I Can't Believe I am Still Here (Today)

For the last seven years or so, my heart has been a real focus for me. Back in 2015, I had an episode of atrial fibrillation combined with racing heart rate, that scared the heck out of me and also put me in the hospital. That evening was quite a story, but that’s not what I want to share today. Today I want to describe how my heart and my mind are in cahoots.

Here’s what happens. I got to bed at a reasonable hour, like 10:30pm, and fall asleep shortly thereafter. Throughout the night, maybe every 3 hours give or take, I wake up after having a crazy vivid dream. Everything is cool and I know it’s a dream, but as I lie awake and try to get back to sleep, I notice my heart beating faster than I would like. It’s a little disconcerting, and I try to ignore it, but in the quiet of the night the beats creep back into my head. I can actually hear them if I am on my left or right sides, and I can kinda feel them in my chest. Of course, the more I think about it, the faster the heart beats. And for good measure, the heart might throw in a premature atrial contraction (PAC), which is an extra beat that throws off the rhythm. It’s like 1, 2, 3, 45….6, 7, 8, 910….11, and so on. And once those those start happening, it’s anybody’s guess to see how my mind & body will work this out.

To add insult to injury, during this gap in sleep, while I am trying to sort out myself, my head reminds me of all the bad or stupid stuff I have done throughout my life. I am laughing out loud right now as I recount this, because it sounds so absurd, but in the middle of the night, I am the product of all the things that have gone wrong, and all the possible things that can go wrong will definitely most likely happen. The reality as I see it in the middle of the night with with an internal war zone happening, is that nothing good is going to happen. And to make matters worse, if I start to take my mind off it and recite some prayers or similar rote activity, I have trouble remembering the words. And you know what that means, I must be having a stroke! (LOL, holy shit this is crazy, even as I write it at noon…)

Do you see how the steam roller just went right over me, heading down hill faster than I could run out of its way? Yeah I did too, and it sounds ridiculous right now, but in the middle of the night, it is real.

Luckily Deepak Chopra told me in one of his meditation talks recently that in the middle of the night, my lower brain is active, which is the fight or flight part of the brain. So when something happens, my brain is focusing me for battle immediately! He says that that thinking and brain messaging is not “the truth.” We have to wake up a little more and let the frontal lobe give us more rational and creative thinking to balance our irrational thoughts. The steps are to take a few deep breaths and let things calm down. Taking deep breaths actually gives your body the opposite signals from fight or flight – because in the wild you would not be breathing deeply if you had to act fast against some life threatening predator. Breathing deeply and slowly counteracts the irrational messaging in your body and brain. And it gives time for the rational brain to wake up and take charge.

So I’ll end this post with that bit of good news. There are other techniques that I have been using to try to be settled throughout the whole night – and I’m still working to get there. But the above technique has saved me from running to the closet to grab my Apple Watch, so I can chart my ECG and heart rate and document it all. Besides, I have the Oura ring to do that already…

Sleep well, and breathe for god’s sake.

GPV