So I have been to a cardiologist myself who have told me I have benign ectopics originating from two different places in my heart.
Of course I am now getting used to occasional single ones when I am resting, but am still nervous when I get them when I am exercising. Especially yesterday as I could feel them in my pulse, had to stop exercising 15 minutes in, and felt like I was dying for at least 30 minutes afterwards.
Then again I was insanely stressed, had just eaten chocolate before the gym to get some energy, was tired, not breathing calmly (anyone else have trouble regulating their breath when their exercising to the point of out-of-breathness? I asked the fitness instructor how to breathe on my induction and he looked at me like I'm crazy and said 'normally' haha!) and probably going at it a bit too hard out of desperation.
So no wonder right!
If you're anything like me you have read the odd vague snippet online of medical websites saying 'uh oh, palps when exercising aren't good! Get that checked out' or words to that extent, and have constantly (and quite rightly so) panicked!
Definitely get it checked out though (or if you're like my dear mother have palps for 50 years since you were 15, do extreme amounts of exercise, take drugs, never go to a doctor and don't even worry about them even when they cause dizziness, and still be alive at 60!) (No I'm joking, probably best not to do drugs, we're not in the groovy 70s any more!).
Anyway, on to the point of this message. I googled some stuff about exercise about palpitations and found some wonderful comments! Hope they help! (Reference A)
<A short selection on the topic of, to paraphrase, 'Shit Please Tell Me If I'm Going To Die From My Goddamn Heart, And Quickly'>
1. Stav98: No
2. themoabird: My cardiologist spent some time advising the British Olympic team. He told me that many of their ECGs were (and I quote) "an absolute nightmare". He said that a lot them "almost literally" didn't have normal sinus rhythm.
I once placed in the top 10 of a 25km road running race with more than 1000 people in it with my heart doing crazy things. 10 years later, I'm still alive.
My holter test caught 350 PVCs in a 24 hour period. Quite a number of these occurred while I was exercising. My heart is structurally normal; and again, despite this stuff having been going on for nearly 30 years in total, I'm still here.
Benign heart palpitations are benign whether you're exercising or not.
3. Andrea: My primary physician told me, while attempting to calm my little head about these palpitations or PVCs, that they have done extensive testing on Navy SEALS, who are in top physical shape. They would expose them to all kinds of crazy environmental changes like extreme hot, extreme cold, put them under immense stress, etc. Anyway, he told me that these men and women who were in perfect physical shape would begin to have palps and pvcs.
I don't think they're harmful to exercise, I think they can just happen
4. RLR: "Palpitation events of the type you are experiencing during exercise are no different in classification than those being experienced at rest or any other point.
Again, I'm trying with all dispatch to get you and others here to turn away from your beliefs that these events are being produced by some kind of underlying disease. The problem is that the only resources you're retrieving from your internet search has to do with pathological arrhythmias and therefore, you make all attempts to bring equality and similarity between your symptoms and those of pathological variants.
At some point, all of you are going to have to face the truth and the medical facts regarding this specific type of palpitation event. Your failure to do so will forever hold you from moving forward with your lives.
No matter what characteristics arise with these events, no matter how frequent, how intense, whether pounding, fluttering, skipping, perceived absence of a heartbeat, or other manifestation, these palpitations are forever harmless. They cannot cause a heart attack or damage the heart in any way. They cannot cause you to suddenly drop dead of all things because they are in all aspects harmless due to the actual underlying physiology which produces them.
Now if you're unwilling to take the time to sit yourselves down to work toward gaining the proper understanding concerning these palpitations and their true nature, then there is nothing I can do to help you. It is felt by some that it's more safe to believe them to be dangerous and simply use this forum for reassurance from irrational fears. Well I am considered to be advanced in age and growing older as the years pass since this forum was created. I won't be around here forever.
You need to face yourselves, not some voice from a forum, and produce the discipline necessary to gain a firm understanding about these palpitation events. Now I have spoken ad-nauseum in hundreds of threads about the true nature of these events and how they are entirely dissociated from absolutely any form of pathological arrhythmia whatsoever. I have explained in detail what causes your palpitation events to occur and the furthest extent of their inability to harm you in any way. Yet, if you look at the threads, there is most always a brief acknowledgement of my posting that generally states to the effect "Ah, I see now Dr. Rane. Thank you so much for your post and I realize now that these things are harmless and cannot do anything serious to me. I'm much better now and your explanation makes perfect sense. . . .. . I just have this one other question and I swear I'll never ask again. Can these palpitations cause me to suddenly die? I know you talked about the regular kind of palpitations but these ones I'm having now are different. They go thump - bump - bump instead of the other way around. I've been reading that if you get those kind you're going to drop dead and now it has me scared. I don't want to leave my family or children. Please help me."
