POTS and bronchitis?

[Mary]

I don't ordinarily have POTS symptoms (for which I've been grateful!) but got quite sick this past week-end with a very bad sore throat and chest congestion, and began to feel lightheaded. I checked my BP and it had dropped to 90/50. I can't remember my HR. Ordinarily it's around 135/80 or so, highish, but I'll take it! I drank about 1/2 tsp. salt in a glass of water, went back to bed, and my BP had normalized when I got up.

This morning I'm still sick but quite a bit better, but my BP was acting weird again, down to below 110/__ and my HR was over 100. So I drank more salt water, this time two doses of a 1/2 tsp. salt in water, and finally my BP is back to where it ordinarily is and my HR is more stable.

It's possible I've gotten dehydrated from being sick, not drinking enough water. Also ordinarily I eat a lot of sunflower seeds (the kind with shells on, they're more work to eat but take care of my salt cravings), which I haven't been doing. I'm wondering if this is the case of these symptoms, or if the virus or whatever has made me sick could be causing this?

A couple of months ago when I wasn't sick I had similar symptoms, just out of the blue, felt lightheaded, and then checked my BP and sure enough it had dropped and HR went up. I can't remember what I did that time, I probably drank salt water.

I just wanted to see if anyone might have a clue as to what is going on here - thanks!

 

[Sushi]

I just wanted to see if anyone might have a clue as to what is going on here - thanks!

My BP tends to drop if there is some physical stress like illness—but my HR doesn’t go up, so NMH rather than POTS. Happened yesterday so I was wondering about the change to circadian rhythm caused by the time change. I had just read that there are more heart disturbances around time change shifts.

 

[Wolfcub]

I don't know if you still have any fever @Mary but fever raises the heart rate. It always does. Even a slightly raised temperature will do that.

Viruses just basically mess us up. Ordinarily the system stabilises when the virus is killed but even in healthy people that can take a couple of weeks or so.

I hope you will be feeling better soon, and my kind thoughts. It's so much harder for us, isn't it?

I wonder if a part of this is the body saying your system has been hit by a horrible bug, and screaming for more rest and lying down? So that's why POTS symptoms are coming up?

I really don't know. But send my kind thoughts your way Mary.

 

[Mary]

Thanks @Wolfcub - it wasn't just the raised heartrate, but my BP dropping at the same time. The other morning my BP was 90/50, very low for me - I got lightheaded. It's usually 135/80 or something similar. I had to drink salt water and finally it came back up. I think I've seen posts which talk about a possible immune component to autonomic dysfunction - I was just wondering a whether a virus could screw with our autonomic systems . . . though I don't even know if I've been dealing with a virus or bacteria. I'm definitely a lot better than a couple of days ago, but still taking it easy -- thanks for your kind thoughts!

 

[taniaaust1]

POTS can be started by viruses, it is a known trigger for someone developing POTS in the first place. I suppose seeing we already have ME/CFS in which POTS is common, we then would be more suspect able to a virus possibly giving us POTS.

sorry to hear that you are getting this new issue as this of autonomic issue sucks and obviously it isn't just causing POTS for you but coexisting other autonomic malfunction issues too eg the BP dropping.

POTS can cause a whole new lot of disabling symptoms with the ME/CFS and make things a lot worst. (as Mary said though the heart rate can also go up when sick).

 

[Mary]

Thanks @taniaaust1 - it's not constant, thank goodness! And actually mainly seems to hit in the morning, and only since I've been sick, so I'm hoping this is just temporary. Also, the salt water seems to help a lot. I feel for people who have to deal with this on a regular basis!

I think my heart goes up to try to compensate for my BP dropping . . .