Heart is skipping/missing beats?

[AnxiousNiki]

Hi everyone,

I am a 28 year old girl, slightly overweight. I don't know why my heart has started missing beats?! It has just started a week ago. First and second day there were like 2 missed beats in a whole day after that it went crazy. The third day it started to happen every minute. That day I panicked at went to the ER. They did my ECG, blood tests and urine test...all normal. The thing I felt was that the ECG lasted just few seconds and at that time there was no skipped heartbeat. The doctors said no need to worry, everything is fine. They said they might be just ectopic beats that are quite common. I thought that they didn't even see the nature of the skipped beats, how could they just say that? Anyways I came back home at 5 in the morning. The missed beats do not occur when I'm sleeping. The heart seems to be calm when I just wake up, but again it starts with one and two and so on.
Then again one day after I came from the ER my heart started to miss a lot of beats, I called the paramedics. They hooked me up with the ECG monitor and at that time my heart skipped a beat once. They gave me the printout of it. The paramedics also told that it's very common and it's benign but advised me to get it checked with a GP. Now the thing is that it is a long weekend here and there are no doctors available at the moment. I have a long distance flight coming up next week and don't even know if it is okay to fly with missing heartbeats :( . If I reach my destination there, I have got many doctors who can check me but at the moment I'm very worried and anxious all the time. I'm not able to eat, sleep or do anything properly. These missing heartbeats are driving me crazy. It's like I feel it's missing, it takes my breath away for that moment and then I feel the heart going thud....this keeps on continuing. It seems to increase when I move around or talk or bend or walk fast. I seriously don't know what it is! Help! Need some reassurance plz.

[Mom2four85]

If it helps any, your heart is pretty resilient and can take a beating so to speak.  

For a few years I had 54,000 extra beats and skips and my heart even stops then I'm out taking a dirt nap (fainting, syncope etc).  I've had everything from Pvc's, PSVT to Vt and VTach/VFib since I was 9.

I know it's scary but if you've been checked out, it's probably just your heart readjusting to the needs of pumping and environmental things.

Keep a journal of symptoms and get a copy of all of your dr's visits and test results.  This way you will be able to see exactly what is going on and what the tests say.  I know for me, it really helped me when I talked to dr's when I showed them my journal.

Be informed and try to find a way to cope with the symptoms when they happen.  Breathing and exercise helps a lot if you've been cleared by your dr.

Years after an ablation, I still have a ton of pvc's and other things going on even after but they found I have a genetic heart problem and had to have a defibrillator implanted.

[AnxiousNiki]

Hi Mom2four85, sorry to hear about your health. I hope you're doing well now. Yeah, the heart missing or skipping its beats is scary. Sometimes I fear that what if it just stops. How do you know or what do you feel when it happens to you? Do you feel something or just faint?
Anyways, thanks for your assurance.

[Mom2four85]

Usually when my heart is going out of sync, I faint and have no idea anything even happened.  I don't get warning signs or extra hard heart beats or a feeling of I'm going to die that I've ever been able to pinpoint.

Take case in point, I had a tilt table test.  Doing great until the last 3 min and I fainted; I had no clue and no heart beat.  Has I not been hooked up to machines I would have no clue this ever happened.  Fatigue and chest pains for a few min after, but then it all goes back to normal.

I've had an arrhythmia and fainting for 40 years,  everything from PAC's PSVT to PVC's and VT/VFib episodes, it's just something you learn to live with and forget about.

Sometimes yes, I do get sick but it's normally with the annoying pre-syncope issues.  Now that is when I feel really sick, more severe symptoms that last for days and takes me a bit to recover.

Both of my daughters (14 & 30) have had an arrhythmia and fainting episodes but both have checked out fine and don't have what I do (HOCM).

Honestly, there is no way to reassure anyone completely, but if you've had a complete workup and know what's going on you have to find a way to cope with them as they happen and move on.

[AnxiousNiki]

Thanks a lot.

[achillea]

It sounds as though you are experiencing garden-variety Premature Ventricular Contractions or PVCs.  In general these are benign, and though it's hard to believe, *everybody* has them.  The trick is that not everyone is sensitive enough to feel them.

Here's an explanation:

http://www.webmd.com/heart-disease/tc/premature-ventricular-contractions-pvcs-topic-overview

I know you are freaked out by this, but you are a young woman (though no longer a 'girl') and so at very little risk for anything heart-related.  In addition, your ticker has been medically checked out several times.  This is no joke:  In general, medical tests actually do catch the biggies, and all things considered, the chances are that your heart is OK.

Consider this--and it's important:  Real heart problems impair your life in a big way.  If you have them, certain symptoms will show up when you do normal daily activities.  So, if you can walk a block, go upstairs, carry groceries, and do it all *without* nausea, actual fainting, crushing pain in the center of your chest (as if an elephant were parked there), and a strange, drenching, absolutely cold sweat, the kind of thing that soaks your clothes instantly, your heart is almost certainly OK.  

When we first experience benign PVCs, the big problem is the fright that the sensation causes, and a good shrink or counselor can help with that.  Ask me how I know.

[AnxiousNiki]

Hi Achillea! Haha.. ya I'm a 28 year old woman. I was very nervous and frustrated because of these skipped beats even while writing the question, that's why I would have written that by mistake. Thanks a lot for your reply.

[achillea]

Really, ask for a referral to a counselor who specializes in this kind of fear.  You do not have to live with this.

[AnxiousNiki]

Constant worries and fear...I know this is very exhausting for the mind as well as the body. Sure, I will look up for a counsellor but I'm traveling from today for next one month. Hope everything will be fine. Thanks.