they can dive into their pseudophil (philosophy in fake language only because it ain't thinking properly) to kid themselves but phenomenology really should be what I've just described not their tosh of metaphysical journey they've overlaid as observer instead of it coming from the individual themselves. First person. Not limited only into their dodgy narratives.

This is all just a manifesto to make something that is illness and disability being treated badly sound like 'psychiatric' pyschoanalytic tosh. And I can never work out whether it is really callous ideology or some strange obsessive passionate belief in some old neuresthnia world that never really existed but some still believe did that drives all this most strange of stuff. Because it does get strange and Freudian.
 
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Merged conversation

One thing that strikes me as significant about ME/CFS is that it leaves almost all brain functions completely intact, unlike MS, Altzheimer's or even Parkinson's. Members here may be severely disabled and may have brain fog but their intellect is completely unimpaired.
This smacks of opinion but it is framed as fact. Please remember this is a science forum.
 
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This smacks of opinion but it is framed as fact. Please remember this is a science forum.
It is fact. The scientific discussions here are at a level I have never seen elsewhere - because people are motivated to get a real answer. There is no way that people engaging in this debate like this can have significantly blunted thinking in the way that people with MS or Parkinson's or Altzheimer's can do. Maeve's last message about her health was not just eloquent but very intelligently contructed yet she was physically unable to do anything.

I do not know of a single case of someone with ME/CFS having major intellectual impairment. People may find it very hard to concentrate, or think rapidly. They don't call their husbands 'dad' or pee in the corner of the bedroom.
 
I do not know of a single case of someone with ME/CFS having major intellectual impairment
People with ME share core diagnostic requirements. Things like unrefreshing sleep, PEM, OI, etc. They all have these factors to varying degrees. Same is true for things like balance or pain or exhaustion. Some people are in so much pain they can think of little else. Some people are so exhausted they cant' get out of bed. Some people need walking aids because their balance would cause them to fall without it,

For some people, their intellect is hit hardest. Brain fog, although such a descriptor does it little justice. The degree of this impairment has been challenging to demonstrate because neurocognitive evaluations are blunt and not really targeted at our deficits. That's made even more difficult without premorbid scores to act as baselines for comparison purposes.

But some of us do have those scores, and some of us have had their intellect assaulted enough to have doctors repeatedly request a battery of neurocog tests. I've been sick for over a quarter of a century and i've felt my cognitive skills slowly erode. That sensation has been reflected in my tests. Since the year 2000 I've had five comprehensive neurocognitive tests and i've seen my IQ drop anywhere from 15 to 20 or more points. You are correct in that I'm not yet peeing in the corner of my bedroom, but I can assure you I feel my Stupid and it is an intellectual impairment.

More importantly, I am not alone. There are many like me. We don't engage as much because we are prone to mistakes, but some like myself try to participate irrespective of our deficits.

pwME who labor under the brain fog slight are a very real component of our community and it would be a mistake to not factor them into whatever algorithm you're wielding to characterize us.
 
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Thanks @duncan for explaining so clearly. I'm one of them too.
No major intellectual impairment, maybe, but your remark hurts @Jonathan Edwards .
Impaired most definitively. Feeling stupid; too often.
I wasn't tested as often as you were, duncan. Only once with 2-back, 3-back over a period of three weeks on good and bad moments.
Results were obvious. Not much brain left on bad moments.
I recently asked a neurologist about my brainfog, he didn't "do brains" that day.
I don't pee in the corner of my bedroom either, not all gone, but too often not all there either.
 
I do not know of a single case of someone with ME/CFS having major intellectual impairment.
Perhaps it's a different sort of intellectual impairment. For example, many members describe it taking over an hour to write a post of a couple of paragraphs. The post may be intellectually sound, but the effort required may be daunting, and only possible at all on good days. We also have a self selected membership, with those unable to think clearly at all simply not being on the forum, or not taking part in research discussions.
 
Perhaps it's a different sort of intellectual impairment. For example, many members describe it taking over an hour to write a post of a couple of paragraphs. The post may be intellectually sound, but the effort required may be daunting, and only possible at all on good days.

Yes, that is what I am talking about. I do not want to upset people but I think this is a fairly simple distinction and of crucial relevance to theorising about widespread brain inflammation. As I understand it people with ME/CFS have difficulty completing tasks just as someone with severe breathlessness from heart failure might, or someone with a nasty dose of glandular fever, or someone on morphine following a multiple injury car accident.

The point is that when inflammation or other damage hits parts of the brain indiscriminately, as in MS or Alzheimer's most typically, something very different occurs. Intellectual function and other functions like speech or vision fail in a qualitative way. The person cannot recognise their spouse or is blind or has no idea of normal behaviour.

Taking an hour to compose a paragraph would be entirely consistent with a problem in the hind brain or hypothalamus around centres that control attention and awakeness. A general difficulty with finding words would probably be too. If there are focal lesions scattered through brain based on damage then you get specific deficits - and they stay there for at least months. If damage is general you are simply in a coma.

What strikes me as interesting is that narcolepsy is an immunological disorder that just affects cells in one particular area in the hypothalamus region. As far as I can work out something equivalent could account for all the cognitive problems people with ME/CFS encounter.
 
