Symptoms of Neurasthenia

Neurasthenia is one of the neurotic disorders diagnosed in China. It arises from prolonged exposure to stress and tension, manifesting as heightened mental excitability and easy mental fatigue, often accompanied by emotional distress, irritability, sleep disturbances, and muscle-tension-related pain. These symptoms cannot be attributed to organic brain disease, somatic illness, or other psychiatric disorders.

Symptoms of Neurasthenia

1. Mental exhaustion and diminished cognitive capacity

Patients frequently experience persistent fatigue, lethargy, slowed thinking, difficulty concentrating, impaired memory, reduced work efficiency, and general aversion to physical or mental activity.

2. Heightened sensitivity to internal and external stimuli, with resultant hyperexcitability

Even routine activities—such as reading, watching television, or browsing newspapers—fail to relax the mind or alleviate fatigue; instead, they trigger heightened mental arousal, leading to involuntary, uncontrolled ruminations and daydreaming. Particularly before bedtime—when relaxation and sleep should occur—patients may find themselves involuntarily recalling past events or engaging in excessive associative thinking, resulting in neural hyperarousal and insomnia. Additionally, some patients exhibit marked hypersensitivity to environmental stimuli such as sounds and light.

3. Emotional lability

This primarily manifests as excessive worry and irritability. Worries typically revolve around real-life conflicts and perceived insurmountable difficulties. Concurrently, patients display diminished self-control, reacting impulsively to stressors with anger or agitation—often directing frustration toward family members—and subsequently experiencing remorse, sadness, or tearfulness.

4. Psychophysiological disturbances

Some patients present with a constellation of psychosomatic symptoms, including dizziness, blurred vision, palpitations, chest tightness, shortness of breath, and excessive sweating. Urological and reproductive system manifestations may include increased urinary frequency, nocturnal emissions or premature ejaculation in males, and menstrual irregularities in females. These somatic complaints often obscure the core psychological symptoms of neurasthenia.

5. Sleep disturbances

The most common complaint is difficulty falling asleep, accompanied by restlessness and frustration that further impedes sleep onset. Others report frequent dreaming, easy awakening, or a sensation of extremely light, non-restorative sleep—feeling as though they have not slept at all throughout the night. Some patients awaken still fatigued and drowsy, while others experience daytime sleepiness yet paradoxically find their minds overly active and alert when attempting to sleep at night—reflecting a disruption in circadian sleep-wake rhythm.

The above outlines the characteristic symptoms of neurasthenia. We hope this information proves helpful.