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How the heart influences what we perceive and fear

quantamagazine.org

1–10 of 57 posts

Re: How the heart influences what we perceive and fear

#2
Reminds me of a personal experience I had with general anesthesia and a remembered "dream" segment of calmly wondering if I had died of complications and the afterlife was just this void. The current theory of mechanism for anesthesia is that it stops nerves from carrying signals to the brain which would be consistent with the lack of fear in considering what would be a premise of horror short story.

Re: How the heart influences what we perceive and fear

#3
Q: Is the described effect moderated by blood pressure? In other words, if one's blood pressure is higher, does the systolic effect rise in intensity relevant to the neurological processes discussed in the article? I would guess so but the article doesn't really get into that.

Re: How the heart influences what we perceive and fear

#4
My heart brought me a solid anxiety disorder. I have ventricular extrasystoles, been to a couple of different cardiologists, done longtime ecg monitoring, echocardiograms and everyone told me my heart is fine, and I should chill.

Coupled with low blood potassium levels and increasing distrust in my heart, I developed a fear that I could get ventricular tachycardia, and basically die instantly. I'm 33.

I know it's slightly off topic, but just be happy if you don't feel your heart beating and it's doing its work without you noticing. In my case, my anxiety disorder and fear is increasing adrenalin, making my heart stumble even more. It's so annoying knowing all that, but the emotions are just overwhelming and it's really hard to fight this.

Re: How the heart influences what we perceive and fear

#5

My heart brought me a solid anxiety disorder. I have ventricular extrasystoles, been to a couple of different cardiologists, done longtime ecg monitoring, echocardiograms and everyone told me my heart is fine, and I should chill. Coupled with low blood potassium levels and increasing distrust in my heart, I developed a fear that I could get ventricular tachycardia, and basically die instantly. I'm 33. I know it's sli…

Have you done any mindfulness training?

Re: How the heart influences what we perceive and fear

#6
Shootout eyes are probably just a western trope (I would guess "soft eyes" would be more effective) but if saccades are tied to the cardiac cycle https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00100... it would, in principle, be advantageous to draw during an opponent's saccade.

(compare the scramblers in Blindsight)

Re: How the heart influences what we perceive and fear

#7

My heart brought me a solid anxiety disorder. I have ventricular extrasystoles, been to a couple of different cardiologists, done longtime ecg monitoring, echocardiograms and everyone told me my heart is fine, and I should chill. Coupled with low blood potassium levels and increasing distrust in my heart, I developed a fear that I could get ventricular tachycardia, and basically die instantly. I'm 33. I know it's sli…

Have you done any mindfulness training?

Tried it, with limitted success. Maybe I should dive in deeper.

Re: How the heart influences what we perceive and fear

#8

My heart brought me a solid anxiety disorder. I have ventricular extrasystoles, been to a couple of different cardiologists, done longtime ecg monitoring, echocardiograms and everyone told me my heart is fine, and I should chill. Coupled with low blood potassium levels and increasing distrust in my heart, I developed a fear that I could get ventricular tachycardia, and basically die instantly. I'm 33. I know it's sli…

Look into EMDR.

Re: How the heart influences what we perceive and fear

#9

My heart brought me a solid anxiety disorder. I have ventricular extrasystoles, been to a couple of different cardiologists, done longtime ecg monitoring, echocardiograms and everyone told me my heart is fine, and I should chill. Coupled with low blood potassium levels and increasing distrust in my heart, I developed a fear that I could get ventricular tachycardia, and basically die instantly. I'm 33. I know it's sli…

What you’re describing is common and you can recover, I recommend a book called DARE - it changed my life.

Re: How the heart influences what we perceive and fear

#10

My heart brought me a solid anxiety disorder. I have ventricular extrasystoles, been to a couple of different cardiologists, done longtime ecg monitoring, echocardiograms and everyone told me my heart is fine, and I should chill. Coupled with low blood potassium levels and increasing distrust in my heart, I developed a fear that I could get ventricular tachycardia, and basically die instantly. I'm 33. I know it's sli…

I also have VESs (among other things), and I can confirm that they indeed feel quite nasty. In my experience, the heart seems to have a direct connection to the lower-level emotion-regulating parts of the brain, and any physical symptoms can trigger an overwhelming sense of imminent doom that completely bypasses the filters of my rational mind.

But I can also tell you that you eventually get used to it, and it just becomes a part of life. Feel free to drop me a line if you want to talk about it sometime (my username over at the big email provider with a G)

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