New to the forum!!!

I have 3rd degree heartblock, use a dual chamber pacemaker and am dependant on it. I have had a pacemaker since I was a toddler, so having a pacemaker is all I know.

I never even thought to join a forum, I thought I was an expert all this, but apparently there is a lot I do not know. haha.
I love the idea of this club, I do not know anyone who has a pacemaker, and I am typicially the only young person in the waiting room at the pacemaker clinic, so it is great to read about everyones experiences!

I also have some questions about exercise, I have always been an active person, I am gym goer, and usually go 4-5 times a week and have been doing so since I was 14. I really want to run a marathon some day but I find running terrribly difficult. Now I know running is not an easy thing to do and some people even without a heart condition find it very difficult and its something you have to train for. I always have found that I can not do cardio as intense or as long as most people (without pm) I always found it odd because I would say I am in good shape and do cardio 5 days a week for 30min each time. but I find I can get easily exerted if I intensify my cardio. for example intensify the level on a stepper machine or elipitical or increase my speed when jogging. I get dizzy, nauseous and simply exhausted and it can come very quickly. Since my goal is to one day run a marathon I want to know if this could be my pacemaker causing me to be more sensitive to high intensity cardio?

I am in better shape than my boyfriend, and he kicks my butt with cardio.

Any advice?

Sarah

3 Comments

continued..

by sp86 - 2009-03-30 08:03:27

Oh I forgot to add, I am 23 years old now, and have no other health conditions other than the congential heart block.

marathon runner

by PC - 2009-03-30 09:03:47

Hi Sarah,
I recently have been fitted with a duo chamber pacemaker for slow and irregular hearbeat. Not real knowledgable about PM"s and all but I have run a marathon before and am starting to train for another. What you really need to do is train slow and graduall increase your runs to no more than 10% a week. There are also lots of learn to run books out there. It is a long process but very rewarding one when aclompliced.
You may have to have some of your pacemaker settings looked at. Could be that maybe your PM is not adjusting to your increased activity causing you to feel bad. Have you ever gotten the printout for the PM?
Perry

PM Settings

by maryanne - 2009-03-31 01:03:02

I have had a PM for 24years....I have been active all my life. Although I haven't run a marathon I do run with my longest run todate being 16km...my goal is 20km. With that being said I have mentioned to the PM folks that I find it's my acceleration time that effects me...once I am in what I call my groove I am ok, it's just getting there. They believe it is the activity acceleration that might need to be adjusted along with any other Rate Response paramaters.

They are also going to have me wear a holter monitor and have me go for a run and then take a read out and see what happens...and based on that make adjustments....so that would be awesome.

So I am sure there is something they might be able to do for you....sometimes it just takes a little while for them to tweak things that work best for you.

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