Hi all,

I came across this site today and am hoping to get a little help understanding what the heck is going on with me. I am a 37 male who is overweight but generally healthy. Healthy with the exception of heart palpitations. They started about 6 years ago with a racing heart rate and and sudden "hiccups" in my heart. I could feel these "hiccups" in my throat. I had all the tests done and they all came back as healthy. The heart doc said I sinus tachycardia. The racing heartrate eventually went away; happens rarely now. What has stayed are the palpitations and the sensation that one could happen at any time. I cant live with them anymore. I have 4 children with the youngest being 3 and I cant stand being alone with him as I am afraid that I will drop dead. I coach sports and have all but giving that up as I had experienced some racing heartrate and palpitations while coaching. I am finding that I am steering away from activities in my job as I am afraid that I will get one of these sensations. Lately when I get them I feel myself get light headed, flushed in the face and the feeling that I need to flee whatever situation I am in. My doc says I have anxiety and possibly some PTSD as I lived in a pretty bad situation growing up. I want to believe that it is my anxiety. I want to but am so afraid that something is going to happen to me. I cant even get on the treadmill unless my wife is home as I am afraid that I will die. Can anxiety really cause these symptoms? Can losing weight help with these symptoms (Dumb question I know). I just need something, someone to give me the green light to live. I am afraid that I am going to miss out on the rest of my life. Lately it is tough. Please help!

When you read around in this forum you'll see that symptoms like the ones you described, are common, and if no medical disease is found by doctors, ecg, holter and so on, they can very well indeed be caused by anxiety. This and/or events in your digestive system can via the vagus nerve influence upon your heart and trigger palpitations.
Think of it as nerve impulses from outside and not originating from within your heart. That way of thinking has helped me a lot. I still get them, but they very seldom influence my way of living. (Except when they now and then disturb my sleep badly, that frustrates me and lower my mood ...)
Best of luck.

The pattern being described is quite common in the evolution of panic threshold events, or panic attacks. The reason that they often subside is the subsequent experience that nothing dreadful or climactic actually occurs. In other words, once you've experienced the self-limiting features of the events, they no longer possess the same level of import and thus, begin to wane in their ability to incapacitate.

While PTSD can in some instances be responsible, I will quickly tell you here that the misapplication of this clinical disorder to broadening circumstances has produced far-reaching implications which are overdrawn to the greatest extent. PTSD actually constitutes a very discrete disorder and in its true form, produces psychopathology in a very specific manner. Much like the phenomenon and fad of OCD variations, ie relationship OCD, work OCD etc, none of these variations on the true form of the disorder actually exist. OCD, like PTSD, is a very discrete clinical disorder and its features are limited to patients who demonstrate them. I simply tell you this to be mindful that labels can produce the underlying clinical criterion based entirely upon perceptual compliance. Simply put, your past is defined in such a manner that it qualifies the diagnosis.

Understand that anxiety has the ability to produce both physical and physiological disturbances because it influences the central nervous system, which is the communication superhighway throughout the entire body. Any departure from normal results in variations of change which are universally misinterpreted as constitutional symptoms of disease. It is both innate and through social training that humans forge the direct relationship between physical symptoms and physical disease, when in fact no such direct relationship is universal at all. It is entirely common for physical and physiological manifestations to arise in the entire absence of an underlying organic cause.

The fear that you might die actually produces a very specific response set by the brain which is genetically hardwired. The brain is designed to provide the body with the absolute best opportunity for survival and this instinct is quite dominant in instances where there is fear which would compromise such safety. It is the instinctual response by the brain in such instances which seemingly compels patients to return time and again to their doctor in search of the underlying disease or disorder which is placing their life in jeopardy in order to define and overcome it such that safety once again becomes the normal status.

It's quite easy to see how a cyclic response set can arise in such instances which in many instances can come to rule the lifestyle of persons afflicted to the extent that they seek safety in all that they do and avoid any type of circumstance that would either increase the potential for the symptoms to arise or otherwise place them too far from safety in the event crisis occurs. It's very critical to understand that this entire premise is not based in reality, but rather merely perception based upon the interpretation of the present "symptoms."

You're going to be fine and your life is not in danger in any manner whatsoever.

Best regards,

Rutheford Rane, MD (ret.)

I would bet that yes...you are simply headed down that all too familiar road and letting anxiety and panic lead the way. Most of us here do the same, a lot. You're going to be fine, but don't let yourself fall into this behavioral problem. Spend some time reading posts here, and replies from RLR. Allow yourself to see the light at the end of the tunnel and that there is an escape from this path/pattern. It has taken many of us a lifetime to get into the shape we are in (the BAD shape)...i expect it to take a little time to re-wire my thinking. Have a verry Merry and Peaceful Christmas!