Keith Littlewood - Phd researcher in environmental pollutants and thyroid dysfunction posted:
“Understanding how the heart is affected by low thyroid hormone can help to avoid unnecessary single action heart medications. Like the general function of the body that relies on a voltage, decreased thyroid hormone contributes to that decreased voltage. This affects the contractility of the heart, decreased heart rate and increased likelihood of irregular heart beat, ventricular hypertrophy and heart disease. --The P wave- is associated with atrial depolarisation/contraction. The QRS combined is associated with ventricular depolarisation/contraction, hence that large spike that's needed to contribute to blood supply to the arteries. ST segment is the plateau phase and the T segment is the repolarisation. It's the QRS, ST and QT segments that are often associated with various aspects of heart dysregulation and correlate with a hypothyroid state.--I've written before about Szent Györgis revisiting of Bowditch's staircase effect or what is called the interval force relationship of the heart. Bradycardia is a decrease of the resting heart rate. A known symptom of low thyroid function that is often reversed with appropriate therapy. This also seems to be a necessary component of TRa where mice altered without the TRA1 gene despite growing normally had lower body temperature, heart rate and altered QRS and QT segments.--Understanding how the heart is affected by thyroid can be useful for interpreting whether or not cholesterol, glucose or blood pressure meds are really needed.”
This seems to have some great explanations... It was a therapist who said "hmm, dampness and a slippery pulse, use a sauna and no wild swimming" Phew 😆
If you find the key to unbunging my resistance to return to yoga give me a shout 🙏I used to do an hour a day but since my crash after the first vaccination I can't even bear the thought of it?! 🙅♀️🧘♀️
I was/am the same with swimming ! I manage yoga once a week - helping a pal locally - otherwise I think I would be disappearing beneath my snuggly throw 🧘♂️🏊♀️
ah interesting hot tub with a bobble hat on was one of my greatest recovery tools pre diagnosis and I couldn’t explain why…. Sadly electricity costs means it’s a cold tub this winter but I may well fire it up for a treat if it gets a bit warmer. We have plans to build a sauna too. Benefits of marrying a Swede 🇸🇪🥵
(funny he's never been worried enough to listen to it .. or take regular pulse / blood pressure readings )
"your dose needs reducing to 100mcg"
( i protest,, i had already agreed to reduce a bit at previous consultation ~ it had made me unable to function properly for weeks and i was only just starting to feel human again)
"you'll die"
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i'm in two minds about the wild swimming .... i used to do it , both before and after being diagnosed hypo, and i firmly believe it has lots of benefits overall including beefing up the immune system / vagus nerve stuff etc etc ..... but once hypo i did always find it would take me the rest of morning and two large mugs of hot chocolate to recover from .... not like those 'other' people who could do it and them pop off to start work. .. so it's pretty much a no no nowadays because it just feel like it's asking a bit too much of my body and 'a 5 minute dip' takes all day.
Until our local gym pool closed, i used to really like sitting in the steam room followed immediately by the cold shower , followed by returning to the steam room followed by cold shower , before i had a brief swim in the pool .
Could never put my finger on why/ how~ but i really felt there was something in "the change from hot to cold and back again" that did me good ~ kind of felt like it was having the same benefits that my wild swimming used to ,, but without needing hours and hours to recover from.
I was talking to my husband recently about wild swimming. I am certain it does us good but similarly to you; I'm not sure why... But being lovely and warm ALL THE TIME is such a recent thing that I can't help but feel there is an ancient mechanism as work when we get cold.
i kind of see it as keeping 'the full range' of something in regular use .. whether that be the hinge on our garden gate or the full range of movement in our joints , or the full stretch of our muscles/ tendons , or our body experiencing the extremes of temperature.
if we only ever open the gate enough to walk through . the hinges will have rusted up when we try to open it enough to get the car in .
So opening and closing 'fully' and regularly is good for the gate .
Tai chi is good for keeping the body flexible / strong / and with full range of movement
and based on this rather dodgy logic ....i suspect going from hot to cold and back again is good for us .
I think Tai Chi has a lot more going for it... it spoils it a bit as I have to watch a video to remember the moves which ruins the flow somewhat.... I want to waft around like a ninja 🥷
it has 'everything' going for it ... really .. i strongly advocate anyone interested to find themselves a good tutor who was themselves trained properly .
Look into Yang Style Long Form ~ took me about 4 years of one hour per week lesson and 40 minutes a day 'practice' to be able to this :
This is the same routine I have, having spent a day at a group session and I still get lost when I swap to the other side... there is a localish class, it's just the idea of being in a room full of people puts me off 😬
yes I was the same… my bones would just feel cold and dead for hours after I’d done the cold swim. I think when hypo our BBT tends to be much lower than healthy anyway, extra stress on the system to maintain a healthy BBT is either going to be the jumpstart you need or it’s just going to be one more burden.
I’ve a working theory that the reason cold exposure works so well is the same premise that ketosis works so well (short term) the heightened adrenal function down regulates the immune system, which has initial anti-inflammatory impacts which feels lovely, along with huge spike in norepinephrine (again, thank you adrenals) and ofc endorphins to keep us coming back for the next plunge. But overtime, and when a system is compromised by chronic hypothyroidism (usually because of improper treatment) the adrenals eventually just say “enough.” And the hypothyroidism can then get even worse… but as I say just a working theory. As an adjunct to this working theory I wonder if anything of “deprivation” (like big cold exposure, heat exposure, sugar deprivation - like ketosis - fasting, low calorie diets, night shifts that deprive sleep) ultimately “overrecruits” (in a sense) the adrenals and when there is insufficient thyroid hormone circulating those adrenals end up, excuse me, buggered.
As with all things in life, the boring reality is probably just to do it all in moderation and never beyond tolerance! But then that message wouldn’t sell supplements/weight loss programs/influencers’ lifestyles etc etc. 🙃
lol 'buggered' is an official medical term .. my dad's doc told him 'sorry john your inner ear is buggered and i can't do anything about that '
i have to really watch it with getting overly cold if i go on 'adventures'.. if it happens i'm a in a mess pretty rapidly and have to be taken into the nearest pub and fed hot chocolate while people consider whether they need to find a bed to put me in.
So i've had to moderate my adventures , which really bugs me, as i used to like canoeing round headlands to see what was in the bay beyond , but i daren't do it nowadays in case i just 'crash' half way out to sea (and the lifeboat is Soo embarrasing)
I would really like to do the "Cross Bay" walk where i live ,, but again i'm too worried about bieng "that woman who had to be carried/ dragged the rest of the way across the sands"
Assuming having a heart means we likely have a heart condition....
You should only swim in water with a temperature between 26–33C (79–91F) as this will have the least effect on your heart. Most public swimming pools are regulated at 29C, which is 84F. Pools that are hotter than 33C may cause your blood pressure to drop, making you lightheaded or faint. Being in colder water may provoke irregular heart rhythms.
visited a little spa hotel recently who proudly told us the pool was freshly changed water and 24 degrees…. 🥶🥶🥶 I got a toe in and went back in the sauna 🤭
if my nice local gym bythe edge of the sea was still open i'd still be doing my hot /cold/ hot thing there every day (and using their hot water for all my showers instead of my own )
ironically the reason it's not still there is that the building kept getting flooded by the sea and they inevitably went bust.
Our local swimming pools are turning down the water temperature because they can't afford the energy bills. We have already bought our grandchildren 'shortie' wetsuits so they don't get horribly cold and decide swimming isn't for them. You won't get me in there until it's warmed up again.
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