What is POTS exactly?????

Hello all and welcome to my journey! 

My name is Grace Quinlivan and I am a 21 year old female living in upstate New York. I am currently in my senior year of college.

So you may be wondering what the heck is POTS. POTS stands for Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome. Postural referring to a change in posture, orthostatic meaning upright position and tachycardia meaning a fast heart rate. Basically, when a human (without POTS) changes their position to an upright posture, gravity pulls the blood down and the body senses this. The autonomic nervous system then directs the blood upward and the blood circulates the whole body. For people with POTS, the autonomic nervous system malfunctions meaning when the upright position is assumed, the blood pools in the stomach and lower extremities of the body and the blood does not make it up to the head. This then causes the heart to try and compensate for the absence of blood in the head by beating rapidly. As you can imagine, this does not feel great.

People with POTS  frequently feel very light headed, dizzy and in a case like mine pass out quite frequently. In addition to being a circulation disorder, POTS is also a chronic illness. People with this disorder have chronic fatigue, heart palpitations, GI issues, headaches etc. Now you may be wondering how this can be cured and the answer is, it unfortunately cannot. Treatments to lessen symptoms include lifestyle changes, increased fluid and salt intake, rest and rehabilitation therapy. 

The plus side for me is that I was diagnosed fairly young and I am expected to grow out of daily symptoms in a few years. Right now I have trouble standing or walking for more than a few minutes. I am hoping in a year or two I will be able to resume a normal life with the exception of flare ups or bad days. I hope this post spreads some awareness! 

#POTSawareness #PosturalOrthostaticTachycardiaSyndrome 



Source: https://www.bing.com/images/search?view=detailV2&ccid=SemStagq&id=9A1A2006287DCB067430260C1756DBC38D68C58C&thid=OIP.SemStagq5rRh2V7nQO8uXQHaE8&mediaurl=https%3a%2f%2fi.pinimg.com%2foriginals%2ff0%2f01%2f74%2ff00174a26e76e6fbbb28cb5042e3fc6a.png&cdnurl=https%3a%2f%2fth.bing.com%2fth%2fid%2fR.49e992b5a82ae6b461d95ee740ef2e5d%3frik%3djMVojcPbVhcMJg%26pid%3dImgRaw%26r%3d0&exph=600&expw=900&q=postural+orthostatic+tachycardia+syndrome&simid=608040217044345599&FORM=IRPRST&ck=B915EB241C5572850D3650A5E2BAB4A4&selectedIndex=89&ajaxhist=0&ajaxserp=0

Comments

  1. This is so informational Grace! I have never heard about this condition before and this was a great way to explain and spread awareness about this condition. I hope that you see improvements throughout the next few years! You did a great job in explaining it simply! I hope today has been a good day for you!

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  2. Thank you for sharing your story about your condition! I think it's so important that you chose this topic so you can inform more people about it and what you go through daily. I hope your journey with it continuously improves and I'm glad you expect to grow out of daily symptoms soon!

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