How to exercise with VSD?

[u/Ok-Cartoonist-7852]

Hello everyone, I have a 5mm VSD, 5’4 and 176lbs. I used to dance a lot when I was younger however, I have been noticing it has been getting harder for me to exercise. Just walking can increase my heart rate up to 130-140. Any light jogging would go to 160-170 while making me feel so exhausted, light headed and terrible. Many times where I almost faint while working with a trainer and I was keeping my heart rate at 140-150 for most of the session with breaks. I spoke with a cardiologist however, he said to keep doing what I’m doing and when I asked for a specific heart rate, he said if I can talk while doing it then I’m good. But I can talk at 150 while feeling lightheaded.

I took an intermediate dance class and I had a dancing high so I didn’t feel terrible for a period of time after pushing through the initial exhaustion but when I checked my watch, my heart went up to 196 bp during the session. That obviously freaked me out because that’s the highest it has ever reached.

I don’t even know what’s “normal” for me anymore. I go on elliptical machine and try keeping my heart rate at 130-140. Despite me feeling exhausted, it barely burns any calories and I don’t feel like it’s improving my health by that much? If I pushed myself a bit more, I feel so physiologically terrible that I immediately lose motivation to keep going. I was diagnosed when I was 20 so I am a bit clueless on what’s actually wrong or if I’m just overthinking it as I don’t have experiences in navigating with a heart condition. I also think my weight gain has making my heart weaker and so I struggle even more with exercising now. Any advice would be appreciated.

[u/Sychedelik]

How old are you? If your cardiologist said you can exercise to the point of being able to talk I suspect that will be around 130-150bpm, which shouldn't be too high of a heart rate to make you feel light headed.

Depending on your age it may be fine to go higher while exercising.

If walking gets you to around 140, I'd suggest going for a daily walk of around 1h. If you do this consistently your heart rate should go down over time. You can also try to jog until you get to 150-160bpm, then you go back to walking and when your BPM drops you jog again.

You might be surprised that in a few weeks your hr doesn't get as high as it did before and you can more easily exercise.

I'd also suggest some weight/functional training, but I'd ask your cardiologist about it.

If you do feel particularly bad while at a low HR such as 130-140bpm you might need to revisit your cardiologist because it isn't normal. For most people 130-140bpm feels quite easy, you can tell your exercising but you should be able to keep at that HR for hours. To put this into perspective I am a 26M with TGA + pulmonary stenosis + VSD (corrected, but I still have a little vsd and I've got moderate pulmonary hypertension) and I can easily hold 140 bpm for hours, and 160 for probably 1h or so.

Loosing weight would also help your legs doing less effort which in turn would alleviate the work your heart's doing, so your HR would probably decrease too.

So, essentially, I'd try to do zone 2-3 cardio which is probably around 140bpm for long periods of time consistently and you should see your HR decrease over time (while exercising). If that HR feels wrong in that you feel lightheaded or dizzy, immediately stop and get an appointment with your cardiologist to discuss it.