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Palpitations and anxiety
Hello! First time poster here looking for some advice outside of my family. I'm a 22yo male 5'8 288lbs (I know I'm overweight, I've lost 40 pounds so far though!). Recently I started having a weird sensation on a daily basis. I'll start out with my ER trip a few weeks ago. I started feeling light headed and had trouble breathing. The doctors in the ER ran a few tests.. from what I can remember I got a BNP test which came back <5.0, a D-DIMER, a chest x-ray and some regular blood work They said that everything was fine and that I had an anxiety attack and started hyperventilating. Two years ago I also had an EKG that came back 100% normal. They gave me a one time prescription of lorezepam (1mg dose) for anxiety. I'm not worried about what I went into the ER for, I'm now worried about a different sensation I'm feeling at least once a day since I came back from the ER that I didn't go into the ER for. I'll get a fluttery feeling in my chest, around the upper left side, and then immediately get light headed for a few moments and from what I can find online it sounds like a palpitation. I will admit I get EXTREMELY anxious when this happens. On top of that I've had a dull ache in my left shoulder/left side of neck/very upper left side of chest. This is just a dull ache that I can easily go about my day without noticing at all.. and I've actually had this for months which just adds more anxiety. The last couple times this happened I tried taking one the lorazepams the ER gave me, and then I feel 100% better like nothing is wrong. My main concern is when these sensations happen I feel as if they happen, then I get anxious.. not that my anxiety is the one causing the sensations. Does this sound like an actual heart problem or is it just anxiety getting the better of me?
I would GREATLY appeciate any insight or experience any of you have on my problem.
I would GREATLY appeciate any insight or experience any of you have on my problem.
Best Answer
Anxiety can't mess with our head. I remember going to the e.r for many reasons. Chest pain. Head pains. That was to years ago
Omg I was back and fourth on the e.r. I was sick from the head. Came to realize it was all anxiety. Thanks to therapy I got back to my feets. Yessss. And look at me no health issues and I'm still alive. I would think I will die from a heart attack. But 2 years after I'm healthy like a bug. Flying around everywhere. Lol We all experience that. God bless. And get all the help u need. U will be fine. Don't let anxiety play with you. Be smarter than that. God luck.
Omg I was back and fourth on the e.r. I was sick from the head. Came to realize it was all anxiety. Thanks to therapy I got back to my feets. Yessss. And look at me no health issues and I'm still alive. I would think I will die from a heart attack. But 2 years after I'm healthy like a bug. Flying around everywhere. Lol We all experience that. God bless. And get all the help u need. U will be fine. Don't let anxiety play with you. Be smarter than that. God luck.
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Of those who found peace afterwards, there is a common thread - they accepted the doc's diagnosis and stopped self-diagnosing themselves looking for clues etc. That is not easy for all to do, however and some can't stop worrying even after doc says there is nothing wrong, because the anxiety sensations of heart issues seem so real and in fact you do sweat more when anxious for example.
You have 3 current issues:
Palpitations.
I can't diagnose you but if doc says you heart is healthy all I can say is the palps likely don't exist but because you are so anxious you are over-analyzing your body looking for clues.
Dizziness
Again, I can't diagnose you but likely the dizziness is just in your head because you are over-analyzing your body. Many times when I am at the computer writing to someone who says they get a dizzy feeling, I wonder what to say and get a dizzy second thinking about what that person is feeling - in reality I didn't get dizzy, but because I concentrated too hard on the idea of what it felt to be dizzy I sort of fool myself into thinking I might be dizzy - although because I know I didn't just happen to get dizzy at the second I was thinking about it, I can reason that it was just in my head so I stop the feeling quickly. Because you don't know the dizziness is just anxiety playing a trick on you, you can't stop thinking you are getting dizzy.
Dull ache
As I think about what to say, I just felt a dull ache in my shoulder. (In fact there are a few other bones that are aching slightly if I want ot concentrate on what is ouching, itching or twitching in my body. and I just got a tiny ouch in the muscles below my rib cage - very, very tiny so nothing but to the anxious person they are potential clues to study which inevitably leads to noticing them more and more.) Likely it was there for a while and maybe comes and goes, but because I am not worried about my body, I didn't notice it before. Likely you always experienced it before, but just ignored it because you knew it was meaningless.