[jmmatthews]

Hi Everyone,

My names John. I'm new to the site so I just wanted to tell you my story.So sit,back relax,grab a snack, and if your heart starts acting up while reading this...Yell at it "Stop it!!!" lol.

My Story: Well. first things first, I'm a 30 year old male from Texas and I've been dealing with "skipped beats" for a little over a year now. I grew up in a small north Texas town and the youngest of 3 boys. I was never taught about nutrition or the importance of exercise and spoiled by a mother who let me partake in any kind of food I wanted no matter how unhealthy. I was always known as the fat kid in school and to not show how much the teasing got to me, made fun of myself for being fat and was the class clown (if you make em' laugh before they can point out something to laugh at you about you were better off...right?) Anyways, by the age of 21 I had ballooned to the weight of 260 lbs... not to mentioned I smoked 2 packs a day and by this time in my life having horrible anxiety and panic attacks and was battling depression and severe hypochondria. Well, I decided at the age of 23 I need to do something about my weight after going to the doctor after having a massive panic attack and him finding that my blood pressure was 200/111 which scared the hell out of me.

I packed my stuff and headed for Austin. Living there helped me get in a healthy frame of mind.I quit smoking, I started running,lifting weights, and eating extremely healthy and by 25 I had lost 90 lbs. and was in the best shape of my life. I was working out hardcore 7 days a week and soon got to where I could run miles which I never in my wildest dreams imagined. By 27 I was running races and marathons and was a strict vegetarian only eating whole natural foods...no sugar,sodas,junk food...ect. To make a long story short, last October 2010, after work one night I started feeling what was like my heart stopping and starting again.It did it for about an hour or so maybe once or twice every couple of minutes and it wasn't like a hard pounding so I just blew it off as me being tired or dehydrated (at this point I was going out with my friend and drinking a lot...maybe once or twice a week) I started noticing that My heart was acting up after workouts especially after long 6-8 mile runs but then again didn't I never worried about it because in a couple of hours when I would settle down it would stop. I found out after asking questions my dad told me that they were probably PVC's and that he had been having them for almost 40 years and that my grandfather had them and so does my brother. Anyways...everything was fine up until October of 2011. The night before the horrid incident I had went out and had 4-5 beers with my friend and then went home and got in the shower and went to sleep. The next day I got up and went to work and by about 3 o'clock my heart started in with the skipping which I wasn't even worried about so I got of work, went home and took a shower and still...the skipping proceeded.I drove over to my girlfriends house and we went out for pizza cause that's what she wanted and the whole time we were sitting there..thump,thump,thump,pause.....,thump! about 3-4 times a minute...well, by this time I started getting a little annoyed but still blew it off. We went home and started watching a movie laying in bed and all the while my freaking heart kept skipping which by this point was doing it A LOT! I stared thinking to myself...what if I'm having a heart attack? and went into complete full blown panic attack mode...(which I haven't had in almost 6 years.) and FREAKED OUT! after I calmed down a bit they stopped and I went on to sleep. But ever since that day I've been obsessing over my heart. I quit working out, quit drinking coffee which I love so so so much, and have had such anxiety over I walked out on my job one day because the skips started and I had a panic attack and had to get out of there. This went on for almost 3 months with me being scared.
They usually come on after a big meal or when I'm slouching/bending over or to the left. I've also noticed that when I tilt my head down it causes a couple of skipped beats and also when I lay on my stomach but most of the time while sitting in a chair kinda slumped over.

Here it is January 20,2011 and my mind is totally at ease. about 2 weeks ago I had a bad 3 day run with skipped beats all day. I couldn't sleep,eat,or anything I was a big huge ball of nervousness but I came to the realization that all the worrying,panic,and stressing myself out about these things isn't gonna make them go away or make it any better on me mentally.."I'm letting this ruin my life!" I said to myself and I decided to take back control. I took some valerian root and made myself go to sleep that night. I woke up feeling 1000% times better. I got up and took a walk around the neighborhood and let the sun shine down on me and thought to myself..."I'm in control". Since then I've had skipped beats yeah,but it nowhere near as much as it was...i'm going to say 40% of what I was experiencing before... I'm no longer going to worry about them...if it was going to kill me, it would have done it a year ago..it would have killed my dad 40 years ago...not to mention my grandfather lived till he was 88 with the darn things. The worst thing about having about having palps is the fear we get when experiencing them...I haven't been to the doctor for them and probably won't because from what I've read and been told, when you go to the doctor 99.9% of the time they do NOTHING about them and say they don't know whats causing them or how to cure it and I sure as hell aren't getting on some dangerous heart med that might really mess my heart up. This is just something my heart does now and I'm probably going to deal with it for the rest of my life so there is no use in letting these things run/ruin my life...I'M NOT GOING TO LET THAT HAPPEN!!!

[Katie]

Ur amazing! Good job! We are all trying to not let them bother us- but- you should still get them checked out by the dr.

[ctcsmith]

love ur attitude

[CMoore416]

Thanks for sharing your story and welcome! I wish I could be as calm. Mine started up a couple years ago but only like one or 2 a month. Then July of 2011 they started up for hours and have been like that since. I had had a li g period of stress in my life and of course this made my stress levels worse. I was always active and now I do nothing. I became depressed but am getting better. I also am scare all the time and it back on my work hours and avoid anything fun I used to do. I would love to not have these a live my life again buy I guess I have to work on acceptance. All tests have been good but still so hard to accept. Thanks again for your story!

[DaniRae]

Great post and good for you! I am at that point too where I will NOT let them control me. I just won't. I refuse to let them take away time from my life anymore. Sure I will still come and post and sometimes I get freaked but for the most part, they are what they are. Nothing I can do to change them, there is NO cure... so take it for what it is and enjoy life!

[shellylabelle]

You have a great attitude!

[Chaoticdopey]

im getting really close to that attitude. after having these for 8 months now

[CMoore416]

Wish I could say the same.... Lol I'm better but. Not much

[jmmatthews]

I have them pretty much every day...like just a little while ago when I was eating dinner, I had like 10 of them in 30 minutes and probably close to about 50 er so all day and pretty sure more are on the way...HA!...THERE'S ONE NOW! HAHAHA! I've pin pointed the time a couple of months ago when they started and tried to think of what (if anything) I did to cause this...they came on after I started having lower back pain due to lifting too much so I really feel as though if I went to the chiropractor and have him straighten me out it'll stop . Yeah, I wish it would just go away but it's not so I'll do my best to ignore it cause I've watched my dad over the past 30 years of my life get worked up about his PVC's and rush to the hospital and lay around checking his pulse and I don't wanna be miserable like that so when they are acting up I just ignore them and keep going about what I'm doing...like typing this right now lol!! Anyways...I'm gonna be fine and so are you SO QUIT WORRYING!!! hahaha! enjoy life!

[Cheers]

Great story - thank you for sharing. I hope to get to that point VERY soon!!