carlozdre
01-08-12, 23:37
Hi everyone,
I would just like to start by saying I am using my husbands' username as I have just signed up but for some reason I am not allowed to post on this forum with that username.
I am very scared at the moment.
I have been diagnosed with anxiety and depression about 10 years ago. Since then I have been on rivotril/clonazepam which I successfully came off in 2007 and Zoloft/sertraline which I stopped taking last march. I have done it gradually and it took a lot of effort, time and money. Nevertheless I felt myself again and thought I was cured.
A few months after being Zoloft free I have been going through stressful episodes, unemployment, relocation, job searching and interviews and started to feel unwell again last December.
I don't remember having physical symptoms but emotional. Would cry without any reason, be very irritable to the point that I could not stand anyone moving around or simply being in the house. My husband would come from work and even though I couldn't wait to see him back home I would start having a go at him for not putting his shoes back in their place or really really stupid things like that.
I had obsessive thoughts such as bad memories chasing me all day, the same thought over and over again, usually something embarrassing I have done years ago and completely forgot about it. This somehow was an alarm bell as I found it very strange and thought it wasn't normal.
As time passed I became unable to deal with any sort of pressure at all, like opening the mail or answering calls even though I was on a job hunt and agencies would call me on a daily basis.
My heart will start racing and I would start shaking. It made me so emotionally consumed I just couldn't cope with anything anymore and I felt like postponing every single thing in my life: paying the bills, replying to emails or phone calls, etc.
By this time I had realised I might slip back into troubles and tried to contact my gp.
Now, they have an 0845 number only which I cannot stand and I never dial one of these numbers, it's a principle I try to stick to. So I have emailed them instead saying I was worried fr my mental health and asked for an appointment. They emailed back saying they do not offer appointments via email and I should call them. I thought "right, then f off" I will deal with this myself.
Then I noticed I started to get the crazy heart rates when I would climb the stairs from the underground rather than taking the lift. 130 steps, however, unlike before, now my heart would always be about to jump right out of my chest.
Then the job interviews came and my heart would go crazy high just at the thought of being interviewed. Many times I could not grasp a proper breath of air and was shaking all over.
I was sure the interviewers always noticed and while my mind stayed very sharp during the job interviews, after I felt emotionally and physically drained.
I then got a job and started in May, after going through a tough selection process( I have attended 3 interviews to get through).
By this point I had all the reasons to be happy and celebrate but I just could not enjoy my success and even worst, my anxiety attacks were back.
One evening I was in a restaurant with family celebrating and the whole evening I kept very quiet, didn't feel like talking at all and these long forgotten anxiety symptoms were slowly coming back. Blurred vision, dizziness, rapid heart rate, almost panic, the feeling that I wasn't actually there.
Then after a couple of days one evening I was about to go to bed and felt these weird chest pains, more like grabbing sensations on my left side that made me really uncomfortable and scared me. Once I started to pay attention to them and became worried, this horrible shoulder pain came, something I have never experienced before. It hurt really bad and I started to panic like I used to 10 years ago, when I had no idea what panic attacks and anxiety were.
I kept saying to myself "calm down, it's just panic and anxiety" but because it felt like never before, I just couldn't control myself and lost it. My heart was beating like crazy and the pain was horrid. I quickly went online and searched for "shoulder pain anxiety" and saw someone's post and then managed to cry myself to sleep once the heart rate went down a bit.
Next morning I woke up with this feeling of dread and doom and instantly started to cry. It was all back and most likely had a heart attack.
Went to the ER and once I started telling the receptionist what happened my heart rate was back right up.
They couldn't even take my blood pressure as I couldn't calm myself down.
When they finally managed to check my bp, 11/7 or something a dr saw me. They did 3 ECG and took a lt of blood. Because I could not calm my heart rate,due to the panicked, they thought I had a heart attack.
They took an X-ray too. Everything came back normal, the dr told me i had sinusal tachycardia ( which I knew from 10 yrs ago) and told me my test results looked better than his.
I sad I feared there was something wrong with my heart, should I see my GP, a cardiologist? He said I was young and healthy, I should exercise seriously, take up yoga and do not seek medical help (as in seeing a cardio or my gp about my heart) as it would only make matters worse.
The reassurance made me feel like new again...for about a day.
Since then, for the last 2 months I have been living in continuous fear and had a horrible horrible time.
Lots of heart symptoms came back and new ones too.
I am now very worried about these chest vibrations/electrical feelings I had for the last few weeks, just after the chest tightness disappeared ( that lasted about a month).
I have been obsessed I had Wolf Parkinson Whie syndrome until my gp explained to me last week what it was( I have been too scared to look it up for the past 9 years), then I got stuck on atrial fibrillation.
