Heart Palpitations And Gas?

[jaybee465]

Hi there,

I'm a 25 year old healthy female and about 6-7 months ago I had a strong heart palpitation while sitting down for dinner. I went to the bathroom to splash water on my face as I was terrified as to what just happened to me. Since that night, I've had on and off, about 1-4 palpitations in a day every 2-4 days. Sometimes they happen a few days in a row, and lay off for a few days then come back again. Some are strong, some are light, and some feel more like spasms.

I've been to the doctor many times and was tested for thyroid problems, digestive problems, candida, celiac, heart disease etc etc. These tests were all done from blood or urine. Everything came back normal, and my doctor says my heart is fine, I just have a bit of anxiety I need to work on.

I also have a lot of bloating, gas bubbling up into my chest, occasional diarrhea, hair thinning, muscle twitching, etc etc. I've tried many different vitamins as I thought it was a mineral deficiency, and nothing seems to help. Every day I'm losing more and more hair, and getting more and more gas. I'm only 25 and I feel like I've aged by 40 years in 5 months.

I heard about gluten free about 3 months ago, is it possible that my blood test did not detect an intolerance for gluten, and that maybe I do not have celiac but just a strong intolerance? My doctor didn't explain this very well to me. Also do any of you have or had heart palpitations like this caused by gluten? While sitting and resting, no racing heart beat or pain in chest, just a jump, flutter or spasm feeling in the chest? Also what about the other symptoms? hair loss, muscle twitching, gas etc.

Originally I went gluten free for about 2-3 days while my doctor was suppose to contact me for results. She suggested I try it for a few days, and during those days my stomach did feel better and I didn't have heart palpitations, but then my test came back and she said I have no negative effects to gluten and there was no reason to stay off of it. I figured it was just three good days I was having.

I just went gluten free again, thinking why not give it another try since nothing else is working? I've been off it for 3 days and nothing seems to have happened yet, but I am still getting a little bit of bubbling and gas. I've also been able to go about 3 days symptom free and then they come back.

I'm curious if any of you have or had my symptoms with the heart palpitations and gas/bloating and if it occurred even in the first few weeks of being gluten free, and how long did it take before you were symptom free?

Any help or suggestions are greatly appreciated!

Thanks!

-J

[burdee]

Hi there,

I'm a 25 year old healthy female and about 6-7 months ago I had a strong heart palpitation while sitting down for dinner. I went to the bathroom to splash water on my face as I was terrified as to what just happened to me. Since that night, I've had on and off, about 1-4 palpitations in a day every 2-4 days. Sometimes they happen a few days in a row, and lay off for a few days then come back again. Some are strong, some are light, and some feel more like spasms.

I've been to the doctor many times and was tested for thyroid problems, digestive problems, candida, celiac, heart disease etc etc. These tests were all done from blood or urine. Everything came back normal, and my doctor says my heart is fine, I just have a bit of anxiety I need to work on.

I also have a lot of bloating, gas bubbling up into my chest, occasional diarrhea, hair thinning, muscle twitching, etc etc. I've tried many different vitamins as I thought it was a mineral deficiency, and nothing seems to help. Every day I'm losing more and more hair, and getting more and more gas. I'm only 25 and I feel like I've aged by 40 years in 5 months.

I heard about gluten free about 3 months ago, is it possible that my blood test did not detect an intolerance for gluten, and that maybe I do not have celiac but just a strong intolerance? My doctor didn't explain this very well to me. Also do any of you have or had heart palpitations like this caused by gluten? While sitting and resting, no racing heart beat or pain in chest, just a jump, flutter or spasm feeling in the chest? Also what about the other symptoms? hair loss, muscle twitching, gas etc.

Originally I went gluten free for about 2-3 days while my doctor was suppose to contact me for results. She suggested I try it for a few days, and during those days my stomach did feel better and I didn't have heart palpitations, but then my test came back and she said I have no negative effects to gluten and there was no reason to stay off of it. I figured it was just three good days I was having.

