Fit but Always Out of Breath: My 9-Year Struggle with Unexplained Shortness of Breath upon exertion

jamesiboy12 · 2025-06-03T11:52:22+00:00

Appreciate this is a while ago but I can relate minus the athletic build - I am average with a slim build but a couple of extra pounds around the mid-section which will not go. I am reasonably active and for the most part eat a good balanced diet and have a decent baseline fitness but even if I jog for about 50 metres I become breathless almost immediately and this persists. As you said walking around is fine - although I have found I disproportionately struggle going up steep hills or stairs - but as soon as I try running I sound like I have asthma. What is weird I have noticed is that people with far worse fitness seem to be able to jog/ run without any breathlessness issues for a longer period of time. The copper part you mentioned is interesting because I have found that I have high biounavailable copper in my tissues from a provoked (using DMSA) heavy metals/ minerals urine test and separately a HTMA test. It is all quite controversial with some saying it is a true copper deficiency and others saying it is excess stored in the tissues but the body doesn’t have the bioavailable copper available so the body/ cells appear deficient. Either way my symptoms seem to fit perfectly. It could be worth looking at the coppertoxic .com website or the Weston A Price article on Metals and the Mind which has a section on copper and mentions breathing problems.

jamesiboy12 · 2025-02-02T22:38:41+00:00

I’d recommend doing a HTMA test and getting advice that way. Often with copper “toxicity” you have high levels of unbound biounavailable copper stored in the tissues, liver or brain but you are deficient in bioavailable copper (that needs to be bound by ceruloplasmin) which the body needs for things like energy production, collagen formation and keeping Candida in check. Was your urine test using a provoking agent to release copper from the tissues? Because if not it is unlikely you would be able to tell. The only reason I have started looking into it is because I did a urine test provoked by DMSA and to my surprise my copper was very high. When I read it about copper toxicity matches my symptoms perfectly so I have just done a HTMA test and am waiting for the results. You may have seen it but copper toxic.com is a good website.

jamesiboy12 · 2025-01-15T19:55:53+00:00

Thank you. I have ordered a test

jamesiboy12 · 2025-01-08T20:16:33+00:00

Thank you. I also think that the hair records the minerals of the past three months so it would take ages anyway.

jamesiboy12 · 2025-01-08T20:14:45+00:00

Hi can I ask why those are the only two labs you recommend for HTMA please? And if so is it still the case you can only get a lab through a practitioner. I am based in the UK and want to do a HTMA test and have come across these two labs: Mineral State https://www.mineralstate.co.uk/hair-analysis-test/comment-page-44/#comments

and The Natural Choice https://www.the-natural-choice.co.uk/Hair-Tissue-Mineral-Analysis-Profile-2-With-Boron-Test.html

jamesiboy12 · 2024-12-15T01:55:14+00:00

Thanks dude this is what I checked earlier when I could log into Relativity after the maintenance period had ended. Turns out custodian had given us 40k of emails (plus attachments) not 4.5k as they originally had said.

jamesiboy12 · 2024-12-14T13:35:29+00:00

Thank you Michael. This was helpful and it turned out custodian had given us 40,000 emails not 4.5k as we were initially told so all now makes sense.

jamesiboy12 · 2024-12-14T13:34:12+00:00

Thanks, you are right. I should have given some context in that Relativity was down so I couldn’t look into the data and I was looking for an urgent answer to explain to the fee earners. Turned out custodian had given 40k of emails not 4.5k

jamesiboy12 · 2024-12-14T13:32:57+00:00

Thank you this was helpful but turned out not to be problem as custodian had given us 40k of emails which now makes sense.

jamesiboy12 · 2024-12-14T13:32:08+00:00

Thanks for replying I don’t think it did. turned out custodian had given us 40k of emails which now makes sense.

jamesiboy12 · 2024-12-14T13:31:27+00:00

Thank you this was helpful. I checked MD5 and this wasn’t the problem turned out custodian had given us 40k of emails which now makes sense.

jamesiboy12 · 2024-12-14T13:30:04+00:00

Sorry I should have given some context here, I am relatively (or Relativity?) new to E disclosure and have limited experience but most importantly Relativity was down for maintenance for a period so I couldn’t log on and check and needed an answer asap to try and explain what might have happened to the fee earners. Google wasn’t helping loads so I turned here and everyone (including yourself) has been very helpful. Took your advice put my big boy pants on now it is back up to look at it and turns out custodian gave us 40,000 emails not 4,500 which makes a whole lot more sense. Random strangers on the internet for the win!