I got some relief from the obsessing thoughts for the last 2 days and felt somehow better, with just a few vibrating chest sensations.
Then while I was at work ths afternoon, I can't even explain how ths happened, but I just remembered how 10 years ago when I first got hospitalised after a antic attack, doctors did lots of blood tests, ECG and because the panic state I was in was so elevated and the chest tightness wouldn't go away they also did a catheterization to check for any blockages/clogged arteries.
Just before releasing me from hospital as everything was normal, they did an ultrasound of my heart and I remembered today that they told me then, and even showed it to me on the screen that there was a little blood ...I can't even remember exactly what they said (went through too much stress then) but said it was completely normal and I was perfectly healthy.
However,just playing this episode through my head today made me diagnose mitral valve regurgitation which I quickly looked up on my phone while at work ( job I have been struggling so hard to get).
I have read horrible things about MVP and got so scared, been crying again and heart palps are back.
I don't know what to do anymore, I cant live like this, I am DESPERATE.
I am so sorry, this is an incredibly long post,I just felt the rush to just write on here tonight, after reading so many of your posts.
I just need to add that after that ultrasound 10 yrs ago I have been visiting many cardiologists in the search for a diagnosis (as for the first year of my suffering no one mentioned mental health and kept sending me like a ping pong ball from doctor to doctor not knowing what it was).
Anyway, I had many ecgs done, blood tests and 3 years ago had a heart monitor for a few weeks, all normal.
I just can't control my thoughts and not sure if the erratic heart beats I'm feeling are causing the anxiety/irrational fears or the other way around.
One would expect to be wiser after 10 years, I just can't understand what's going on, I just feel I'm loosing it.
Thank you very much for your patience in reading this.
Wish you all the best :bighug1:
---------- Post added at 23:15 ---------- Previous post was at 23:10 ----------
Just realised I have mistyped some words, missed some letters, it's because of the device Ive been using, hope it's not too awful.
---------- Post added at 23:37 ---------- Previous post was at 23:15 ----------
Really need to get this off my chest, I think I am losing my mind, I am sooo obsessed with my heart, it is unbelievable. I can't stay still anymore as I can feel its every single beat and I can't cope with the feeling. I have always had this obsession, I mean, since the attacks have started when i was 20. Since then I can't even sleep or sit next to my husbands left side as I am scared of feeling his heart. And I can't sleep on my left side anymore as that makes me feel my heart. God.
I would just like to start by saying I am using my husbands' username as I have just signed up but for some reason I am not allowed to post on this forum with that username.
I am very scared at the moment.
I have been diagnosed with anxiety and depression about 10 years ago. Since then I have been on rivotril/clonazepam which I successfully came off in 2007 and Zoloft/sertraline which I stopped taking last march. I have done it gradually and it took a lot of effort, time and money. Nevertheless I felt myself again and thought I was cured.
A few months after being Zoloft free I have been going through stressful episodes, unemployment, relocation, job searching and interviews and started to feel unwell again last December.
I don't remember having physical symptoms but emotional. Would cry without any reason, be very irritable to the point that I could not stand anyone moving around or simply being in the house. My husband would come from work and even though I couldn't wait to see him back home I would start having a go at him for not putting his shoes back in their place or really really stupid things like that.
I had obsessive thoughts such as bad memories chasing me all day, the same thought over and over again, usually something embarrassing I have done years ago and completely forgot about it. This somehow was an alarm bell as I found it very strange and thought it wasn't normal.
As time passed I became unable to deal with any sort of pressure at all, like opening the mail or answering calls even though I was on a job hunt and agencies would call me on a daily basis.
My heart will start racing and I would start shaking. It made me so emotionally consumed I just couldn't cope with anything anymore and I felt like postponing every single thing in my life: paying the bills, replying to emails or phone calls, etc.
By this time I had realised I might slip back into troubles and tried to contact my gp.
Now, they have an 0845 number only which I cannot stand and I never dial one of these numbers, it's a principle I try to stick to. So I have emailed them instead saying I was worried fr my mental health and asked for an appointment. They emailed back saying they do not offer appointments via email and I should call them. I thought "right, then f off" I will deal with this myself.
Then I noticed I started to get the crazy heart rates when I would climb the stairs from the underground rather than taking the lift. 130 steps, however, unlike before, now my heart would always be about to jump right out of my chest.
Then the job interviews came and my heart would go crazy high just at the thought of being interviewed. Many times I could not grasp a proper breath of air and was shaking all over.
I was sure the interviewers always noticed and while my mind stayed very sharp during the job interviews, after I felt emotionally and physically drained.
I then got a job and started in May, after going through a tough selection process( I have attended 3 interviews to get through).
