Pulmonary Embolism Support Group
By far the most common form of pulmonary embolism is a thromboembolism, which occurs when a blood clot, generally a venous thrombus, becomes dislodged from its site of formation and embolizes to the arterial blood supply of one of the lungs. Symptoms may include difficulty breathing, pain during breathing, and more rarely circulatory instability and death.
So how did everyone ease back into exercising especially those that dealt with heart palps? I've been walking 15 minutes twice a day 4 times a week, but at a slow pace. Scared to do more...
-
Look at what my best friend did with my picture!
-
We all have 24 hours in a day. How we spend these hours is important. Watching a little bit of a video about how sitting affects us made me aware of how much sitting and laying down I do. Gonna have to work on that.Your turn. Tell me another truth.
for the first two months after my first PE I could not do any exercise. I just took short walks around my neighbourhood.
The first thing I started with was yoga, at least the poses that did not involve the chest too much (I suffered some consequences because of a lung infarction/development of adhesions).
I started lifting weights three months after the PE, first at home and then at the gym. In the beginning, I had some trouble with my heart rate, but probably mainly because of deconditioning. The first workouts I had, I really had a hard time lowering my pulse after exercise (took some good 30 minutes to get back to normal).
I resumed running (indoor) 4 months after my PE, but I could not do much. However, by March the following year I was able to run my pre-PE distances.
After my second PE (Nov 2015), I did not do anything besides yoga for one month. Note that my PE this time was really minor compared to the first one and I did not have any symptoms besides a general sense of tiredness and occasional shortness of breath. However, after the PE they found some evidence of developing pulmonary hypertension (this is because the new PE worsened the damage made by the first, as I still have residual clots in the lung from then) which they expect to reverse anyway. I have then picked up running again and now run my normal distances, although with a slightly lower pace.
Last year i had to discontinue and then pick up running a few times because of anemia and then because of a broken toe. Everytime I have my first run after a period of inactivity, my lungs hurt, but with the second and third one it gets better. I now know myself.
My advice is to listen to your body, and increment exercise gradually. If you encounter a "roadblock", try to understand whether you are pushing yourself too much or whether it is just a sign of deconditioning.
For me, exercise was crucial in recovery, especially psychologically. What kept me going, during the dark days of my first PE, was the hope that some day I could run again and be healthy as before.
Good luck!
Yeah, it's just really taking it slow at first. And I agree about deconditioning. It's remarkable how much, conditioning you lose and how quickly you lose it after being laid up from something like this. So any kind of exercise takes it out of you for a while.
My doc was very high on getting back to activity after I was discharged from the hospital, but he wanted me to start slow- walking, stationary bike, stuff like that. But I could barely walk because of the DVT. I think within a week, I was able to walk half way down the block. And then within another week I was able to go around the block. I can't remember when I got back to my regular exercise routine but I would say by the 3-4 mark. My heart rate still always gets pretty high when I work out but I think it's normal for me now. My resting pulse rate is like 90-95 since the PE, which was in 2007.
Is your cardiologist ok with you exercising more?.
@rmb That is a good question. I haven't asked him but he did say at my appt last week when I was saying how my heart rate spikes that I may need to increase my warm-up time. I guess I will continue to take it slow.