This is a success story and a mystery--what caused the success?
Summary: My fourth episode of tachycardia ended "spontaneously" but after supplementing with Vitamin D3 and making other dietary changes.
For about twelve years, I have been eating a subset of the McDougall Program diet, as described here: http://anti-itisdiet.blogspot.com/2010/ ... i-eat.html. It has been great therapy for me. It ended all but one of my many medical problems: http://anti-itisdiet.blogspot.com/2007/ ... ation.html
However, I have had one series of problems that began earlier, four episodes of tachycardia (rapid heart rate), that the diet did not cure. A hospital emergency room doctor ended the first episode quickly with an injection of a chemical into my artery. That correction lasted about 10 years. After elaborate pharmaceutical preparation, a cardiologist cured the second episode with electro-cardioversion (a shaped electrical pulse to the heart nerve). That lasted about a year. (My memory of some of the events is fading.) The third episode, again while I was taking metoprolol, ended "spontaneously" a few years ago in July and the correction lasted until the following March, last year, when the fourth episode began. In 2013, I began taking Vitamin D3 (3000 IU per week) in October, and the episode stopped "spontaneously" in mid December. Now, in January I am still free of rapid heart rate. My rate is generally about 55 beats per minute (down from about 125 during each episode).
Here is a summary of the circumstantial facts:
1. Vitamin D is the "sunshine vitamin" because it naturally comes from exposure to sunshine (as well as from some animal products such as some fish).
2. All four episodes of tachycardia began in the period c. December 15 to March 15, the cumulatively darkest months.
3. One episode spontaneously ended in July, the sunniest month of the year. (I walk two hours daily, but I live in rain-forest country, where sun is rare most of the year.)
4. One episode spontaneously ended after taking Vitamin D supplements for about two months.
PUZZLE
I know enough to be leery of falling into the trap of "after this, because of this." Perhaps spontaneous conversion was a coincidence with taking the Vitamin D3 or other diet changes. What did cause the fix? I don't really know, but in the meantime I plan to continue taking D3 in the low amount I am using (about RDA).
NOTES
1. Blood tests have shown that my levels were within the conventional limits, though "low." Even my precautionary physicians have seen no concern for inadequate Vitamin D.
2. Here is one list of foods containing Vitamin D: http://www.webmd.com/osteoporosis/featu ... od-sources. I can eat no solid animal products without getting inflammation problems. Three times in my life when I tried fish oil (for Vitamin D), I got a hemorrhage in one eye or the other. Fish oil is a powerful anti-coagulant, I now know. I avoid it and other anticoagulants.
3. Here are Dr. McDougall's recommendations on Vitamin D: http://www.drmcdougall.com/misc/2011nl/mar/vitd.htm. I need to review this to reconsider using a UV lamp as an alternative (or addition) to supplementation.
4. Confusing the issue are these other changes I made in my diet around October 2013 (when I began the D3 supplements): about 10 servings of greens per week; eliminating salt completely; eating about 20 mushrooms per week (not treated with UV for Vitamin D).
)