By this point I had all the reasons to be happy and celebrate but I just could not enjoy my success and even worst, my anxiety attacks were back.
One evening I was in a restaurant with family celebrating and the whole evening I kept very quiet, didn't feel like talking at all and these long forgotten anxiety symptoms were slowly coming back. Blurred vision, dizziness, rapid heart rate, almost panic, the feeling that I wasn't actually there.
Then after a couple of days one evening I was about to go to bed and felt these weird chest pains, more like grabbing sensations on my left side that made me really uncomfortable and scared me. Once I started to pay attention to them and became worried, this horrible shoulder pain came, something I have never experienced before. It hurt really bad and I started to panic like I used to 10 years ago, when I had no idea what panic attacks and anxiety were.
I kept saying to myself "calm down, it's just panic and anxiety" but because it felt like never before, I just couldn't control myself and lost it. My heart was beating like crazy and the pain was horrid. I quickly went online and searched for "shoulder pain anxiety" and saw someone's post and then managed to cry myself to sleep once the heart rate went down a bit.
Next morning I woke up with this feeling of dread and doom and instantly started to cry. It was all back and most likely had a heart attack.
Went to the ER and once I started telling the receptionist what happened my heart rate was back right up.
They couldn't even take my blood pressure as I couldn't calm myself down.
When they finally managed to check my bp, 11/7 or something a dr saw me. They did 3 ECG and took a lt of blood. Because I could not calm my heart rate,due to the panicked, they thought I had a heart attack.
They took an X-ray too. Everything came back normal, the dr told me i had sinusal tachycardia ( which I knew from 10 yrs ago) and told me my test results looked better than his.
I sad I feared there was something wrong with my heart, should I see my GP, a cardiologist? He said I was young and healthy, I should exercise seriously, take up yoga and do not seek medical help (as in seeing a cardio or my gp about my heart) as it would only make matters worse.
The reassurance made me feel like new again...for about a day.
Since then, for the last 2 months I have been living in continuous fear and had a horrible horrible time.
Lots of heart symptoms came back and new ones too.
I am now very worried about these chest vibrations/electrical feelings I had for the last few weeks, just after the chest tightness disappeared ( that lasted about a month).
I have been obsessed I had Wolf Parkinson Whie syndrome until my gp explained to me last week what it was( I have been too scared to look it up for the past 9 years), then I got stuck on atrial fibrillation.
I got some relief from the obsessing thoughts for the last 2 days and felt somehow better, with just a few vibrating chest sensations.
Then while I was at work ths afternoon, I can't even explain how ths happened, but I just remembered how 10 years ago when I first got hospitalised after a antic attack, doctors did lots of blood tests, ECG and because the panic state I was in was so elevated and the chest tightness wouldn't go away they also did a catheterization to check for any blockages/clogged arteries.
Just before releasing me from hospital as everything was normal, they did an ultrasound of my heart and I remembered today that they told me then, and even showed it to me on the screen that there was a little blood ...I can't even remember exactly what they said (went through too much stress then) but said it was completely normal and I was perfectly healthy.
However,just playing this episode through my head today made me diagnose mitral valve regurgitation which I quickly looked up on my phone while at work ( job I have been struggling so hard to get).
I have read horrible things about MVP and got so scared, been crying again and heart palps are back.
I don't know what to do anymore, I cant live like this, I am DESPERATE.
I am so sorry, this is an incredibly long post,I just felt the rush to just write on here tonight, after reading so many of your posts.
I just need to add that after that ultrasound 10 yrs ago I have been visiting many cardiologists in the search for a diagnosis (as for the first year of my suffering no one mentioned mental health and kept sending me like a ping pong ball from doctor to doctor not knowing what it was).
Anyway, I had many ecgs done, blood tests and 3 years ago had a heart monitor for a few weeks, all normal.
I just can't control my thoughts and not sure if the erratic heart beats I'm feeling are causing the anxiety/irrational fears or the other way around.
One would expect to be wiser after 10 years, I just can't understand what's going on, I just feel I'm loosing it.
Thank you very much for your patience in reading this.
Wish you all the best :bighug1:
---------- Post added at 23:15 ---------- Previous post was at 23:10 ----------
Just realised I have mistyped some words, missed some letters, it's because of the device Ive been using, hope it's not too awful.
---------- Post added at 23:37 ---------- Previous post was at 23:15 ----------
Really need to get this off my chest, I think I am losing my mind, I am sooo obsessed with my heart, it is unbelievable. I can't stay still anymore as I can feel its every single beat and I can't cope with the feeling. I have always had this obsession, I mean, since the attacks have started when i was 20. Since then I can't even sleep or sit next to my husbands left side as I am scared of feeling his heart. And I can't sleep on my left side anymore as that makes me feel my heart. God.