Big temperature change with exercise or prolonged exertion

[bertiedog]

I suppose because of Covid and the fact I have been getting more and more negative symptoms I bought a temperature gadget that takes your temperature 5 cm from your forehead. It has been very enlightening.

When I am resting with my feet on the sofa my temperature is between 36.3-36.5 for the most part. However whenever I have done some cleaning and can feel some negative effects it drops to 35.1. This has happened every time I have checked and especially after walking my Beagle for 25 minutes maximum. That 25 minutes includes a sit down of at least 5 minutes.

Today I felt a bit better having raised my thyroid medication a bit due to the symptoms I have been experiencing and I was very surprised to see that this time though I didn't feel too bad at all after my walk temperature had dropped to 34.9.

Yet again after a short rest and a top up with my oxygen concentrator it is back up to 36.4.

I was wondering if everybody has checked their temperature in this way and sees a similar patten?I should add that I do have hypothyroidism but thought I was doing ok on 1 1/2 grains NDT daily plus 25 mcg thyroxine. I have been on this dose the whole of this year after having to drop my dose from 2 grains at the beginning of the year when I had some really nasty viruses that caused huge heart and OI issues making me intolerant of any thyroid medication for a short time. My blood tests looked find in February so I stuck to the 1 1/2 grains plus the 25 mcg thyroxine.

Symptoms have been creeping up since May when I started getting a bad lower back and since then I have started having frequent short lived viral attacks, GI symptoms, intractable migraines and more recently weight gain. plus huge exhaustion.

The final symptoms that helped me to sort out what is probably going on was arthritic pain in my hands and feet which was so bad some days I wondered for how much longer I was going to be able to walk. I also looked back at my Kardia data and could see my heart rate had dropped down to 62 when checked whereas it used to be around 72 at least.

Because we have had an endless hot summer in south east England I have rarely felt cold, otherwise I might have picked up a lot earlier what was going on.

I realise that things are going to be unstable for some time because it will take a while for the small extra increase of NDT to work but I was surprised by the temperature variation with any exercise or exertion and wondered how common this is in ME/CFS.

Pam

 

[ljimbo423]

When I am resting with my feet on the sofa my temperature is between 36.3-36.5 for the most part. However whenever I have done some cleaning and can feel some negative effects it drops to 35.1. This has happened every time I have checked and especially after walking my Beagle for 25 minutes maximum.

This is really interesting. I would think it would be just the opposite. The more you do physically the higher your temperature. Maybe somebody that sees your post could explain the possible biology behind this.

Would being low on thyroid medication cause your temp. to be low after physical activity?

I hope things even out for you soon and you feel better.

 

[PatJ]

When I am resting with my feet on the sofa my temperature is between 36.3-36.5 for the most part. However whenever I have done some cleaning and can feel some negative effects it drops to 35.1. This has happened every time I have checked and especially after walking my Beagle for 25 minutes maximum.

This is really interesting. I would think it would be just the opposite. The more you do physically the higher your temperature. Maybe somebody that sees your post could explain the possible biology behind this.

If the temperature sensor is relying on a normal/healthy/average amount of blood in the head then maybe this is a sign that exercise is causing your blood to move down into the body and not circulate properly back upward. This would also lead to feeling worse since it's a form of othostatic intolerance.

 

[bertiedog]

If the temperature sensor is relying on a normal/healthy/average amount of blood in the head then maybe this is a sign that exercise is causing your blood to move down into the body and not circulate properly back upward. This would also lead to feeling worse since it's a form of othostatic intolerance.

Thank you Pat that really does make sense because I definitely do have OI but its the hyperadrenic form that I suffer with so although I actually feel hotter than normal (from adrenaline) when the symptoms come on of exhaustion and heavy legs whenever I have taken my temperature its a lot lower than normal. As mentioned above after say 30 minutes of lying down with my feet up my temperature recovers.

I don't think my temperature would recover though if I am sitting upright after exertion, I think I need to be lying down. I will have to check that and see but I know I never fully recover sitting.

If it is due to the OI my guess would be that it happens to everyone who suffers with this.

Pam

 

[pattismith]

Pam, did you check with another kind of thermometer?

you may also check with your forehead thermometer at another part of the body.

This way you may control if your low head temperature is related to your OI

 

[bertiedog]

Pam, did you check with another kind of thermometer?

I haven't done recently because my old digital one ceased working but I often had low readings. I did Google how the forehead thermometers work and this is what came up -

Temporal artery thermometers — often sold as forehead thermometers — use an infrared scanner to measure the temperature of the temporal artery in the forehead.

So its the temperature of the temporal artery that is measured so I am thinking if there is less blood flow getting to the head because of OI that would be the issue. It recovers as long as I am lying down with legs on the sofa but it doesn't work if I stay sitting upright but I tend not to do that because I would be feeling so dreadful.

I have been reading about this on Cort's site, he has written loads about all the various forms of POTS and the drugs used. I do take a low dose of Propananol and had to raise this during the hot summer but now I think I have an explanation as to why I need a bit more thyroid medication. Betablockers stop the conversion of T3 which is the active hormone so by having to double my beta blocker for several months it was in effect making me slightly hypothyroid again.

Already I have had a bit better energy with much less pain and that is with just a quarter of a grain rise and have lost the 3 lbs in weight that I had put on but unfortunately it does nothing to stop the leaden legs, exhaustion, etc when I have to do a bit of cleaning or shopping.

I checked my genetic SNPs from the GeneticLifeHacks sites of which I am a member and I do have the ones involved in the Adrenergic system and POTS and also a problem with the NOS3 gene: which codes for endothelial nitric oxide (NO) synthase enzyme, which is essential for relaxing blood vessels.

It might explain why my mother and brother had a tendency to feint when under a big stressor but neither of them had disabling symptoms like mine.

Thanks for everyone's help it does help me to understand what is going on but I think I just have to accept how things are.

Pam

 

[PatJ]

leaden legs

I expect you've tried this but I'll mention it anyway: if the leaden legs feeling is due to blood pooling then compression stockings might help.