This weekend was our Pacific Masters Championships. It was a close battle between WCM and USF and I don't know who won at this very moment. I don't care.
You see, I left right before the 1000 today (the last event) right after the last relays. I watched some great swims today. Amazing swims. My friend Brendon swam a 2:03 200 fly and really hit his taper (as he's not going to Nationals)- we were teasing about how he does really well the week after a tapered meet. He seemed to finally figure it out this time.
My friend Stephen called me tonight and told me that Brendon also had a great 1000, was warming down, had a heart attack and died. He was 35. I was stunned. I've been crying since then trying to make sense of it all. It doesn't make sense.
I called some other friends and no one else can believe it either. Suddenly, the meet doesn't matter, swimming doesn't matter, what matters is that we lost a really great guy today. He was always so happy, funny, and loved to tell jokes. He was really good natured and fun to be around. I will miss him terribly.
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Originally posted by swimr4life
OK! I'm a little scared now! How can you tell the difference between the benign palpitations and the lethal arrhythmias? I've been having an irregular heartbeat for over a year now. I've told my Dr. and he said not to worry. When I have it , my heart almost stops for a few seconds, then feels like its doing flipturns, then races for a few seconds and settles into a normal beat. Is this ok?
Sorry...I don't mean to hijack the thread but this got my attention!!:confused:
I have one form of this. I have PVC (Premature Ventricular Contraction.) There is a corollary condition, PAC (Premature Atrial Contraction.) As best as I can understand it, basically what happens is that either the ventricle or the atrium contract out of turn from time to time. What I feel at this time is the normal thub-dub, thub-dub getting interrupted with what I can only describe as a thub-dub-dub. And then my heart sort of skips a beat to get back into rhythm. When it kicks back in, that first beat seems almost twice as hard as normal. It happens with varying frequency, from as much as once every few minutes to whole hours between occurrences. I don't always feel it each time it happens. And I rarely notice when it's NOT happening. (I can't say that I've ever felt it while swimming.)
They told me they have no concrete causes, but they believe it could be attached to stress, excessive caffiene, lack of sleep, certain meds (none of which I take.)
I notice it most when I am lacking sleep. And I notice it most when I am very relaxed and quieted down, such as watching TV or reading a book. (But that might be because the quiet allows me to notice it more readily.) I fully admit that I drink my share of coffee.
They told me this is not something to worry about, unless it progresses to a regular and frequent occurrence (like, once per minute constantly.) But I still can't help pondering what it would be like to feel it occur, and then realize that my heart didn't start back up ... Reading about incidents like the one that precipitated this thread serve to intensify that pondering.
Originally posted by swimr4life
OK! I'm a little scared now! How can you tell the difference between the benign palpitations and the lethal arrhythmias? I've been having an irregular heartbeat for over a year now. I've told my Dr. and he said not to worry. When I have it , my heart almost stops for a few seconds, then feels like its doing flipturns, then races for a few seconds and settles into a normal beat. Is this ok?
Sorry...I don't mean to hijack the thread but this got my attention!!:confused:
I have one form of this. I have PVC (Premature Ventricular Contraction.) There is a corollary condition, PAC (Premature Atrial Contraction.) As best as I can understand it, basically what happens is that either the ventricle or the atrium contract out of turn from time to time. What I feel at this time is the normal thub-dub, thub-dub getting interrupted with what I can only describe as a thub-dub-dub. And then my heart sort of skips a beat to get back into rhythm. When it kicks back in, that first beat seems almost twice as hard as normal. It happens with varying frequency, from as much as once every few minutes to whole hours between occurrences. I don't always feel it each time it happens. And I rarely notice when it's NOT happening. (I can't say that I've ever felt it while swimming.)
They told me they have no concrete causes, but they believe it could be attached to stress, excessive caffiene, lack of sleep, certain meds (none of which I take.)
I notice it most when I am lacking sleep. And I notice it most when I am very relaxed and quieted down, such as watching TV or reading a book. (But that might be because the quiet allows me to notice it more readily.) I fully admit that I drink my share of coffee.
They told me this is not something to worry about, unless it progresses to a regular and frequent occurrence (like, once per minute constantly.) But I still can't help pondering what it would be like to feel it occur, and then realize that my heart didn't start back up ... Reading about incidents like the one that precipitated this thread serve to intensify that pondering.
