HI
I haven't posted for quite a while  and maybe that is the measure of my situation really - I totally sympathise with how you feel but it seems these palpitations do  have a way of taking over our lives.
I have had them for a long time many many years in fact, had all the tests and often re assured by the outcome of the tests and through the years have had massive gaps where I didn't get them.
They kicked in again quite badly about seven years ago and put it down to the menopause and really since then I have tended to get by with re assurance from RLR and this site - I read so many posts where I think that is me that is how I feel but  dont' tend to come onto the site so much but when I read your posting  my heart went out to you because your right - you can be enjoying life to the full and then these HORRIBLE  palpitations come along and what is more annoying they come in different shapes and forms - I can get the eptopics the fast heart beat, the skipped heart beats in so many different places - I can go through a couple of weeks of nearly nothing and start thinking good thoughts, feel happy and think wow I am having a good few weeks here and then wham they are back again and I go right down - I am going through a bad time at the moment and my biggest fear is being on my own with them and something horrible happening to me - I know it won't but Im afraid when these things get a hold of you  they do bring you down and we are scared so the highs are extremely high and the lows are very low and you think how can I go on like this.  I really do think they affect everybody at some point in their life and some can just   forget they even happened  but others like everyone who visits this site  they become a major part of  life -  because I have had them for such a long time and nothing has happened to me then that is re assurance in itself but I wish and wish that I didn't get them - I know I am too aware of what my body is doing, always have been and that doesn't help - I know I have problems with my digestion and that doesn't help. In  a way I feel vulnerable because of the palpitations they are cunning because they weaken our physical and mental  resolve to tackle them.
You will get over todays feelings - just remember here I am safe and well after many years of them and here we all are on the site  to support you as well.
Take care.

Thanks for replying.
Seffie - I know I said they havent worked for me but they do work for some, so they are worth a try as they are very safe. They have been used for years so it's not as if it's an untested medicine. And if they don't work you can stop them very easily.
Bead

What do you think your heart rate should be after going downstairs and back up again? If you are presently in a sedentary lifestyle and don't perform aerobic exercise on a very regular basis, then the body will respond as it needs to in order to compensate for exertion of any kind. A rate of 110 for such circumstances is not even remarkable in my opinion. People who exercise regularly achieve roughly 80% of maximun that is roughly 160 to 185bpm, a value that decreases over time due to conditioning.

As for the benign palpitations, the frequency does not alter their designation. They continue to be harmless other than the emotional trauma they can certainly exert. You should not look upon the circumstances with despondency, however, because the situation is certainly managable through medication or other intervention. I have also encountered a number of patients who have experimented with various fish oil capsules, vitamins, minerals, supplements, etc. in the attempt to reduce the presence of the palpitations. Again, my comment with regard to these products is that they can create tremendous GI disturbances, which in turn will increase rather than decrease the problem at hand. Not that you're using these products, just a reminder.

Persons with anxiety continue to feel overpowered by the sense that something physical is wrong with heir heart, despite all tests to the contrary. If you had an "electrical circuit" problem, this would have been evident in the diagnostic tests. We don't need to see the occurrence of an abhernt ryhthm or even have you experience a change in heart rhythm for us to see the underlying cause. This single point frustrates patients more than any single aspect of their situation. They become convinced that we must see the evidence to know of its origin. Problems associated with cardiopathology are not of any nature whatsoever that we need to see the problem in motion to know it's there. There are underlying signs that appear on testing that tell us a problem exists, even in cases where patients have experienced no prior symptoms at all.  

My suggestion here is to seek professional services that can help you with your emotional response to the palpitations and ways to help you better cope until it passes. This is, by the way, not a permanent condition and most often self-resolves.

You're going to be fine.

Best regards and Good Health

HI there
Thanks for all your help.
I am now taking an SSRI and seeing a CBT counsellor (very expensive but hopefully worth it, there's no suggestion of getting it on the NHS where I live). I have only seen her twice so far so it is early days. The SSRI is not helping at all so far - in fact I feel depressed as well now whereas before it was just really bad anxiety. But maybe I am depressed because I expected medication might help.

I am having to write down my thoughts and feelings at time when I feel anxious and panicky and surprise surprise it is always to do with my heart or feeling dizzy. But the physical feelings come before the thoughts - I am analysing it and it is always the physical feelings that come first. Is it possible if you are stressed for your body to produce symptoms before your mind clicks in to whatever is making you anxious. And then you notice sensations and then that goes on to produce a vicious circle?

The thing I can't get out of my head though is that the doctors have said I will have to live with the heart problems. But our friend RLR gives me hope that  these problems can go away. I don't know who t believe.  I want them to go away, I don't want to live with the problem of feeling ill every day. And I can't understand how I have woken up one day with two different types of heart ryhthm problem. Ectopics AND problems with racing heart that comes on out of the blue (sometimes I am just sitting there and I get a run of 5-10 beats that are so fast in succession I can't help but jump when I feel it). Other times minimal exertion brings on tachycardia of 200bpm that lasts up to half an hour. But apparently I did very well in the treadmill test without any weird palpitations being brought on - just ordinary high heart rate that didn't feel at all weird of my ideal max heart rate of 175 or so which I was able to sustain really easily, so I don't believe I am really unfit or too sedentary (I am on the go all day with kids and housework).

NONE OF THIS MAKES ANY SENSE TO ME! (sorry for the caps but I am feeling so frustrated and depressed with it all.) Sorry for all this waffle - I just am struggling getting my head round all of this and I have this horrible feeling that my life is being wasted and I need to get on with enjoying it. I have always felt how precious our lives are and how we need to enjoy every minute but I am so frustrated that I can't get back to my normal life that is undisturbed by feelings of ill health.

Hi Beadbabe,
just wanted to say that I feel exactly the same as you, when I used to go & see a CBT counsellor I used to say to her that if I didn't have the palpitations I wouldn't be anxious. Last week when my ectopic beats were every minute all day my anxiety was through the roof, they have eased up a little but are still there & now seem to have changed. They have eased up a little but now I have started to get weird beats & today I went to pick up my son from school & my heart went in to a chaotic rhythm for about 10-12 seconds, I coughed but it didn't make any difference then coughed again & it raced for abit & then went back to normal. I was really freaked by this & got home as quickly as I could. Then I sat down & thought about this & remembered that I have had this before many times but just not this year.
I used to discuss it with my CBT counsellor & she said that I should just relax when it happens because my heart will revert to normal rhythm whether I do anything or not.

Sorry, I've gone off the point abit, but what I'm trying to say to you is that even though you may feel that the palpitations cause the anxiety it may be that something else such as stress, bereavement etc caused the original anxiety which then manifested itself in other anxiety symptoms such as palpitations which then kept the anxiety going!

I am having very similar symptoms & frequency to you so please know that I understand & empathise completely. I too feel very frustrated & down about them & how they affect my quality of life.
I am waiting for another 24 hour monitor & there are things I want to get clear once & for all & then I will just have to learn to live with these things & learn how to manage anxiety so that I can enjoy life.

I agree that unless you have suffered from these it is very hard to understand just how distressing they can be. I know some people think that I should 'just pull myself together' but if it was that easy then I would have done it. However, I am doing as much as I can to manage my anxiety & I feel that I am on the right track. I can now cope quite well with other anxiety symptoms but my palpitations are still the hardest to deal with.
Hang in there Beadbabe, we are here for you!
Seffie xx