I just went gluten free again, thinking why not give it another try since nothing else is working? I've been off it for 3 days and nothing seems to have happened yet, but I am still getting a little bit of bubbling and gas. I've also been able to go about 3 days symptom free and then they come back.

I'm curious if any of you have or had my symptoms with the heart palpitations and gas/bloating and if it occurred even in the first few weeks of being gluten free, and how long did it take before you were symptom free?

Any help or suggestions are greatly appreciated!

Thanks!

-J

Heart palpitations are my standard reaction to cane sugar (a diagnosed IgG mediated delayed reaction allergy). I get gas/bloating/gut cramps from all my other 6 allergy/intolerances.

[Simona19]

Hi!

I'm just in middle of the tests for the same thing. I'm gluten free for 6 months and casein free for 5 and half. Even after eliminating them I had blothing and gas, but no more diarrhea. My Gastroenterologist sugested this: Bacteria owergrowth - SIBO and Fructose intolerance. I was positive to both. She prescribed to me two antibiotics for 2 weeks and for the fructose intolerance- I need to avoid fruit and vegetable with high amount of fructose in them( apples, pears, all melons, sweet potato, asparagus...) and jelly, fruit juice and syrup. I will have only mild blothing because I can't stay way from all fruit. I simply can't. Every fruit is bad for me, but I'm aloved to eat berries, bananas, peaches, apricots in very small amounts.

About palpitation. I have same symptoms as you. I will sit down to eat and after few bites I have it. I can't even sleep because I can hear my hearth. I'm crawing salt like crazy. I will eat it until my mouth burns (potato chips, or soup), but later I feel better.

I also have numbness, thingling and muscle twiches in my legs and hands. I saw my new Neurologist on Wensday. He ordered tests: EEG, EMG for legs and arms (needles in nerves and then electric through them)and blodd work for 19 things. They are: Red rate, or rite?

Lyme(Elsa, WB)

B12, folate, VDRL

ds DNA

thyroid peroxidose? AB

anti hemoglobulin AG

Hepatitis, B, C. Antigen

Cryoglobulins? some globulins

GM, Antibody (Ganglio syndrom)

MAG Antibody mypelian...., glycep. serum

SS-A, SS-B antibody

Lupus anticoagulant

antiphosph..lipid antibody

I can't read some of them. I will post the results from them later with the right spelling. All this can make my leg numb.

It can also affect the hearth. It can be related to autonomic neurophaty. It seams that my blood pressure is low. My body is making my hearth to pump faster by itself which makes palpitation. For this I need to have TiLT table test- to see how is my heart working when I will change the positions.

I hope that all this would be some how helpful to you.

[mushroom]

Hi there,

I'm a 25 year old healthy female and about 6-7 months ago I had a strong heart palpitation while sitting down for dinner. I went to the bathroom to splash water on my face as I was terrified as to what just happened to me. Since that night, I've had on and off, about 1-4 palpitations in a day every 2-4 days. Sometimes they happen a few days in a row, and lay off for a few days then come back again. Some are strong, some are light, and some feel more like spasms.

I've been to the doctor many times and was tested for thyroid problems, digestive problems, candida, celiac, heart disease etc etc. These tests were all done from blood or urine. Everything came back normal, and my doctor says my heart is fine, I just have a bit of anxiety I need to work on.

I also have a lot of bloating, gas bubbling up into my chest, occasional diarrhea, hair thinning, muscle twitching, etc etc. I've tried many different vitamins as I thought it was a mineral deficiency, and nothing seems to help. Every day I'm losing more and more hair, and getting more and more gas. I'm only 25 and I feel like I've aged by 40 years in 5 months.

