Worried about heart when trying to sleep...

[Jmayerfan83]

Hello this is my first time posting a question for maybe alittle help, im 22 years old...and i have congenital heart disease.  When   i was born i had a bypass, and fontan operation done on me.  I've taken medications my whole life which include, digitek, warfarin sodium, and enalapril maleate. Im very worried about when im tryin' to fall asleep, im actually up right now cause of the episodes i was having from sleeping. When i lay down and start falling asleep, the moment im near sleep i wake up in a sort of panic, feeling my heart is going very slow, (yes i do have palpitations, and an irregular heart beat threw out the day) and my legs seem to feel very weak...as well as a bit of vertigo, or dizzyness and just a bit of nausea. When i feel these symptoms, i'll get up from my sleep and walk around, then i end up staying up cause im scared to fall asleep thinking my heart will stop if i do.  If anyone could please give me some insight on this, i would very much appreciate it. thank you so much, peace and love~

[tracon73]

What did the 24 EKG show was the reason for the dropping?  I recently had a sleep study and the lady that preformed the study said my heart rate dropped really low (scary low, lower then any other study she had completed) and she recommended me to get a EKG. Mine too was in the low range for to long she said.  What did your EKG study show?

[anacyde]

Find a new ENT doc.

[sb786]

Hi there! i am 27 years old and have had the same problem you describe since i was about your age. It feels like your heart stops as soon as you are dozing off to sleep and you jolt awake gasping for breath. its weird but i always feel like if i don't wake up my heart will definietely stop and that by jolting awake i start it beating again. but i got a 24 hr ecg, thankfully the same thing happened on the day and guess what my heart didn't stop when i was jolting awake every few seconds!! it does slow down a little. mine went from 55bpm to 51 bpm when i dozed off to sleep!! and stayed like that for about 3-4 hours and then lowered a little more to about 45bpm which is fine. it felt like my heart was stopping because i'm so aware of my heart beat!! i was so convinced that my heart was stopping!!

[CollegeGirl143]

yeah i understand your concern. Surgery for sleep apnea is an extreme measure which might be why the surgeon is refusing. Its generally only done in very dangerous or annoying cases, and since you arent having too much of a health problem with it, it seems that the risks might outweigh the benefits considering you already have a heart related issue.. If you still want the surgery, ide ask my cardiologist to call the doctor you want to perform the surgery so they can sit down and talk.

[Jmayerfan83]

I really appreciate the concern, no i have not brought it up to my cardiologist, i do have an appointment coming next week. About sleep apnea, i have been diagnosed with having that, i went threw sleep studie tests, and said that i would need my adnodes fixed or removed, and tonsils.  I went to a throat nose and ear doctor talking about surgery, sad thing is he refused to do the surgery on me, due to the fact that i am on warfarin sodium. I dont understand why he would just refuse to perform it on me, even my cardio gave me orders for an exact date of when to be off the medicine, and then back on after the surgery on a later date. If this is just my sleep apnea thats doing this, i really dont want to feel like this every night i try to sleep...cause it brings more concerns, considering i do have congenital heart disease.

[CollegeGirl143]

it might be something called sleep apnea, or it might be your heart. The only thing you can do right now is call your doctor and get either a holter monitor or an event monitor, depending on how often you feel these symptoms.

[anacyde]

What has your doctor said about your symptoms?  Have you brought this issue up?

[Angie O Plasty]

Have you actually counted your pulse when this happens?  It would be useful to know what the heart rate is when you're having these symptoms and then compare it to your usual resting rate.

[Jmayerfan83]

I also wanted to include that i feel a shortness of breath as well, and in my mind i think to myself is there just not enough blood flowing threw my body?