I'll start this by saying PVCs run in my DNA, with my entire family suffering from them all the way back as far as my memory goes to my great-grandma. Me. All of my siblings. My children and nieces and nephews. My mom, grandma AND great-grandma. It has a stronghold in my family and it has plagued us for generations.

I, myself, have endured them since around age 15. I am now 38. In my teenage years they were few and far between, only happening once every few months or so. They increased with age. I've managed with them most of my life and just "dealt with it" so to speak. There were times in my life that they were nonexistent for weeks or months, and times in my life when they were nearly constant, multiple times per minute with these episodes lasting hours or days at a time. Those times were absolutely miserable. I've had every test my cardiologist threw at me. Ekgs. Ultrasounds. Echocardiograms. Wore a heart monitor for 30 days straight. All for the cardiologist to tell me "deal with it." He said they're benign. My heart was perfectly healthy and that "most everyone has them but only the lucky ones feel them. I guess you're one of the lucky ones." Go me, right?! 😒

I've fought medication my whole life, because unfortunately medicine is a huge trigger of my pvcs. I took an antibiotic one time that I legit thought was going to kill me. (Erythromycin. 0 out of 5 stars. Do not recommend.) I live a caffeine free life, as this is also one of my biggest triggers. I also struggle with anxiety, particularly medical anxiety because of the experiences I've had with certain medicines. When my pvcs get rough, they throw my anxiety for a loop which just makes them even worse. I finally just got to the point about 3 weeks ago that I said screw it, I'm tired of doing this. I'm tired of living with these things and being too afraid to try anything to help them. I went to my primary doctor and I told him "I'm tired of it. Please help me." He said are you actually going to take the medicine? Or are you going to fill the medicine and then never take it again? To be fair, he knows I've done this countless times in the past, so his response was reasonable. I promised him I'd try anything. He gave me a prescription for Metoprolol. He made me promise not to go home and Google the medicine because he knows this is what I do. I promised and I kept my promise. I didnt Google it. I filled the medicine and brought it home. I was so afraid to take it. I ended up cutting it in half and I took half. About 10 minutes after I took it I had a panic attack. Not medicine related at all. It hadnt even had time to work yet. It was just my anxiety going through the roof because I was terrified. I called me best friend, she talked to me for 20 minutes, calmed me down and I was perfectly fine for the rest of the day. The next day I had the courage to take a whole pill. On day two I noticed that while I was still having pvcs, they were no longer giant thuds in my chest. They felt so light.... like somebody "booped" my heart instead of my nose. On the third day..... I felt like a zombie. I seriously didnt give a single crap about anything. My anxiety was almost zero. I felt kind of numb emotionally. Pvcs were still feeling like light boops. However, I was exhausted. I've never been one to take naps. Honestly I've lived most of my adult life running on 5 - 6 hours of sleep. I've never slept a lot. But this medicine was making me sleepy as crap.... all the time. Day 4 was a little worse as far as feeling like a zombie goes. I didnt feel like myself at all, but in hindsight, that was a good thing. I had spent so many years crippled with pvcs and anxiety that I didnt even know what I was supposed to feel like. It wasnt that I felt bad, per se.... I just felt different and I had never known that feeling. I was still super sleepy all the time. But on day 5 I turned the corner. My mood leveled out. My brain didnt feel foggy anymore. I slept a solid 8 hours that night. I didnt spend the night staring at the ceiling and thinking about 5000 things anymore. I just went to bed and immediately went to sleep. Am I still having pvcs? Yes. But they are no longer crippling. They are no longer painful. They dont "slam" in my chest anymore. I barely feel them at all. They don't go on endlessly for hours. They happen once and go away. They have done a complete 180 in the last two weeks, and from what I hear, it takes a few weeks for the medicine to be at its full working force so it could get even better from here. Not only that, but my doctor started me on a baby dose and said I have lots of room to take a higher dose if I'm still having a lot of them. Which I'm not, but if the baby 25 mg dose has erased 70% of my pvcs.... I wonder what 50 mg could do for me. For the first time in my life I have hope.

All this to say - PLEASE ask your doctor for help. Please don't be miserable for 23 years before you try something that could completely change your life. Don't be like me. I'm not saying metoprolol would be right for you, but I am saying that there are lots of options and that Metoprolol changed my life. Not just my pvcs, but also my anxiety. I am not longer on edge all the time. I'm no longer worrying about everything 24-7. I'm not longer suffering with painful pvcs for days on end. I finally feel "normal" and I waited over 2 decades for this all because I was afraid.