Inwas recently diagnosed with Vestibular Migraines by both an ENT and an Otolarongolygist. Most of my symptoms seem to fit, but one that nobody can give me a straight answer on if it fist or not is that occasionally my heart will race for seemingly no real reason. I’ve had a full cardio work up, including holster monitor and echo, with a cardiology consult to rule out a heart problem, but sometimes it gets really bad an manifests with chest pain. The cardiologist said he thought it was nerve pain as it’s more of a stabbing pain then a crushing pain, but it was bad enough at one point for me to get a friend to drive me to the emergency room. The nurse practitioner there told me it was probably just anxiety, but she seemed to be mistaking me asking questions about what they wanted to give me to take and what tests they wanted to do as anxiousness. Does anyone else have a problem with racing heart or heart palpitations? I’m still in the diet stage of the heal your headache program, so I’m not taking any medication yet, and am a little wary of it in general since I know one of the main side effects can be increased heart rate.
I went through a full cardio workup because I had an increased awareness of my heartbeat when my dizziness started a few years ago - my heart wasn’t racing, though. And I didn’t have chest pain at that time. I had EKG, stress test, holter monitor then. But in the last year I developed chest pain, which turned out to be due to reflux - I had to have another EKG and another stress test while they were checking to make sure it wasn’t my heart.
I wouldn’t rule out the possibility that anxiety is the cause of the racing heart - if you read the “MAV Survival Guide” (here on this website) you’ll see that many MAV’ers have symptoms of anxiety or even a history of panic disorder. I believe some other folks who have posted here have experienced palpitations that were found to be anxiety related. Frankly, I think anxiety is a normal response when you start having dizziness for no apparent reason!
We’re ALL wary of meds - that’s totally understandable. But for some of us, we have to go that route. Hope the diet will make a difference for you. Best of luck!
I would get what I would say were heart palpitations when my vertigo got really bad. Just the feeling that my heart was beating really fast and almost skipping beats. It was horribly uncomfortable and even prevented me from sleeping on my left side for a while. I wouldn’t say it was racing–it wasn’t THAT fast, but it was faster than normal.
It went completely away when I was able to eliminate the vertigo.
Hi,
I have heart palpatations too. They started about the same time as MAV for me. Mine appear as two different kinds. One where I feel like my heart skips a beat, those are called PVCs or PACs and one where my heart suddenly speeds up for no reason. Initially I got chest pain, neck pain and arm pain which convinced me I was having a heart attack. I immediately got checked out and everything was normal. The Dr. said that it was either anxiety or heartburn or a combo of both. Apparently extreme heartburn and GERD can mimic a heart attack. It kept happening so I had a full heart work-up done (when this all began) because my 24/7 rocking feeling is in sync with my heartbeat. All my tests were clear. Since I’ve started to deal with this condition emotionally, my palpations have become less frequent. I’ve also seen them get better since taking magnesium and potassium daily. Stress, hormones, being too tired or a flare up of hearburn make them worse. They can be really scarey, believe me, I know. But the more you try and relax and realize that they are not deadly, the better they will usually get.
Taking meds are scarey too but if you have to go that route, try not to focus on the side effects. If the med does bother your heart rate, you can go off of it and try another.
This is a great place for support. Hang in there -
Cherity