Hello, Friends,
This is a reprint of a piece I wrote in May, 2011. I'm reprinting it today due to some blog feedback which indicates reader interest in the topic of PVC's (premature ventricular contractions):
Happy Hazy, Sunny Day!
Well, I'm back in the saddle again after much more chemical reactivity than I'd bargained for.
The rain has ended and the sun is shining -- literally!
Now, cardiac arrhythmias -- how do they fit into the picture of chemical reactivity? I'm not sure precisely how, except to speculate that the neurotoxins in the aggravating chemicals might stimulate the nerves electrically, which would include the heart nerve. I just know that, for me, they are now part of the MCS picture.
I had been diagnosed with benign arrhythmias as a child -- what they now call "supraventricular tachycardia" (SVT). I was treated, at that time, with tiny doses of daily phenobarbital and digitalis. After a few years, the arrhythmias went dormant. For decades. Until the MCS came into bloom.
Let it be stated firmly that I am not a medical professional and can proffer neither diagnoses nor the science behind the symptoms. I leave that to more capable minds. What I can provide here, however, is anecdotal background into which a better mind can one day "splice in" the exact reasons for these physical symptoms.
Sometimes right away during an exposure to aggravating chemicals, or sometimes a day or two later, I will experience a multitude of "premature ventricular contractions" (PVC's). These feel like little drum rolls of the heart or, at other times, an abrupt and hard "thud" as though the heart "fell" downward, or jumped upward! These "thuds" cause me to gasp involuntarily. At their worst, the PVC's keep coming and turn into an extended bout of SVT. This is a racing of the heart so fast and so hard that you can see the person's shirt bobbing up and down over the heart. Mine has reached over 200 beats per minute for extended periods of time, as in three hours. My chest and back, at these times, experience a sickening ache, and I feel lightheaded. A person cannot go on like this indefinitely. My last bout caused the need for a visit to the emergency room for 2 shots of adenosine, a heart-stopping drug which resets the rhythm.
At other times, the heart will just launch into radical, fast SVT within a split second, as though someone simply flipped a switch inside of me. If I cannot cough hard enough or bear down effectively enough (two techniques for stopping an arrhythmia in its tracks), then "we're off to the races" and I'm in a bad place, praying for the heart to stop "galloping" on its own.
The PVC's occur most, and a multiplicity of times for one or two days at a time, during or following such things as heavy scented-laundry exposure, visits to mainstream medical offices (dental offices being the worst for me), and typical office buildings.
Also worth mentioning here, for the sake of completeness and accuracy, is the tendency for gluten to do the same thing to my heart. Because there is a known "toxic fraction" of the gluten molecule which acts as an inflammatory agent for those sensitive to gluten, the gluten molecule becomes, for me, one more "chemical agent" in the reactivity picture. My first symptoms of gluten sensitivity were, in fact, neurological. I'd get wobbly, somewhat dizzy, following the ingestion of wheat bread. I'd eat the bread and then find myself leaning against the wall for balance. There was the frightening day when I was eating wheat bread in the car, while driving. The PVC's began, making me gasp every other second. I also felt that dizzy, lightheaded sensation. A person cannot drive this way. I had to stop the car and sit, just hoping for it all to pass. I wondered about the wheat bread.
I took a baseline blood test for gluten sensitivity, which showed, at that time, a "moderate" level of antibodies to gluten in my blood. I was advised to stay away from gluten at that point, or at least to limit it as best I could. (I do understand that known celiacs must stay away from every single molecule of gluten. I understand, also, that I might actually be a full-blown celiac which might be more obvious at this point if I pursued further testing. Then again, there may be some people who are neurologically sensitive to gluten without having celiac disease. The neurological angle of gluten sensitivity is now beginning to be explored.)
So gluten, for some of us, can act as "one more chemical" -- an actual toxin -- precipitating our symptoms.
Now back to neurotoxins, in general, as they often precede or coincide with my own PVC's:
My greatest concern, therefore, comes for those cardiac patients, elderly patients, and all neurologically compromised patients who most visit mainstream medical offices. As I've noted in a previous post, mainstream offices and most public buildings contain innumerable neurotoxins in the form of chemical disinfectants, air-freshening products, the synthetic scents that exude from each person, plus upholstery and carpeting which absorb and "breathe back" all of the above . . . etc.
For me, it is highly likely that if I had to visit a cardiologist or any medical professional regularly, I would be living with nearly continual episodes of PVC's!
So what is the case, I wonder, for frail elderly patients whose hearts are worn down, to begin with . . . whose brains and nervous systems are more susceptible to damage by everything they eat and breathe? Do many cardiac patients actually get worse upon more frequent visits to the cardiologists' offices?
It surely makes me wonder.
Stay as well as you can, and cheers!
~ Carolyn
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