arrhythmia and palpitations

[belinny]

I have had heart palpitations since I was a teenager so I have had it for about 20 years.I have had two children and I am now 9 weeks pregnant.  About seven years ago I was having the heart palpitions quite bad after I took a prescription drug to try to lose weight.  I was sent for an ekg and I wore a holter monitor for a couple of days.  Both said that nothing was wrong.  The doctor thinks that my heart is "nervous"  I have had to deal with anxiety spells and depression after the birth of my second child.  I am no longer on any antidepressants and I feel that I am not bad enough to take them any longer. For the past couple of weeks I have noticed an increase in the palpitations and skipping.  It is now every day and it occurs alot during the day.  I was just wondering could it be the pregnancy or is something else going on now.  They have increased more over the years and my grandmother has a pacemaker.  My mother also has the palpitations bad and there has been a lot of heart attacks with death in the family.  I would appreciate any input.  Thank you.

[belinny]

I spent an awful Christmas morning by having to get out of bed a couple of times because the palpitations were so bad and frequent that I couldn't sleep.  This is the worse that they have ever been since I started having them.  I keep telling myself that it is all to do with the pregnancy and maybe the hormones.  I just try to get through the day but sometimes it can be very hard to enjoy anything.  I had tried atenolol years ago but I stayed taking it because it dropped my heart rate too low even with half the dosage I was taking.  Maybe after this pregnancy I will be able to try something else again.  I have a lot of anxiety so I consider myself at times my own worst enemy.  I have actually prayed to God to please look after me and I pray that he does.  Thanks again to everyone for their comments.

[gorsal]

And I thought I was the only one... On Christmas morning instead of playing with my two children ages 4 and 7, I was on the internet trying to find any information I could on these horrible heart palpitations.  I truly believe that I am going to die when these occur.  They only last about 3 seconds, but leave me absolutely exhausted and depressed.  Just this morning I began the 30 day heart monitor, but also called a psychiatrist- has anyone felt that these palps might be due to panic or anxiety?  I am 36 years old and have had a couple of stress tests and a stress echo which all came back normal.

[rdf6218]

You asked if anyone knew of a better beta blocker to use.  Both doctors I visited said Toprol is a safe one to use because you can eventually stop taking it.  I guess with many beta blockers, once you are on it, you're stuck. But, I am only going by what I have heard. Anyway, I would ask your doc about the toprol.  It made me dizzy the first couple of days, but that is because my blood pressure is pretty low to begin with and it needed time to adjust.  Good luck.

[BHoss]

Wow, all I can say is thank god I'm not the only one going through all this thinking I'm going to die any minute. I've spent a few thousand dollars at my doctors office just to have my doctor tell me that I will be ok and that nothing that's happening to me is life threatning.
My problems heve been going on for about 6 months and now I see people have been living with this problem for multiple years. I guess the biggest thing it does to me is cause lots of stress, just wondering if your going to fall down dead. Other than that I can deal with the weird feelings pretty well. May GOD be with us all.

[Veritas01]

Congratulations on the pregnancy.  I am a 56 year old male.  I have had AFIB and espisodes of PVCs for the past 25 years.  Most days I am fine with an occasional PVC or two.  However, I often go into a cyle of several days or weeks of very high PVC activity.  Sometimes I can trace the onset to my stupidity, caffeine, cold medicine, alcohol.  Over the years I have learned to eliminate virtually every trigger from my daily routine but even then I still have real bad dads.  I have taken fish oil, magnesium, copper, vitamin b1, taurine and goldenseal.  Of course when I am symptom free I think...what a smart guy I am ...I feel great it is all thoese supplements.  But then inevitably I get a series of attacks.  Sometimes I wind up in the ER.  Sometimes I tough it out.   Very depressing worrisome time when they are bad.   I have taken a series of medicines over the years.  Corgard. Quinnidine. Sotalol and now Flecainide and Atenolol combination.  My control has been best on the Flecainide/Atenolol but I still have streaks of bad days and that is discouraging.  I have been told because my problems are mostly PVC related I am not a good ablation candidate.  The occasional AFIB I can live with.  It is the bigeminy, trigeminy, etc. rythym of PVCs that leaves me weak, out of breath and basically a drooling idiot.  If I could give you all a Christmas gift it would be a lifetime without these problems.  You gift to me is posting your experiences and I cannot tell you how assuring it is to hear about people who suffer the same way I do and are going about life despite it.  Thanks and Merry Christmas.

[alistinker]

Hi

Yep count me in!  I am so sorry you are feeling this. I have been having these pvc's/pac's since I was 21 (now 34!) but they have not been all the time. I have a years when I don't get bothered by them and then I get them back after having my children.  I have 3 children and my hormones definately cause my PVC's to get bad.  I find that they bother me most when I am trying to fall asleep but once I am asleep I am ok.  My youngest is 10 months old and the pvc's came back  when I was 6 weeks Post Partum (right around the time when my period came back!)  I too am scared as my dad has had triple heart bypass surgery and now has a defrib/pace maker fitted but his heart disease was cause by excessive smoking since the age of 15 but still i get worried.  Have just been given an event monitor for 30 days and have managed to catch a couple of these beats but still my dr says i am fine.  I take 12.5mg of atenelol...twice a day...sometimes it helps sometimes it doesn't.  Does anyone know if there is a better choice of beta blocker for the treatment of PVC's/pac's?

Thanks to everyone who takes the time to post on here.  I sometimes feel like I am addicted to the site as it gives me so much assurance.

happy holidays everyone

Sharonx