I was diagnosed with paroxysmal Afib 6yrs ago,mines is exercise induced,I’m a long distance runner and have been for many years,and apparently endurance running has cause it
I’ve never had an attack outwith running and my episodes always come during three quarters of a mile and one mile and a quarter,so basically in a warm up,my episodes are becoming more frequent and I was started on Flecanide pill in the pocket for when I had occasional episodes but they are coming more regularly and it’s looking like I may have to take daily Flecanide as I like to run 5/6 days of the week as it helps me with my mental health
I’ve had echo tests, angiograms all my blood tests and bp results always come back “textbook”
I’m currently waiting on an appointment with the arrhythmia clinic
Is there any runners on here or anyone with any identification or experience with this?
It’s so frustrating man and the anxiety is driving me mad
Thanks In advance
Frustrated runner
Written by
positively4thstreet
To view profiles and participate in discussions please or .
understand about mental health but the heart muscle, like other muscles, expand and this is why athletes get AF and de training is only way to eliminate this.difficult choices for you
You are in good company here as there are many athletes on this forum but unfortunately the only way is as Rosy says - de-train safely. This is your body sending you messages so please listen to them. Drugs are one way of managing AF but they have affects, none of them good in my experience. Have you thought about ablation?
2 books with a lot of information - The Haywire Heart -the first book looking at AF in atheletes. velopress.com/books/the-hay...
And look at the AFA website for lots of information on everything AF.
Run by all means but know how to run safely - these books will help.
Rule of thumb - you should be able to talk when exercising, if you cannot slow down or pause and rest. Wear a monitor and track your HR. Ask your doctor about ablation and lifestyle changes.
Knowledge is potential power so know your enemy and know that exercise is only one way of managing anxiety and wellbeing.
Hi,The thing about AF is that it is all things to all people ....just depends! I know that is absolutely no use to you at all ! However, there is mountains of anecdotal evidence to show athletes, particularly cyclists and runners, are particularly prone to AF. But if you look closely at your family genetics, historically and you find an incidence of cardiac issues and/ or strokes you might be forgiven for wondering if AF may have been behind it all. All that said, I can trace strokes in the paternal side of my family, AF with me and my paternal second cousin, and AF in my daughter in both her pregnancies and she now practices Thai Kickboxing and extreme health and fitness activities in her local gym. Hmmmmm! I wonder how she will be aged 60 ? Interestingly, when my daughter stopped breeding, the AF stopped.
I have palpitations and have had them for 45 years on and off.For most of the 45 years intense exercise or running would temporarily "cure" my palpitations. The palpitations always go away during the 90 minutes or so when I am exercising hard. This isn't working as well as it used to when I was younger but I really think that my palpitations(which were 8% of beats recently) are made worse by: the lockdown, my divorce; and my severe midlife crisis. When I sleep, I have no palpitations. When I drink alcohol(quite a bit of it) I have no palpitations(or worries). When I have sex, I have no palpitations.
Reality is causing my palpitations. When I leave reality, my palpitations leave me.
Sorry to hear of your difficulties with reality. Have you tried mindfulness or something similar? Or perhaps talk to a doctor? I too have had palpitations forever but dismissed them as 'normal' for most of my life, but high stress brought them to a higher level and then AF.
Reading through these replies I'm wondering if you could look for a different type of physical challenge that would engage you but put less stress on your heart. Canoeing or kayaking for example. Chi Kung is also excellent. Tai Chi is more meditative but requires considerable physical skill. All of these can be done outside and it sounds like part of what helps you is being outdoors.
As already said temporarily stop the running to see what happens. What I would like to emphasise though is whereas you probably think your running habit is the only way to secure mental health it isn't! Try something completely new (involving much less exertion) that you always wanted to do. Good luck.
I used to row and also played hockey and cycled a lot. I think that caused my AF plus my father and mother had AF.
I had an ablation 11 years ago that was successful, and I moderated my exercise. That has pretty much managed to keep my AF in check. It might be worth you tuning back a bit. For instance, jogging more than flat out running. Perhaps going out with a group to run at a steadier pace. I would not use a heart monitor though. The temptation is to keep looking at it and that puts you on edge.
Tablets never worked for me. But the good news is that ablations tend to be very successful in people with lone AF like yours (and mine).
Don't know your age, but most active younger people want to stay active, so I hear they sign up for ablation. Some of the competitive runners even go back to racing.
I was running when younger. Then at around 55, I was exercycling when AFIB hit. I didn't want meds and the AFIB was coming sooner and sooner. I had to make a decision ... so I had the ablation. That first one lasted 9 months or so, then failed. I got another one immediately.
My second AFIB ablation gave me 10 years of normalcy and peace. However, the AFIB came back in AUG and I immediately scheduled another ablation with one of the world-class EP's.
Recovering fine. Back up to walking 60+ miles a week .... and will soon add back in my 4 days a week resistance training at age 67.
My one recommendation would be to consult with one of the top EP's.
Hello, I too had paroxysmal AF caused by exercise (although I don’t think I was as active as you!). The medications didn’t work and after 2 yrs of trying meds and it getting more frequent I went for an ablation. Year and a half on and has worked for me. Still get lots of ectopics but much much better than AF. While AF may come back at some point it was certainly the right choice for me. Good luck!
Yes. I may copy and print the next bit- my normal opening sentences. Here goes. The number of cyclists and runners on this forum no longer surprises me. I include myself.Loved running wild and free, cycling with long distance time trials.
The human body is a wonderful machine to live in. Looked after it will work tirelessly year after year. But like any machine, thrashed, over revved, it will break down.
How does any of that help. Well its decision time. You are in one way lucky to know what at least one of your triggers are.
