What Can I Do About This?

[puppylove]

About five nights a week I get so afraid feeling at nighttime. I think it's from adrenaline building throughout the day. I think I posted a thread similar to this a while back about also getting a feeling of dread. Anyways, my question is is this the kind of thing that breathing exercises would help, or since it's like andrenaline thing that wouldn't help? Also what can you do for adrenaline? Thanks!

[anna]

Two out of 3 of my children get like this, well the feeling of doom and gloom more that dread, they have found herbal remedies for anxiety and stress have helped a great deal. The ones they use contain Passion flower, valerian and hops, it does seem to calm down their adrenaline rushes.

[Katybug]

Puppylove,

Meditative breathing can help with this. A really good easy book to learn some of this is "Where ever you go, there you are " by Jon Kabat -Zinn . The chapters are short...only 7-10 pages each with a little meditative exercise that you can do anywhere.

[diamondcut]

Thats something i have always wondered Katie

Do breathing tecniques work with hyper pots people? Can you still help yourself to a degree with doing this, even though chemically you can not stop the high level of adrenalin?

[Katybug]

I can't make it go away completely...I'm not a yogi. LOL! But, I can make it somewhat better when I am having an acute attack. I think that's how I've been able to keep myself from fainting all but 2 times in all these years. When I feel the pre-syncopal symptoms coming on from the adrenaline, I start meditative breathing right away. It keeps me focused which I would bet is why I don't experience the "dread/anxiety" that many people describe with these episodes and it also stops me from hyperventilating (not the crazy hyperventilating that you see on TV, just breathing too fast which increases your HR even more). I think both of these things contribute to reducing the length of the attacks and the frequency of syncope for me. Don't forget, your pulmonary system also sends feedback to your nervous system which can in turn affect the feedback loop for the endocrine and cardiac systems.

My POTS neuro was very specific with me that I need to control my breathing and not allow myself to hyperventilate because it will make the acute attack worse. He also let me know there was a study done on people with heart failure that showed that those that started and practiced a regular program of meditative breathing were able to slow, stop, and in some cases reverse some of the damage to their heart. The study theorized that the breathing helped slow the heart which made the muscle work less. I found the article at one point but I don't know if I can find it again. I'll post it if I do find it.

[puppylove]

Thanks so much! I'm going to try that.

[SeattleRain]

When I talked with my GP regarding adrenaline levels he said there's two ways to treat them: Beta blockers and SSRI's.

What I said in another thread:

If I remember right, he said that the brain will produce the adrenaline/NE in the middle of the night for no apparent reason - and that he treats these patients with a low dose SSRI. Not to treat depression - but because an SSRI directly effects some fancy schmancy nerve or node in the brain I can't remember the name of - that effects how your brain releases the NE/Adrenaline.

I've gone through this for a while - and in the past year it got really bad. Every night felt like the more tired I got, the more the feeling of impending doom.

Anyways, might be something to talk to your doctor about if you're not already on/haven't tried an SSRI. Hope you get some relief soon!