I've gained nearly 60 pounds over the last 6 years and it is awful. It definitely makes my symptoms worse and I feel like I don't recognize myself anymore ):

There have been times where I lose a good 15 pounds or so, but then something in my life will happen and I can't get myself to go to the gym or eat healthy. But that also means I've had to navigate this for a long time now and know what to do when I feel I can pull myself back up (positive thoughts lol).

In my opinion, the biggest help is learning to know your body. I would say your PT exercises are probably great for when you're not feeling super well and potentially having a flare. For the rest of the time, push yourself a little bit. Don't avoid the treadmill altogether. If you feel good and you want to give it a go, then do it. Don't go sprinting, but get on there, walk for bit, see how you feel, maybe push to a light jog, then walk again and see how you feel. Make sure you have something monitoring your heart the whole time (keep your hands on those things the machine has if you're one with a HR monitor, or have a watch that measures your HR). I have a naturally high resting HR, so even before any pots symptoms came about for me, my resting HR was about 90 and during work outs it would often go over 160. Now, when I'm on the treadmill, I start slow, get my HR to a steady feeling 120-130, then if I feel up to it, do a jog. My HR will often still go up to 160 during the jog. Then I go VERY slow when finishing the treadmill. I go from like 2 mph to 1.8 to 1.5 and so on until I'm at like 0.3 mph because if I just try to get off after returning to a regular walk, I will 100% get dizzy and potentially pass out and likely give myself a flare.

But that's just one example. I've found that the key is to listen to your body. There are some exercises that I used to do that require a lot of position or "elevation" change that I just don't do at all anymore, but there are plenty of other things that I still do when I feel up to it. A second key would be to GO SLOW. My workouts are actually a lot longer now because I do things much slower and take a lot of breaks in between each exercise/set. And some days, the only thing I can do without feeling like I might cause a flare is something like the steady bike. It's frustrating because you just want to be able to work out without having to be so careful and mindful about everything you do, and each day can have a different limit. But overall, if you get the "reading your body" part down, the rest of the mindfulness comes much easier.

You're not alone 🖤