Immigrant fatigue: why adapting to a new country reduces energy levels

Arriving home at the end of the day with no energy for anything, feeling like your battery has run out before dinner, and concluding that this is an exaggeration or a lack of discipline—this is one of the most frequent complaints in my clinic, and it almost always arrives accompanied by an apology.

It shouldn't. The fatigue associated with the immigration process has causes described in literature, and part of them directly intersects with nutrition. It is this part that this article addresses.

In summary

• Adaptation fatigue is not the same phenomenon as sleep deprivation, and it does not respond simply to sleeping more.

• Prolonged exposure to stressors has a measurable physiological cost—the concept of allostatic load.

• The fastest impact to reverse is behavioural: the eating pattern that sets in when the day's cognitive load is high.

• Four low-cost interventions: regular timing with protein in the first meal, controlling caffeine and alcohol timing, dietary magnesium intake, and low-intensity exercise.

• None of these replace a medical evaluation when there are red flags, listed at the end.

Adaptation fatigue is not sleep deprivation fatigue

These are distinct phenomena, and treating them as the same is what causes a person to sleep more yet still lack energy.

Adaptation fatigue is sustained by cognitive and emotional demands that do not cease at the end of the working day: visa paperwork and counting down the months until renewal; a full day of work in a non-native language, which increases the cognitive load of tasks that would be automatic in Portuguese; navigating housing, banking systems, GP registration, and contracts—all for the first time and without the support network that existed in one's home country.

Added to this is the affective component—the distance from family and old bonds—which tends to become more evident in September: once summer ends, it is common for a year-end review to be done during this period.

The relevant point for nutrition is that this load is not just subjective. It has a physiological translation.

The physiological cost of living in a state of alert

The body does not distinguish the nature of the threat. A recurring administrative worry activates the hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal axis in the same way as a concrete threat, with the difference that the activation, in this case, does not last minutes: it lasts months.

Literature describes the accumulated wear and tear of this sustained activation as allostatic load—the physiological price of repeated adaptation to stressors. The concept was formalised by McEwen and Stellar and is now the most used framework to explain why chronic exposure to stress is associated with metabolic, immunological, and sleep alterations.

Translating to what matters here: the feeling of fatigue is not imagined, it does not stem from a lack of discipline, and it is not resolved with a mindset change. There is real wear and tear, and it is physical.

The scope of this article

It is necessary to define the scope, because that is what gives value to the rest.

I am not a psychologist. Migratory grief, homesickness, and anxiety are not treated with food, and any promise to that effect should be viewed with suspicion. There is no food, tea, or supplement that compensates for the distance from family.

What falls under nutrition is a specific and larger segment than it usually seems: the effect of this fatigue on dietary patterns. This effect exists, it is consistent, and it tends to organise itself as a cycle—the diet worsens because there is fatigue, and the fatigue worsens because the diet has deteriorated. It is this cycle that can be interrupted, and it is the fastest part of the condition to reverse.

The dietary pattern that sets in

The picture that appears in consultations is frequent enough to be described as a pattern:

• The first meal of the day is replaced by coffee, with no nutrient intake.

• Lunch happens standing up, in front of the computer, in the form of a cold snack—or simply does not happen at all.

• The first structured meal of the day occurs around eight in the evening, with accumulated hunger and reduced decision-making capacity.

The result is a day of approximately ten hours sustained by caffeine and sympathetic activation, followed by a single large meal. The conclusion the person usually draws is that they lack willpower; the correct reading is different: there is no failure of character, there is a lack of intake.

Four low-cost interventions

All four act on the part of the problem that falls under nutritional competence. None involve supplements and none involve significant expense. It is not necessary—nor recommended—to implement all four simultaneously.

1. Regular timing, with protein in the first meal

This is the fastest-response intervention, which is why it comes first.

Under high cognitive load, food choices tend to follow immediate availability rather than prior intention. Decisions made at eight at night, hungry, in front of the fridge, are unreliable for reasons independent of discipline. The decision needs to be anticipated—preparing two or three items over the weekend solves most of the problem.

As for the first meal, the recommendation is that it contains a protein source, rather than just carbohydrates: eggs, skyr, cottage cheese, or Greek yoghurt. Studies conducted by Leidy and colleagues indicate that a first meal with higher protein content is associated with greater satiety and lower intake throughout the day when compared to isocaloric carbohydrate-predominant meals. The usual alternative—toast with jam and coffee—produces rapid blood sugar spikes and drops, impacting morning energy levels.

If only one change is implemented, let it be this one.

2. Caffeine and alcohol: the two sleep modulators that go unnoticed

This is the intervention that breaks the cycle, and it is the least known of the four.