I heard about gluten free about 3 months ago, is it possible that my blood test did not detect an intolerance for gluten, and that maybe I do not have celiac but just a strong intolerance? My doctor didn't explain this very well to me. Also do any of you have or had heart palpitations like this caused by gluten? While sitting and resting, no racing heart beat or pain in chest, just a jump, flutter or spasm feeling in the chest? Also what about the other symptoms? hair loss, muscle twitching, gas etc.

Originally I went gluten free for about 2-3 days while my doctor was suppose to contact me for results. She suggested I try it for a few days, and during those days my stomach did feel better and I didn't have heart palpitations, but then my test came back and she said I have no negative effects to gluten and there was no reason to stay off of it. I figured it was just three good days I was having.

I just went gluten free again, thinking why not give it another try since nothing else is working? I've been off it for 3 days and nothing seems to have happened yet, but I am still getting a little bit of bubbling and gas. I've also been able to go about 3 days symptom free and then they come back.

I'm curious if any of you have or had my symptoms with the heart palpitations and gas/bloating and if it occurred even in the first few weeks of being gluten free, and how long did it take before you were symptom free?

Any help or suggestions are greatly appreciated!

Thanks!

-J

Hi jaybee:

We may have a few things in common, so I'll try to be as specific as I can. I have learned that one person's palpitations is another person's tachycardia, is another person's ectopic beats or someone else's atrial fibrillation or someone else's atrial flutter. A lot of us use these terms without really knowing what they are - I know I used to, and still do unwittingly.

So it's best to use simple terms to describe what's happening. I get what you seem to be experiencing, where you will just be sitting minding your own business and it will feel that your heart has a foot that has just reached out and kicked your chest wall This may be a lone occurrence or it may happen several times, and sometimes may keep happening for me for an hour or two off and on. It may or may not be accompanied by a pounding of my pulse, by tachycardia (a very rapid heart rate) and/or shortness of breath. It is always accompanied by bloating and gas which (excuse TMI) I try to pass both ways to get rid of it and relieve the pressure on my heart and lungs, because that is what I am feeling. There is so much gas in there that it is pressing on everything!!! Most often it occurs when I go to bed at night. The act of lying down causes a rearrangement of the internal organs and a change in the amount of pressure. Now previously I used to faint from these symptoms and it was described as vaso-vagal syncope, pressure on the vagus nerve causes you to pass out. I no longer faint, but I have these new symptoms.

So I described these as best as I could at the time, wore a 24-hour Holter monitor (small portable EKG) and nothing happened during those 24 hours, of course. I came to discover by checking how fast my pulse was racing that it would start and stop - race for 12-14 beats, miss a few beats, then give a little "kick" and take off again. Have described this numerous times to different doctors without it attracting much attention.

But this past summer we had just arrived in Nevada and I started having one of these attacks (at Lake Tahoe, 1 mile high, so I was short of breath naturally) but started absolutely gasping for breath and could not stand up for dizziness. A trip to the ER gave the first diagnosis of atrial fibrillation. Turns out on this occasion I was short of potassium because my meds had been changed and I should have been told to supplement with potassium. BUT, I also get this reaction from the bloating and eating the wrong foods, and I verified this when I had a recognizable food attack and went back to the same ER because I wanted to document it. My potassium was fine, but otherwise the atrial fibrillation was the same (except with the lack of potassium I didn't get the "kicks".) Now I know we are supposed to want to get our kicks, but not this kind

So does gluten cause these attacks? Unfortunately, not for me. They are brought on by other food intolerances, noteably foods high in lectins, which you can read about at Open Original Shared Link The lectins that give me problems are soy, corn, nightshades, legumes and citrus. Don't worry, most people who are lectin sensitive do not react to so many

While I was in Nevada I spoke to a cardiologist just before I left (took that long to get an appt. with her) who says that once you get 'a-fib' it becomes your 'friend', in other words a frequent visitor, and she thinks in my case it is bad enough that I should have a procedure done to my heart called ablation, where they identify the part of the heart's nervous system that is kicking the rhythm out of whack and zap it, thus preventing it from doing it any more. I am still considering this. Meanwhile, because I avoid all lectins and take my potassium regularly, it is not happening very much any more.

