popping sensation in chest plse help

[ella32]

I am terrified at this moment in time.i was sitting watching telly with my son and felt a popping sensation in my chest and true to anxiety I honestly thought it was coming from heart so ended up having panic attack
does anyone ever have popping sensation in chest or around that area plse. Don't want to have another track. Plus I have palpitations every day but in August I had stress test and echo done and everything came back fine. Plse help.xxx

[mummyanxious]

Popping like gas bubbles? I get that a lot.
Sometimes when I've been tense and stretch my actual ribs pop as well but that's a different noise.

[Chris_39]

I also experience this "popping" sensation. Usually, it seems to accompany a lessening of anxiety (which I sometimes experience due to guilt). I take it as a good sign, but I have also wondered whether there are any medical consequences, physically.

Once, I brought this up with a (very good) therapist/counselor I was seeing. He seemed to me to genuinely not know what I was referring to, and I think may have wanted to redirect my attention/concern from this, as it may have seemed to him to only be an anxious concern.

The first time I can remember having this "popping" experience was when I started taking Zoloft (eventually, up to 200 mg: we might have gone higher, but I wasn't able to continue taking the medication when funds for seeing the prescriber and buying the medicine dried up). Zoloft was very, very helpful to me.

Anyhow, it seemed to me that as I began healing and feeling better, there were "pops" and "popping" to/in my chest (almost as if around the heart cavity). I took it as a good thing: that I had been oppressing myself with self destructive coping behaviors for so long, that these (unknowingly at the time, and perhaps, over time) "tightened" the muscles somehow around my chest/heart.

I don't want to disclose too much, but I will say that since then, I have found that when I cope, unhealthfully, with my anxiety, I can now tell a tightening/constricting feeling around my chest/heart. I have gone on and off Zoloft a few times now (I wish I could stay on, and maybe the new job I have now will allow me to, with good medical insurance), but I have found this popping/releasing effect, repeatable.

Since, in my case, my symptoms also seem to be related not just to the negative/unhealthy ways of coping, but also the guilt I have felt. I am Eastern Orthodox, and I have found that the sacrament of Confession helps and can bring about this loosening and popping sensation (which I welcome).

Here, I want to be clear that these are my experiences, and I'm not "speaking them" onto you. I thought that sharing my experience though here would help. I remember once before going on line and not finding anything: not even really good anecdotal information. I think I might have found one, but it wasn't very helpful.

I hope you'll feel better and well soon, and, pardon the pun: don't let your heart be troubled.