Time for a re- think a reality check. I'm 72 going on 30 in my head. But I have realised I cant do the things I used to. So I have had to make changes. Walk instead of run. Pleasure cycle. Now instead of chasing someone who passes me. Smile, smell the Rose's, look around enjoy the scenery. Anticipate the coffee and cake stop.
Exercise for me has changed. I do 40 -45 mins tai chi and accupressure most days. Unless I'm physically active in the garden or other physically demanding activity has taken precident.
Its not the end of your life. It's the start of a new chapter. Others have suggested different forms of exercise/activity Try it you may actually enjoy it. Tell you one thing, you meet and talk to a lot more people in the slower lane than you do head down. Best wishes.
Very true!It seems to me that nearly all the hard exercisers on this forum who have probably developed afib as a result of driving their bodies too hard are men. Maybe when young men are driven to be more competitive with each other and with themselves and it becomes very hard to drop this habit when their " super fit" bodies turn out not to be so super fit after all. I am familiar with the endorphin high - I used to get it when rehearsing for dance performances and in spades after the performance itself. But in between apart from teaching I was always happy to go back to the more relaxed exercise of working in my garden. When I had to stop dancing at age 59 ( the form of Indian dance I practiced is very hard on the back and knees due to a lot of stamping with bare feet)I was worried I would miss it too much. But the garden proved to be enough as a creative outlet. Having said that gardening and dancing have left me with a very arthritic body!
It is hard the cost our bodies pay. The body one worshiped as a temple ( (continuing the Indian idiom) starts to collapse and show signs of age. Glad you have found d some sanctuary in your garden. Chinese medicine would say arthritis caused by too much dampness in the body. Avoid dairy including cheese, yogurt, butter and tomatoes. Eat more rice as it absorbs dampness. Easy to say. Hard to achieve on a normal western diet. Best wishes.
France is the land of more than 400 cheeses! I eat a little every day. I am more inclined to blame my lack of cartilage on Fluoroquinolone toxicity as this class of antibiotics attacks connective tissue and I have cartilage degeneration in my rib cage that started long before my hips were buggered. As for dampness the dampness in the atmosphere definitely makes the arthritis worse!
I've had exercise induced AF for years. I used to be a runner (30 to 50 miles a week) / orienteer, then gym bunny and Spin class fanatic. I now use a Concept2 rowing machine at home on the patio (2 million metres to date). An ECG in hospital will register mild bursts of atrial flutter. During rowing, my heart rate will fluctuate quite a bit but that has lessened with accumulated distance rowed, much like the effect of running.
My AF was recognised by doing a Bruce Protocol test in hospital. A treadmill is set up that incrementally speeds up from slow walking speed, at the same time as the front of the treadmill rises incrementally; you are not allowed to jog or run. You are fully wired up and your heart waves are shown on a large display screen. One nurse watches the screen for the onset of AF, and another regularly checks your blood pressure with an old-fashioned sphygmometer. All the details are captured when you go into AF.
Over the years, I been tested for turbulence around the heart valves, Tilt Table test etc, all passed without a problem.
I'm not on rate control, but I take an anticoagulant and blood pressure medication (after I had a stroke). Before the stroke an EP said I didn't need to take an anticoagulant. Instead he prescribed dronedarone that brought on pulmonary toxicity (that's another story). I'm 74 and agreed with my GP about three years ago that my maximum heart rate during exercise should be limited to 180. These days I keep to around 160 building up from around 115.
I'm a runner - have been (as a keen amateur) for around 15 years. I developed paroxysmal "fast AF" arround 4 years ago and after considering the options decided to go for cryoblation sooner rather than later. I now run around 50k a week without issues. I take care not to overtrain and use a Garmin watch to tell me objectively what I subjectively suspect but would often otherwise ignore: it's time for a rest day.
I exercise pretty much 7 days a week, but never more than 5 days of running - I walk or gym on my "rest" days, which I've found helps the running (we runners all know that we should rest and cross train - AF provides a useful extra justification).
I found heavy meals (especially red meat) and excess alcohol were my triggers - I think they aggravate my digestive system, so I try to avoid poking that tiger. I haven't modified anything else in my diet - I think other foods were/are all fine for me.
In order to reduce the risk of triggering a relapse I've backed off the running intensity (I now do an 80/20-ish split of low/high intensity). I've also made a big effort to improve my gum health (I've read some scary stuff about the risks of poor gum health). And I've brought my weight properly down into the normal zone (rather than kidding myself that "normal" was unreasonably light for "someone like me".
When I first experienced AF it was mostly at night and I often didn't even realise it was happening unless I was lying in bed with no distractions. Over time I learned to recognise it better and used my heart rate monitor to track it. That's when I found it was happening randomly and more often than I realised. It never happened during a run until the last few months before my ablation, when it happened 2 or 3 times - it didn't stop me, but it slowed me down A LOT, and it worried me. As far as I can tell running didn't trigger it or clear it - but it was becoming more frequent.
I now wear my Garmin 24/7 and VERY rarely get a message from it that it's detected "abnormally fast heart rate" which passes within a few seconds, is always slower than the fast AF I used to suffer, and sometimes seems to be a false alarm.
After my ablation my resting heart rate was initially about 10bpm higher, it's now back to where it was before (high 50s). My heart rate has always been higher than the 180-age rule of thumb, however since the ablation my aerobic threshold has dropped by about 7bpm (to high 130s), and my HRmax has dropped by 15bpm (to mid 180s).
Content on HealthUnlocked does not replace the relationship between you and doctors or other healthcare professionals nor the advice you receive from them.
Never delay seeking advice or dialling emergency services because of something that you have read on HealthUnlocked.
Afib, Flecainide and exercise, again!
Exercise and Afib
swallowing induced afib
Exercise and Afib