So sadly, gluten is often not the end of the story, although there are lectins in gliadin in wheat gluten (lectins being a glycoprotein) - but the lectins in wheat don't seem to bother me. It's those in the other pesky foods that get to me.

So next time your heart kicks you, take your pulse and find out if you have a racing heart beat, or one that stops and starts, because I am willing to bet that what you referred to as a palpitation was actually an ectopic beat. Now ectopic beats are not uncommon, and can be totally benign; in fact practically everybody gets an occasional off-beat at some time or other for no particular reason. But you need to check and see if there is a reason for this happening to you repeatedly. Write down what you have eaten on the day you have this ectopic beat(s) and see if there is any pattern there. There may or may not be.

By the way, you can see from my signature my history with gluten, other intolerances and autoimmune diseases. I have never been tested for celiac disease because no one ever thought to do so.

So anyway, rather lengthy, but I hope there was something of interest in there.

[jaybee465]

Thank you all for your responses!

I have tried to take supplements making sure it wasn't a mineral deficiency such as potassium, magnesium, calcium etc. Those things didn't seem to make a difference as I was still getting bloating and palps.

I have been taking down a food journal for the past week and a half and the only thing I noticed is that when I ate bread or some sort of wheat product I would have a palpitation about an hour or so after eating it. So that drew me to conclude that it was related to wheat, I've been gluten free for 4 days now, and I just had a really light palp this afternoon, about an hour ago actually and I've had no wheat. I drink soy milk almost every morning and occasionally eat soy beans, so my next thought is to remove the soy, and I suppose I'll just keep eliminating things until I can pin point a culprit. But I have noticed that when I did get the palp it was much lighter/softer than it normally is, so I think it partially has to do with the gluten, but I'm sure there is one other thing out there.

I'm having trouble finding out what exactly is in the food that I may or may not be reacting to, for example, if I eat a banana and I have one, or I get bloated, how do I find out what exactly could be in the banana that I am reacting to?

Frankly, I've sort of been obsessing over this for quite a while, trying to find my "fix" to the situation and it's wearing me out. My doctor says it's just stress and anxiety, but I don't believe it. Also I do feel a lot better all around when I'm gluten free, I don't feel as sluggish.

I just need to find a cure for the gas and bloating I am getting in the morning and night. And how to eliminate the palps all together.

Also I'm curious if anyone did have these symptoms and how long being on a "diet" or removing it from your diet did they go away?

Thanks again to everyone that replied!!

[jaybee465]

Also, another thing I don't understand is that I've never had any food allergies or any of these symptoms except for a little bit more than normal gas, and all of a sudden all of these things are happening at once! So I'm not sure if it is normal to just get a food allergy out of the blue? I have heard that people with gluten intolerance seem to have just got it one day, so that's why I was suspecting gluten as the culprit. I guess I'll just keep going with the gluten free and food journal and see if I see some improvement over the next few weeks.

Still is anyone has advice on the symptom part of this, and how long they lasted for you. That would be greatly appreciated!!

Thanks again!

[MacieMay]

Hi Jaybee,

I had heart palps but I have no issues with food. Mine were definitely stress related. I do not have them anymore. Do you think you could just be feeling them when you sit down to eat because that is when you are paying attention to them? When I had them I would have them throughout the day but only notice them at times when I slowed down. I was a mother of two and in nursing school, that is enough stress to give anyone heart palps. But...I have to say if you feel better on a gluten-free diet stick with it. I follow this forum because my daughter has a gluten-intolerance. All her tests were negative for Celiac but something was just not right with her. We have been gluten-free for 3 months and she is soooooo much better. The gluten-intolerance is a real thing. It is hard to prove and get a doctor to diagnosis it. Good luck!!! I bet you find your heart palps go away with time. Do you have a family history of anxiety or panic attacks? That can go hand in hand with heart palps. Good luck!

