Lately my Blood Pressure has been climbing but is under control. In monitoring it, however, I have discovered that my Pulse Rate (PR) has been averaging around 100/bpm (sometimes as high as 125/bpm). From what I've read adults should be 60-100/bpm but a high PR can indicate a heart inefficiency. I would have to assume this stems from my somewhat sedimentary lifestyle thanks to KD. Now I get plenty of physical excercise and really feel great, all things considered, but am not getting ANY cardio workout. I think this is contributing to my high PR. How can I get a cardio workout without vigorous excercise (which I obviously can't do)?

Mike I am not sure on how well your mobility is but swimming or running in water or some sort of water aerobics. Possibly?

Thanks Dorsey. That's about the only thing that came to my mind too when thinking of 'low-impact' excercise.

Also Mike if you are concerned about your heart rate or there is anxiety with it, I am hypertensive and I have had palpitations and racing heart due to anxiety issues about 3-4 years ago after suffering panic attacks.

My cardiologist put me on a beta-blocker it decreases the heart rate making the beats more efficient and it is also a high blood pressure medicine. I currently take bystolic 5mg.

Mike, you need to check with your doctor on this health issue. There might be something else causing your pulse to be to high.

Thanks Dorsey and Bruce. I see the Doctor on Tuesday. Dorsey I have EXACTLY what you are describing - I get these anxiety attacks when I start stressing about everything a I have to try to relax and slow my breathing. We'll see what they say on Tuesday.

Sorry to hear that Mike yea I had anxiety bad at one point and once I had multiple tests done EKG's EEG's stress tests a heart cath and Echos and tons of blood work, a brain MRI you get the picture but the doctors found nothing wrong with me including the multiple neurologist i had seen who said the cramps and tremors were all benign and it was all determined to be panic/anxiety related.

What was a real life saver for me when I was at my worst with anxiety I was prescribed Ativan it is very fast acting it calms you and allows you to breathe and your body relaxes and able to be at rest. When I had my attacks I could not breathe my heart raced and skipped beats, my teeth chattered like I was cold and my body would tremble or shake like i was shivering it was a real scary time for me back then.

I saw multitude of specialist that did tons of tests so make sure you are ok first with your doctors.

I am panic free these days cause I know how to cope with it, I did take some SSRI's like Paxil and Lexapro but I hated them I finally came to the realization that every time I had an attack and went to the ER I did not die like I thought I was and the SSRI's made me feel like a zombie so i said I rather feel like I am dying every now and then vs a zombie all the time and kind of went on from there.

I did seek counseling with a therapist and that did seem to help make sure they are ones who deal with panic/anxiety the talking alone is what really seemed to help.

Other than that I think what happened 3-4 years ago was Kennedys stating to show itself more I felt easily out of breath my tremors got worse and I just exasperated it into panic
but it is nothing like before since I am more aware of my body and I have better copping skills now.

Sorry I rambled so much its just so hard to sum
up 10 years of feeling or knowing something was not right with my body and going to see doc after doc until i was told it was ALS and sought out a second opinion at the Mayo clinic and they did the DNA test and finally diagnosed with Kennedys 44 CAG repeats.

Good luck Mike if you ever want to talk about this send me an email i will give you my number maybe i could help in some way.


Take care

Dorsey

Just a follow up. My doctor prescribed a low dosage beta-blocker (Bisoprolol-HCTZ 10 6.25 mg once daily) for my blood pressure and Lexapro 10 mg once daily for Anxiety. He thinks by helping the anxiety it will lower my pulse rate. I'm skeptical about that because my pulse rate is high even when I'm not feeling anxious. Also, I've come to find, unfortunately through experience, that some medications can exacerbate KD symptoms. I couldn't find anything about these that could cause concern with my KD but please let me know if there are any. Thanks.

Mike

The Beta Blocker should slow your pulse rate and if you have tremors should help a little bit with that too.

I have tried 3 beta blockers the first was Meta-toporol it slows the heart rate but did not control my hypertension enough. I now take Bystolic it works great for heart rate and hypertension. I also tried Propananol its a beta blocker but really works well for tremors but i had minor side effects i did not like.

Thanks. First day on the meds and my Pulse Rate hasn't been above 70 bpm all day! It used to be 100-105 24hrs a day. Now I have to figure out how to lower my Triglycerides! Tough to get old!!

Good to hear Mike. And dito on getting old.