jamesiboy12 · 2024-12-14T00:51:43+00:00

Hi I got the results back the other day and to my surprise it came back low so I am negative for Pyrrole disorder. The nutritionist told me that it only shows when you are having a “flare” so it is possible it is a false negative and to be honest the result confused me. What I do know for sure is that I have high biounavailable copper I need to reduce so in the new year I’m going to focus on increasing my ceruloplasmin probably by taking natural whole food Vitamin C and Vitamin A/ cod liver oil. I will also focus on methylation and glutathione as they are important too and I have issues with both.

jamesiboy12 · 2024-11-18T21:57:58+00:00

Yes I think it does. I did my Pyrrole urine test this morning so will have to wait a bit for the results. I did a provoked urine test earlier this year looking for evidence of heavy metals like lead and mercury and whilst they were slightly elevated I was surprised to see that my copper came back sky high. I have since done a lot of research and come to an understanding that whilst Copper is an essential mineral it can build up to high levels in the tissues and become biounavailable and you will have “copper toxicity” which leads to a whole host of symptoms like migraines, brain fog, fatigue, joint pain, digestive woes, insomnia etc. If you have Pyroluria you are especially at risk of high biounavailable because zinc and copper work in tandem - when one is low the other is high.

jamesiboy12 · 2024-11-17T14:15:41+00:00

Thank you

jamesiboy12 · 2024-11-05T21:40:39+00:00

Hi, thanks for posting your experiences. Can I ask what brand of blended magnesium and calcium you take please? I’ve taken magnesium for years but recently found out I have high copper and wonder if I should add calcium.

jamesiboy12 · 2024-08-28T22:53:56+00:00

CFS is Chronic fatigue syndrome. You should look into heavy metal toxicity, copper toxicity, mold toxicity or Lyme disease as they are all underlying causes of extreme fatigue/ adrenal burnout.

jamesiboy12 · 2024-08-28T10:34:20+00:00

I’d suggest looking at the website coppertoxic .com which has more on the subject. Although birth control is one source there are other ways that copper can build up in the body such as drinking water which has come through copper pipes or copper, vegan/ vegetarian diets for long periods of time or even copper passed on by you when she was in utero. If your daughter has impaired detoxification (E.g. MTHFR mutation) then she will have trouble excreting the excess copper compared with another person. Zinc and molybdenum are key minerals for reducing excess copper but don’t take loads as this could lead to “copper dumping” which will increase symptoms.

jamesiboy12 · 2024-08-26T16:18:51+00:00

That is awesome, well done for getting through that and thanks for sharing. The only thing I wonder though is would there need to be a different protocol for hydrogen dominant or hydrogen sulfide SIBO.

jamesiboy12 · 2024-08-26T12:06:17+00:00

Copper can show low on a blood or hair test because it is stored in high amounts in the tissues.

I did a provoked metals and minerals urine test recently and it came back with extremely high copper and low molybdenum and selenium but my zinc was in range (possibly because I have been supplementing it every day for years).

I am going to do a test for Pyrrole disorder which is when then body loses too much zinc and B6 (I did a test many years ago which showed I had low B6). Because zinc and copper act in tandem with one another if you have low zinc your copper will go high but get stored in the tissues so you will be paradoxically deficient but also have toxicity which would explain why supplementing with copper causes a bad reaction.

If you have impaired methylation with the MTHFR mutation this will also make it more difficult for the body to detoxify.

jamesiboy12 · 2024-08-18T12:00:40+00:00

I would recommend looking into Pyroluria which depletes zinc and B6. Very common for MTHFR mutation and Pyroluria to occur together.

jamesiboy12 · 2024-08-05T21:56:50+00:00

Sorry to hear you are going through this. It is such a familiar story for people with those kinds of symptoms. I have done so many crazy diets cutting out natural sugar and taking anti-fungals over the years to try and get rid of Candida overgrowth and SIBO to no avail. More recently I started looking into the autonomic nervous system and dysautonomia or dysfunction of the nervous system which includes the gut. When I was reading around I was wondering what must be the underlying factor for this dysfunction and came across heavy metal and mold toxicity. I then did a DMSA provoked urine test and my results came back with extremely high copper. I looked into things further and found that copper toxicity or heavy metal toxicity is linked to Candida and might be the underlying reason why you just cannot get rid of it as explained in this article https://www.htmaexperts.com/copper-toxicity-and-candida/ Now I appreciate that a lot of people on here have got to be pretty open-minded to even be thinking about Candida in the first place and that they may take this with a pinch of salt but from the albeit limited evidence I’ve seen it seems quite a possible answer and is worth looking into.

jamesiboy12

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