[Victoria6102]

I have had palpitations a lot, so trust me I understand what you mean. Before I found out I had celiac, I went to a cardiologist for my palpitations. They said I had orthostatic hypotension, which is low blood pressure which gets considerably lower instantly when you change positions (such as sitting to standing, or laying to sitting). The test for it is very simple: take your blood pressure while you are sitting calmly; then quickly stand up and take it again right away. If the number has gone down by atleast 10 you probably have this. Palpitations are one of the big symptoms of orthostatic hypotension. The cure is very simple too, drink LOTS of water, and eat as much salt as you can! You should start to feel better within a few days if this is what you have.

[starrytrekchic]

Not sure if this will help, but...

I didn't have any heart palpitations (other than the once or twice a year most people get) until I was gluten free for almost a year. Now I've had them the last two months. They started with one extended, scary palpitation (almost 30 seconds long) and have varied since. I have them most days. The first month they were super scary & caused lots of anxiety, but now I'm just used to them.

I've looked into causes & there are a ton of them. Most don't seem serious, but some are. I tried cutting out caffeine, but failed at that. That seemed to get less when I started taking a magnesium/calcium/zinc supplement & eating a higher potassium diet, but they never went away. They don't seem to be related to food for me, but I'd keep looking at that. It could be a problem with the heart, a viral or bacterial infection, low blood sugar, vitamin/mineral/electrolyte deficiencies, or pretty much anything.

I'd start a list of the possible causes and work through them. That's what I'm doing (admittedly very slowly.)

I don't know that the palpitations are related to gluten (for me they obviously aren't) but you shouldn't have to put up with things like gas. I think you should give the gluten-free diet a nice long trial (6 months or so) and see how you feel.

[starrytrekchic]

I have had palpitations a lot, so trust me I understand what you mean. Before I found out I had celiac, I went to a cardiologist for my palpitations. They said I had orthostatic hypotension, which is low blood pressure which gets considerably lower instantly when you change positions (such as sitting to standing, or laying to sitting). The test for it is very simple: take your blood pressure while you are sitting calmly; then quickly stand up and take it again right away. If the number has gone down by atleast 10 you probably have this. Palpitations are one of the big symptoms of orthostatic hypotension. The cure is very simple too, drink LOTS of water, and eat as much salt as you can! You should start to feel better within a few days if this is what you have.

I'm curious about this because it seems like most of my palpitations occur when I've just sat down, but I haven't seen this listed under things that cause palpitations. Also, I don't get any of the other symptoms of blood pressure drop, except on very rare occasions. Though, I do hate salty things & pretty much never eat them, so that might mean something.

[Victoria6102]

Starrytrekchik-

Yes, I know what you are talking about! The change of position, which can also be standing to sitting, requires a blood pressure change. For people who have what I have, our body can't do it fast enough which makes us feel weird...do you feel faint, dizzy or nauseous when you stand up or sit up, or sit down? You can do a simple check if you have orthostatic hypotension by finding someone who owns a blood pressure cuff and have them measure your blood pressure while sitting, then again right when you stand up and see if the number dropped by 10 points

Hope you get well soon!!

[starrytrekchic]

Starrytrekchik-

Yes, I know what you are talking about! The change of position, which can also be standing to sitting, requires a blood pressure change. For people who have what I have, our body can't do it fast enough which makes us feel weird...do you feel faint, dizzy or nauseous when you stand up or sit up, or sit down? You can do a simple check if you have orthostatic hypotension by finding someone who owns a blood pressure cuff and have them measure your blood pressure while sitting, then again right when you stand up and see if the number dropped by 10 points

Hope you get well soon!!

Thanks. I don't seem to have any of the other symptoms...though I do randomly feel a bit faint when standing. I think I know someone with a blood pressure cuff, so I'll try that.