I have not been diagnosed with any serious heart problems but at the very least I have pectus excavatum; my doc called it pigeon chest. Basically I have a weak/ inefficient heart but no major structural, blood pressure, or heart rhythm problems.
My bad heart has always been a huge problem when I played sports for two main reasons:
- I get out of breath really easy, and I can't push through. I basically gasp for air and my muscles seize up.
- I sweat like no one I have ever seen before. I get comments almost every time I play on how much I sweat from other people.
And another thing that I think is related to aerobic exercise is that I become cognitively slower. I have more difficultly speaking/conversing. The longer I play the worse my cognitive functioning and social skills become. Communicating during the game is very hard for me, I usually don't bother, frustrating my team mates.
Does anyone have any ideas if this can happen?
Does anyone have ideas for treatment? to improve cardio or to reduce sweating?
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I have experience with two heart medications: beta blockers, and calcium channel blockers. Beta blockers had no positive effects on my aerobic performance but diltiazem (a sodium channel blocker) has had a huge effect on my cardio. I have been working on jogging and I recently jogged 3 km in a reasonable 17minutes. In comparison I did 2km in highschool in 15m30s. No idea why a calcium channel blocker would help my cardio so much, although it has not greatly affected my sweating. My best guess at the reason for my cardio problems is that I overheat causing cognitive effects in the brain. But IDK anyone have ideas?