Adrenaline and afib

Going on 5 weeks since ablation. No symptoms to date, however on flec100x2 and 50mg Metop. Heart rate between 76-84. My question is bout adrenaline. I wake up from dream between 4-6am almost every nite with BP 140-150 over 80+. At bedtime it is usually 100-120 over 65ish. My heart rate is not elevsted along with my blood pressure. I have read where both BP and Blood sugar can rise due to Your sleep activity (dreams). Most of the dreams involve me stressing to overcome a situation. Any thoughts? I am hoping that since my heart rate doesn’t rise along with BP that is good.

Are you checking your BP lying in bed, or after standing? or after walking around?

Quit checking your BP in the middle of the night after a stressful dream and the problem will go away.

I wake up from dream and feel my chest beating. Get up ad go bathroom. Go over and sit at table and wait a minute. Take BP. 145/85. HR 80.

Don't quote me on this, as I'm no expert at all, but Chinese medicine says while we're sleeping, our body makes several kinds of successive check-ups, which involve successively different organs. So, the moment in your sleep you usually don't feel right roughly indicates from where your troubles may originate.
More commonly, in our medicine, we talk about different moments of sleep, the very first hours being of "deeper" sleep, while we don't dream very much and recover mostly
physically. Later, we recover more "mentally", which involves our brain and nervous system more intensely. And we dream more.
Early morning hours are typically the hours of afib, for vagal afibbers having their troubles mostly at rest.
Like you, I may often wake up with a pounding heart, especially out of a dream (no nightmares for me), in the 2-3 AM time.
This is always SR, regular, not fast, but with heavy beats. I may have some ectopics. Sometimes, it can lead to afib, self reverting to NSR soon after (1hr or so) without meds.
Likely emotional, hormonal, vagal... call this like you want. Annoying, but harmless to date.

Quote
Geocappy
I wake up from dream and feel my chest beating. Get up ad go bathroom. Go over and sit at table and wait a minute. Take BP. 145/85. HR 80.

Skip the taking BP and pulse part. It's not meaningful. Of course your BP is higher if you've been awakened by a stressful dream. Maybe instead you should be asking yourself why you have so many stressful dreams.

Quote
Carey
Quit checking your BP in the middle of the night after a stressful dream and the problem will go away.

For God's sake, yes! I recently went to the ER for AFib post ablation. I kept looking at my Samsung Galaxy watch to see what the latest news was until my wife told me to shut if off and hand it to her. By news I mean the latest reading of heart-rate. It, and the incessant alarms, were keeping me aroused, which I most certainly could have done without.

REM sleep comes in the lightest stage of sleep, for most of us after usually about 80-90 minutes. Many of us awaken immediately after dreams, in my case no matter what it was about...walking with someone through a building, or being chased...makes no never mind. Lately, this has been happening after the first dream, and it's almost exactly on 90 minutes. Fortunately, trying to keep calm, turning over, adjusting my CPAP mask, and trying to let thoughts come and go, I can fall asleep within five minutes.

If you are brightly aroused, you might as well arise and read for a while to get your mind back onto how tired you feel. When you begin to yawn, you're ready for the sack.

Most of us know when we are on the cusp of a bout of AF, or we can sense it as it goes on. It might be best to get up and do light exercise, and I do mean light, as in shuffle around up and down the hall or whatever, and only for a few minutes to regulate your heart again. Many of us find that walking slowly helps to break us back into NSR. It is also likely that your thoughts will turn to things other than the dream or even your AF.

I know it sucks. Some of us do really poorly with paroxysmal AF, me being among them. If you can learn two or three semi-reliable breaking mechanisms/actions, they will help to steady the heart and you'll be able to relax eventually and return to sleep.

This is getting long, but you may need psychological help if your dreams are nasty and recurrent. This is a form of 'rumination', a persistent intrusion of thoughts that keep us aroused, anxious, fretful, and generally not going very well.

