Charles Darwin

Charles Darwin (1809-1882) was an English naturalist and geologist, best known for his theory of evolution as published in his 1859 book On the Origin of Species. He suffered from ill health for most of his adult life, but remained undiagnosed. It has been theorised that he suffered from myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS), although many other diseases have also been suggested as possibilities.

Presentation of illness
For over forty years Darwin suffered intermittently from various combinations of symptoms such as: malaise, vertigo, dizziness, muscle spasms and tremors, vomiting, cramps and colics, bloating and nocturnal intestinal gas, headaches, alterations of vision, severe tiredness, nervous exhaustion, dyspnea, skin problems such as blisters all over the scalp and eczema, crying, anxiety, sensation of impending death and loss of consciousness, fainting, tachycardia, insomnia, tinnitus, and depression.

Darwin described his illness in his autobiography:

Few persons can have lived a more retired life than we have done. Besides short visits to the houses of relations, and occasionally to the seaside or elsewhere, we have gone nowhere. During the first part of our residence we went a little into society, and received a few friends here; but my health almost always suffered from the excitement, violent shivering and vomiting attacks being thus brought on. I have therefore been compelled for many years to give up all dinner-parties; and this has been somewhat of a deprivation to me, as such parties always put me into high spirits. From the same cause I have been able to invite here very few scientific acquaintances.

My chief enjoyment and sole employment throughout life has been scientific work; and the excitement from such work makes me for the time forget, or drives quite away, my daily discomfort. I have therefore nothing to record during the rest of my life, except the publication of my several books.

Chronic Fatigue Syndrome

 * Did Darwin have ME/CFS? - Zaher Nahle
 * Darwin’s illness revisited: misconceptions or facts? Comment by Norman Booth
 * Robert Youngson proposes in his monograph Darwin's Mysterious Illness that Darwin suffered from CFS.

Other suggestions

 * Asperger's syndrome or other pervasive developmental disorder
 * Chagas disease
 * Crohn's disease
 * Cyclic vomiting syndrome
 * Lactose intolerance
 * Lupus erythematosus
 * Ménière's disease
 * Tick-borne disease
 * Panic disorder with agoraphobia
 * Obsessive–compulsive disorder
 * Psychosomatic disease
 * Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome
 * Orthostatic intolerance
 * Helicobacter pylori
 * MELAS syndrome

Learn more

 * Wikipedia - Charles Darwin's health
 * Darwin's Mysterious Illness - Robert Youngson
 * The illness of Charles Darwin: a retrospective diagnosis.