The usual sequence is well-known: there is fatigue, therefore there is coffee consumption; afternoon tea follows, and another at the end of the day—a socially ingrained practice in Ireland. The point that often escapes notice is pharmacokinetic. The half-life of caffeine in healthy adults is approximately five to six hours, with significant individual variation due to genetic factors and the use of oral contraceptives, which prolong it. A coffee consumed at 4 pm still has half the dose circulating around 10 pm.

The effect is a deterioration in sleep quality, leading to increased caffeine consumption the following day—a self-reinforcing cycle.

Practical recommendation: last caffeine intake about eight hours before bedtime. For those who sleep at 11 pm, the cutoff is around 3 pm. Caffeine-free infusions after this time are not restricted.

As for alcohol, a frequent confusion must be cleared up: alcohol is not a physiological sleep inducer. It reduces sleep latency (time to fall asleep) and suppresses REM sleep in the first half of the night, with rebound and fragmentation in the second half. The typical result is preserved total sleep time but an absent feeling of rest. This explains why certain days of the week are systematically worse than others.

The goal here is not restriction, but information: social consumption remains a legitimate choice, as long as the effect on the following day is known.

3. Magnesium via dietary sources

It is worth starting with what magnesium is not: it is not a sedative and it is not the cause of adaptation fatigue. Products marketed with this promise go beyond the available evidence.

What is established is more modest and yet still relevant. Magnesium acts as a cofactor in hundreds of enzymatic reactions, including stages of ATP production; urinary excretion increases in situations of sustained stress; and the general population's habitual intake is usually below recommendations. The probability of insufficient intake, therefore, is not negligible.

The preferred approach is dietary, as it is effective and low-cost: oats, pumpkin seeds, nuts, almonds, black beans, dark leafy greens, and high-cocoa dark chocolate. Supplementation, when indicated, is an individual decision and depends on evaluation.

4. Low-intensity exercise

This is the counterintuitive intervention: in the face of persistent fatigue, the response with the best evidence is not to increase rest, but to introduce light movement.

The work of Puetz, Flowers, and O'Connor, published in Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics in 2008, evaluated sedentary adults with persistent fatigue over six weeks. The group subjected to low-intensity exercise showed a greater reduction in fatigue than the group subjected to moderate intensity—a result that contradicts the intuition that benefit follows effort.

In practice, this means twenty to thirty minutes of walking, outdoors, preferably during the lunch break. The choice of timing is not arbitrary: in September there is still abundant natural light in the middle of the day, a condition that is progressively lost until December, when sunset precedes the end of the working day. There is also a significant secondary benefit: it is the only break in the day when there is no ongoing administrative or professional demand.

When fatigue is not adaptation

Defining this is part of professional responsibility.

A persistent absence of will, being prone to crying, and progressive difficulty in starting the day do not constitute a nutritional issue. The indicated course of action is an evaluation with a General Practitioner (GP) and psychological support, and seeking this help is not an overreaction. There are psychological services in Portuguese available in Ireland.

Similarly, fatigue that does not improve with adequate sleep and presents alongside other signs—hair loss, cold intolerance, persistent changes in bowel habits—justifies laboratory investigation, not lifestyle changes. The advice is to see your GP. If you have doubts about how to phrase the request in English, this is a question I answer frequently.

Final considerations

The fatigue described in this article is not an indicator of weakness. It accompanies an objectively difficult process: rebuilding routines, work, housing, and bonds in another country, in another language, and without a prior support network.

The body participates in this process, and keeping it adequately fuelled is not a secondary detail—it is a condition for sustaining it.

References

The references below are listed by author and topic. Direct consultation of the sources is recommended for further study.

• Allostatic Load: McEwen, B. S.; Stellar, E. — formulation of the concept of allostatic load as the accumulated physiological cost of adapting to chronic stressors, with sustained activation of the HPA axis.

• Caffeine Pharmacokinetics: classic half-life data in healthy adults (five to six hours), with inter-individual variability due to CYP1A2 polymorphisms and prolongation associated with oral contraceptive use.

• Alcohol and Sleep Architecture: Ebrahim, I. O. et al. — reduction in sleep latency, REM suppression in the first half of the night, and fragmentation in the second.

• Magnesium: de Baaij, J. H. F.; Hoenderop, J. G. J.; Bindels, R. J. M. — review on the role of magnesium in human physiology, including function as a cofactor in energy production reactions.

• Exercise and Fatigue: Puetz, T. W.; Flowers, S. S.; O'Connor, P. J. — Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, 2008. Trial with sedentary adults and persistent fatigue; low-intensity exercise outperformed moderate intensity in reducing fatigue.

• Protein in the First Meal: Leidy, H. J. et al. — effects of breakfast protein content on satiety and subsequent energy intake.