WPW sufferers: What were your symptoms?

[snyderm]

I was hoping to get a general log of what people who have Wolfe Parkinsons White's syndrom experienced.

I have it, and I have a general anxiety all the time about my heart.  I have developed palpatations in the last couple of months.  For the first few days, I had a PVC about every 1-5 minutes.  After that period, I now have a palpatation on the average of maybe a couple an hour to a one every couple of hours.  I typically have more when I have anxiety, or trying to calm down after excercise (which might also be anxiety, but I don't know).

I have a high heart rate during moderate cardio excercise, about 170.  My heart often stays around 120 bpm after excercise, anywhere from 20 minutes to 5 hours, depending on the duration of excercise and exertion.

I feel especially wierd in the mornings.  I think the morning adrenaline really affects me.  I can have a 140 heart rate with light excercise after getting up, showering, walking up and down a few stairs.  It goes down into the 90s when I start my drive to work, but it is still scary.

What were your symptoms?

[snyderm]

Thank you for this message.  I am wearing a holter monitor today, and I have PVCs spitting out like crazy.  I must have a total of 50 or more in about 18 hours.  My anxiety is probably making it worse, too.

This heart monitor will show that my heart goes too fast with light excercise, although it wont show my heart rate after my morning shower (obviously I can't shower with the monitor) which would probably show it very fast.

My normal pulse rate sitting down relaxing is often in the 80's, but sitting down at night it can go down to 70 or 66.  It seems like it just has to be in the right mood.

I am hoping that I just show WPW, as from what I have read an ablation procedure can cure it.  If they find AFIB in my fast excercise heart rate, things will obviously be worse.

I normally like to play computer games, and relax with my best friend, but now with all of this anxiety I find the only place I feel like myself is sitting in bed in front of my TV, which is the one place I am confident I can get my heart to go at a normal pulse (eventually).  The waiting for a quality doctor to exam my test results is seeming to be a long one.

[jj1017]

i was diagnosed with WPW in Dec of 2008. I had a successful ablation in Jan of this year where they were able to ablate 2 "holes" in the left side of my heart between the atria and the ventricle. Prior to the ablation, I would get recurrent episodes of a fast heart rate that would pop up out of nowhere..ususally while sitting, or while sleeping. I was told in 2001 that I had SVT after an ER visit for these symptoms. I was put on several meds..Verapamil, propranolol, diltiazem, atenolol...none really worked and I kept having "breakthrough" episodes. A few years later I went to a different cardiologist to try and get this under control, and was told I have anxiety, and was reffered back to my primary physician and was given zoloft. I took the zoloft for years, and continued to have several episodes and they were increasing in intensity to the point I was passing out. After another referral to a different specialist thru my PCP to an elecrophysiologist, I was given a stress test, which I flunked. I threw miltiple multifocal PVC couplets and some in Bigeminy and my heart rate never went below 100 during the recovery period of the test. I was then sched for an Angio 2 days later, as the EP doc was concerned that I may have TGA based apon my stress test results. All came back normal after the angio. I was then given an event monitor that ended up catching several episodes of Afib as well as VT.
Im so glad I had the ablation..my life has changed drastically since then (For the better!!) I still have the VT (RVOT-VT, would have had that corrected too, but was already in the lab for 7 hours so my EP opted to wait) so I am still on Metoprolol 50mg, but am considering a second ablation for it.
With that being said, my heart rate RARELY went below 100 before the ablation..even at rest. So that has to be my biggest complaint with having WPW.
Sorry for the long winded post!!