During my first couple of years I destroyed my coffee grinder by pouring water into it instead of the water tank on the coffee maker. I also poured the water over the grinds instead of into the tank many times.

I’ve broken many glasses by dropping them, and I frequently forget what I’m doing and have to deduce it by what I’ve got in my hands or where I am. I have to use lists to remember tasks. I’m not able to study new topics like I used to. I can’t multitask to save my life. I sometimes have trouble understanding speech.

My neuropsych tests were still good. I’m never confused about time or who people are. I can communicate in my second language. I can solve difficult problems as long as they don’t require parallell thinking, and as long as I don’t have to do it all at the same time.

I still feel like me. I’ve just not got access to much of it at the same time. Something is clearly wrong, and something clearly isn’t.
 
I still feel like me. I’ve just not got access to much of it at the same time. Something is clearly wrong, and something clearly isn’t.

That is how it comes across to me.
Messing up everyday tasks is interesting because it might be considered the sort of thing that happens with dementia. But I do things like that at times, particularly if I am jet lagged or have not woken up properly or have woken up in a different place. I think it is reasonably plausible that they relate to some sort of brain stem arousal system like the reticular activating system.

In dementia the person does not learn their mistake. They pour the water in the coffee grinder the next day as well.
 
Some pwME have intellectual impairment. If anyone is going to characterize our disease, this fact in my opinion should be part of the characterization.

What should not be part of the characterization is saying there is no intellectual impairment among pwME. That would simply be incorrect and a mischaracterization.
 
That is how it comes across to me.
Messing up everyday tasks is interesting because it might be considered the sort of thing that happens with dementia. But I do things like that at times, particularly if I am jet lagged or have not woken up properly or have woken up in a different place. I think it is reasonably plausible that they relate to some sort of brain stem arousal system like the reticular activating system.

In dementia the person does not learn their mistake. They pour the water in the coffee grinder the next day as well.
I very clearly understand that what I’ve done is wrong. It just feels like my awareness completely blanked out for a moment.

That being said, I’ve spoken to several post-covid patients that had severe deficits at neuropsych evals from mild infections. They really, really struggled in a way that clearly didn’t happen before, and it just doesn’t go away.
 
The intellectual, cognitive or whatever you want to call it impact can be huge. Far far more than making simple mistakes. It’s a significant symptom with associated impact and can be extremely unpleasant. Brain fog is a completely inadequate phrase to describe it at its worst. And it’s important we recognise that.

But another important factor for me, which may not be the same for everyone, and tbh I have a hard time remembering it when at my worst, is it has not been permanent for me. I have been in a dreadful state, but also come back from it. Maybe not fully but starkly and in a way that I don’t think people with other conditions mentioned are able to. I get the feeling that is what @Jonathan Edwards is alluding to? There seems to be a distinction. A barrier or blockage not a breakage.

My brain may be impaired at times but it does not seem irrecoverable.
 
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A barrier or blockage not a breakage.

It is partly that. It is also partly that people with ME/CFS have full insight into their problems -they struggle they find them unpleasant. When a bit of cortex is damaged you are often unaware that anything is wrong. And if you are you are often rather indifferent to the defect.
The intellectual, cognitive or whatever you want to call it impact can be huge.

That is not in doubt. It is the nature of the defect that I think may tell us something important. Maybe like still being under the effects of an anaesthetic, barely in contact with ones environment, but not a sign of focal brain damage.
 
It is the nature of the defect that I think may tell us something important. Maybe like still being under the effects of an anaesthetic, barely in contact with ones environment, but not a sign of focal brain damage.
Yeah I see that. And mention of the hypothalamus is an interesting one. Certainly what I’ve been experiencing over the last few weeks and usually do when bad is on top of fatigue all around thermoregulation, hear rate, sleep, appetite, I notice shivering control is in there too which makes me wonder about the muscle twitches I mentioned too. Add in some memory and mood swings and anxiety perhaps linked to other hormone release (they have been laughably predictable in their daily cycle).

So then the question is do we think that specific parts would be affected in all people or would this vary? And if so, how would specific parts/functions be affected?
 
It is partly that. It is also partly that people with ME/CFS have full insight into their problems -they struggle they find them unpleasant. When a bit of cortex is damaged you are often unaware that anything is wrong. And if you are you are often rather indifferent to the defect.


That is not in doubt. It is the nature of the defect that I think may tell us something important. Maybe like still being under the effects of an anaesthetic, barely in contact with ones environment, but not a sign of focal brain damage.
"struggle, unpleasant" You don't have a clue what that means in braingfog.
No it ain't broken, I think. But to call it unpleasant, to me feels like you're behaving like an elephant bull in musk inside a china cupboard.
I really so think you don't want to hurt anyone, but sometimes.....

Brainfog to me means I cannot prepare for DecodeME. How helpful other lovely members are in putting their precious spoons into insightful video's and papers, in me it won't stick. I have to read and see everything 20 times and then hope "something" sticks.
Any idea how painful it still is when I have to tell I can't use an I-phone? Once a final year uni-student and now a dumbo: That's brainfog to me!
 
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