My life with health anxiety and PVCs
Hello, after reading most of these threads, I’m glad to see others experiencing what I’m experiencing. Obviously I’m sorry people are going through this but it’s nice to know I’m not alone and people are finding salvation. I feel like I’m only one this is happening to compared to the people around me. I have been dealing with PVCs, palpitations, or flutters for a few years. I have been to a cardiologist where they’ve done multiple EKGs, an echocardiogram, and a 2 week monitor. The echo was normal and the monitor found 37 PVCs, 1477 PACs, 1 couplet and 1 triplet over the 14 days. Since both the PVCs and PACs were under 0.11% they are technically not a burden. For reference I’m a lean 28 year old male.
The problem is they feel like a big burden to me. My health anxiety about this is very very bad. It is all I think about 24/7. During a panic attack I had to have my fiancé call an electrophysiologist for me (cause I was too pathetic to do so myself) because I felt like I needed a 2nd opinion from someone who specializes the electrical activity in a heart so that was scheduled.
Before my appointment with the electrophysiologist, It got to the point where I felt a flutter or PVC every few minutes and I couldn’t lie down so I went to the ER for peace of mind and the EKG came back normal and all they said was everything looks normal there’s not much else we can do for you.
I met with the electrophysiologist and the doctor was awesome and explained everything to me and was not concerned. That gave me a good amount of relief for awhile only to end up spiraling again.
Currently I feel like my PVCs have been increasing in frequency but still not to the amount of being a “medical burden”. However, when I feel one I break down and can’t function. It is all I think about and I create “what if” scenarios in my head like what if the monitor missed something, what if this one felt different, what if the fluttering doesn’t stop and I go into afib? I don’t even know if that’s possible but it’s just how my mind operates. I just started a therapy session to go over this so fingers crossed some progress is being made.
If anyone has any tips, suggestions, comments, concerns, or questions please feel free to let me know. I am looking to break this anxiety loop because I feel like they are the main driver of the flutters.