The Hot Yoga Doctor – Free Bikram and Hot Yoga Resources › Hot Yoga Doctor Forum › General Hot Yoga Discussion › Hot Yoga *faq* › Heart Problems
-
AuthorPosts
-
After doing hot yoga for about a month I was diagnosed with a heart condition. I found myself unable to complete even a 60 minute class without feeling dizzy/faint.
My physician has given me the green light to continue with yoga, but what advice can you offer to keep these feelings at bay?Thanks
Hi Julia
Would you be able to tell me what actually brings on the dizziness? For example are they standing poses, semi-inverted ones, no particular pattern, a particular pose(s)? Are there poses that never cause these feelings? Did you start feeling the dizziness after the diagnosis or go to the doctor as a result of the dizziness? If you don’t mind it is an important subject and I would really love to have as much information as I can. Perhaps throw in anything you feel is relevant. You may know your blood pressure too.
I do have some very solid ideas for you but I would like to request more info to see if I am barking up the right tree so to speak! :cheese:
Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂Hi Gabrielle,
I started feeling faint/dizzy during my practice before I had the diagnosis. It was part of the reason I sought the advice of my doctor. It happens ususally 45 minutes into the class, and after doing poses like downward dog, or anything that requires going from a sitting/laying down position to a standing one. My blood pressure I take weekly, is usually within the range of 110/70. At first I thought it was the heat causing the problem, but Ive noticed an intolerance to any sort of cardiovascular exercise as well.
Any advice you can offer would be great!
Hi Julia
How to keep the dizzy feelings at bay?
One way is to be slower and more mindful with your movements where you change your positions (from lying to standing, or where your head changes position from upright to inverted). I know that with my low blood pressure that I have to finish a semi-inverted or inverted pose, take a whole breath or 2 in position after having released the tension of the pose, while staying down there, then release coming up slowly. For example I will relax all my muscles, take the breaths then re-engage whatever muscles are required to move on to the next position. You have to be quite deliberate.
I make sure also that the breath is coordinated with the movement. Inhaling steadily and smoothly as I come back up off the floor, or lift my arms up. Exhaling steadily and smoothly as I bring my arms down. You get the picture. Your blood pressure seems quite normal but taking it easy on moving around should help you, while working on breath. You want to breathe through the nose (have you seen my recent breathing video?) and experiment with the quality and depth of your breath so that you continue to get oxygen to your body. You will work out what you need to do to your breath, make it more shallow or more deep in certain conditions.
You could see if you can find more of a static style of yoga for a while, if you are doing a lot of the type of pose transitions that continue to bother you.
Namaste
Gabrielle 🙂Hi Julia,
I’m a cardiac rehab nurse. I just wanted to mention that if you were placed on cardiac medications, especially Beta Blockers like Metoprolol or Toprol your medications could be causing continued dizziness by preventing your body from responding to your pose to pose positional changes. That improves for most people over time. Moving slowly through position changes can really help in the meantime.
-
AuthorPosts
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.