This example depicts the compelling nature of anxiety and its ability to avoid the truth in favor of irrational fear. The affected individual feels an urgent and driven need to persist in their beliefs because the moment they cease such vigilence will be the very opportunity for tragedy to strike. It's anaolgous to the old entertainers who used to marvel us by balancing spinning plates atop of long sticks. They must continually run back and forth to plates that are beginning to slow down and wobble and keep all them running perfectly in order to prevent them from falling and shattering. That is the life of a person stricken with, and controlled by, anxiety.
All of you need to be aware that anxiety is not a clinical illness or disease, but a state of mind. It is produced by thinking patterns which have been firmly established by repetition in the absence of logic and adherence to reality. It means that you believe in things that are not possible and you guide your lives accordingly because regardless of the facts to the contrary, danger is close and vigilence must be maintained. It is the elective striving to project into the future to prevent any negative course of action by altering circumstances in the present. It is the belief that total preparedness is the only method by which life can proceed safely and orderly in such a fashion that no mistakes are made. This pattern even spills over into forging these patterns into the lives of those around the person with anxiety. It is felt certain that they cannot do it right and something will certainly faulter if the anxiety-stricken individual does not step in and bear the responsibility of preparing life for them or instructing them along the way. There must be order and it must be timely and well in advance and preparation for life's oncoming daily events, covering any base necessary to avoid alteration. It is the fervent attempt to control life itself and defuse any changes from occurring. There is no spontanaiety, but rigid planning to preclude any unforseen and unexpected problem.
Life isn't forged of egg-shells, but rather granite.
There is not a person here who is at risk of harm or death as a consequence of the type of palpitations being experienced. Only you have established this erroneous and compelling belief. Letting go will not cause anything bad to happen. To the contrary
Only you can make the change to reality.
"Mild tachycardia, or faster heart rate, means absolutely nothing more than sympathetic nervous drives being over-stimulated. It's not a sign that the heart is having to work harder at all. Be sure to read my postings referencing the balance and dysregulation of the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous system.
At 20-something, you should absolutely be engaging in any sports activities you choose. Nothing whatsoever is going to happen to your heart as a consequence. When people develop an irrational fear and fixation, the circumstances become self-reinforced by the fact that when natural changes occur, they are misconstrued as signs of something going wrong and immediate withdrawal from the activity is typically observed.
The bottom line is that the kind of palpitation events you and the others here are experiencing are an entirely natural physiological response occurring at an inappropriate time interval. Nothing more.
Best regards and Good Health"
Also this handy response form a different website (Reference B)
"Interestingly, panic and anxiety cause increased production of adrenaline by our bodies, and adrenaline release can cause loss of K (Potassium), so the two problems can be interrelated on more than one level. Still, it makes sense to go to the obvioius first, and in this case the obvious thing is that your K levels have been low on occasions when you've had these unpleasant symptoms, so it would seem reasonable to ask if your cardiologist might prescribe a slow-release potassium supplement for you. Make sure the cardio doctor knows about the ER visit, what led to it, and the low K level it turned up.
In the meantime try adding some potassium-rich foods to your diet (unless you're already doing that). And again, don't try the do-it-yourself approach to potassium replacement, as too much can be more dangerous than too little. "
Also just as an extra titbit, I met up with my friend after having a mini breakdown after leaving the gym early yesterday (ended up crying in a sandwich shop- the highlight of my life!), and he was very reassuring. After telling him about my worries about dying etc, he said to me
"The human body is very strong (this is also what many other people including my mum has said to me- we forget sometimes!), and in [physics] and mathematics the universe is infinite, as well as many of the things within it. It makes sense then, that there is nothing that could not be whithin the universe, and every possibility of events happening, do happen. Whatever you can dream of, it is inside the universe, it has and will happened, and is also happening now. If not, then such things would lie beyond the universe and our concept of infinity and all of science and mathematics would be broken. Harry potter and instant cures for cancer are out there. Everything is indeed possible."
I hope this helped, even a little!
A http://palps.chemicalforums.com/cgi-...num=1290802716
B http://www.doctorslounge.com/cardiol...pic-14835.html
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