Quote
Carey
Quit checking your BP in the middle of the night after a stressful dream and the problem will go away.

Yea right, quit checking BP will make hypertension not there.

Seriously though, going to a sleep Dr. or getting a sleep study in this spot would give someone definitive insight if they wanted to really find out what was going on.

Quote
The Anti-Fib
Yea right, quit checking BP will make hypertension not there.

Having elevated BP after a stressful event isn't hypertension; it's perfectly normal. If he's getting normal readings at other times -- and he is -- then there's no reason to be compulsively checking BP, and especially not when normal physiology says it's going to be elevated.

Quote
gloaming
Many of us find that walking slowly helps to break us back into NSR

And strangely, others of us find that running or speedwalking will get us back into NSR. Perhaps it depends on whether the trigger was vagal or adrenergic.

Quote
Geocappy
Going on 5 weeks since ablation. No symptoms to date, however on flec100x2 and 50mg Metop. Heart rate between 76-84. My question is bout adrenaline. I wake up from dream between 4-6am almost every nite with BP 140-150 over 80+. At bedtime it is usually 100-120 over 65ish. My heart rate is not elevsted along with my blood pressure. I have read where both BP and Blood sugar can rise due to Your sleep activity (dreams). Most of the dreams involve me stressing to overcome a situation. Any thoughts? I am hoping that since my heart rate doesn’t rise along with BP that is good.

Quote
Geocappy
I wake up from dream and feel my chest beating. Get up ad go bathroom. Go over and sit at table and wait a minute. Take BP. 145/85. HR 80.

Quote
The Anti-Fib
Seriously though, going to a sleep Dr. or getting a sleep study in this spot would give someone definitive insight if they wanted to really find out what was going on.

Geocappy, have you been diagnosed with either type of sleep apnea? or have symptoms of it?

Quote
Daisy

Many of us find that walking slowly helps to break us back into NSR


And strangely, others of us find that running or speedwalking will get us back into NSR. Perhaps it depends on whether the trigger was vagal or adrenergic.

That is sure to be a large factor, yes. I have a newly appearing sleep-onset central apnea happening at bedtime. My readout shows multiple CAs for about 15 minutes before I succumb to sleep. I can feel my heart wanting to respond to the boost of adrenalin as I arouse and begin to breath heavily for a few seconds to catch up. That would be the adrenergic response. If I have to belch after a meal, I know that AF is not far behind due to the vagal response to stomach distension. But for many of us, the relief comes from walking, running, or something in between if it doesn't bring on a paroxysmal series in its own right.

Quote
gloaming
If I have to belch after a meal, I know that AF is not far behind due to the vagal response to stomach distension. But for many of us, the relief comes from walking, running, or something in between if it doesn't bring on a paroxysmal series in its own right.

The need to belch after meal can be strong for me sometimes. If I can't, the pressure seems to increase in my stomach and chest, leading to PACs and, then, AFib.
As you say, it's a vagal response.
A quiet walk after meal, or even a peaceful bicycle ride are my best way to deal with this issue.
I think it's for the same "vagal response" reason we're said for years it's better going swimming immediately after meal than after a short rest.

Yes, I have been on Cpap almost 4 years. It took me some time years to accept the idea of a cpap. I am down to 2 events per hour which they tell me is normal. Unfortunately, while normal, I always feel tired and tend to fall asleep while sitting up at night. I am planning to go to sleep doctor to see if there could be something else causing tiredness

Do you know which type of sleep apnea, obstructive or central? If I recall correctly, which is maybe 50/50 chance, the genetic basis (channelopathies) for central sleep apnea, can be same basis as some types of AF. That is all 'for what it is worth'.

Yes, obstructive. Been using cpap religiously for 31/2 yrs. Events were at 16/hr and 32/hr when sleeping on back. Events are down to 2/hr with cpap. Despite this normal reading I am still sleepy throught day and do fall asleep sitting up during day. I have appointment with sleep study doctor to see if missing anything.

Thanks. Hope things go well for you.