It's the potassium

It all started when I was returning from work by train, I managed to get a seat and suddenly I started feeling different, I felt I was gasping for breath and really felt nervous about something, felt like I should reach home as soon as possible and it made me really uncomfortable, I remembered then that I had the same nervousness when waiting at the railway station.
And to comfort myself I called one of my friends and he didn’t pick up.

He called me after some time and I managed to chat for some time and it really relieved my nervous symptoms considerably.
I forgot the whole incident and moved on and then it happened again.

I went to pick up my mother from my sister’s house. On my return I felt really nervous when nearing the tollgate, the lineup of vehicles before my vehicle made me nervous, I did not know why I was worrying but I really felt a panicky feeling.
When driving my legs too started shaking, somehow I accelerated and maintained my composure and reached home and had to lie down for some time to regain composure.

What was happening to me, I should have bothered to check this but I ignored the episodes of panic attack as the symptoms disappeared subsequently.

After a few weeks, I returned home from work on a Friday evening, after dinner I sensed something wrong and felt nervous, able to feel my faster heart beat and tried to calm myself down, I could not maintain composure and called my friend and informed him to come to my house immediately.

He took me to nearby hospital and there, doctors told that it was ok now and gave me injection to cure my acidity. After some time I felt OK and returned home.

This got repeated two weeks later during midnight, same friend took me to a different hospital that was very far and famous, there they took everything from ECG,, ECHO and blood test to rule out cardio issues, Then I was given oral liquid gel and injection for acidity.

These two incidents really did shook me up; I realized that earlier too, when i was in a foreign country i went to hospital in midnight a few times with same symptoms.But that was years back. What is the issue now? And why it is repeating after long gap, I was clueless.

Then nights became too much for me as I lost sleep, suddenly I was unable to sleep in the night, I thought maybe it was too hot and fixed air conditioning which I thought of skipping as I was expecting to move out of the city shortly for new job.
My sleep went for a total toss, I ended up being awake whole night, I was unable to sleep in the night and ended up sleeping around 6 am in the morning.

So I visited a local physician (from the hospital I visited during my first episode) and he was really cranky when I asked him to prescribe some sleeping pills and told me rudely to visit a psychologist instead. As the psychologist from the same hospital was not available on was on a tour, he reluctantly prescribed some sleeping pills (only one valium ten mg- really pathetic guy)

My sleep deprivation continued for some more nights.

So I decided to check with the general physician to know what I am going through is related to my heart or stomach or both, I visited the second hospital after booking an appointment with a general physician. I explained all these things to his assistant who filled up everything along with other information she gathered from me and one word I mentioned was fast heart beat aka palpitation.

After a long wait I was asked to go in and I started explaining him but he cut short me and asked me to lie on bed and proceeded to check for a few seconds and then told me that I needed to wear a 24 hours monitor to check my heart. I was surprised and tried to explain / question him about my stomach issues, but he was in no mood to listen and I moved out in frustration but out of fear, decided to wear the holster and paid a hefty sum for that. I found one guy sitting in the doctor’s room along with his assistant and I was really wondering who he was and why he was there, but I was in no mood to discuss / argue about these things, so I just ignored him.

Then came the big assault, one fine morning I found myself unable to even drink a glass of water as I felt my stomach full and felt a big air balloon inside my stomach.
So I decided to visit a gastroenterologist after my brother insisted what I had was stomach illness called ulcer / acidity and he faced similar troubles some years back.

Gastro I visited heard me patiently (big relief) and suggested that I took medication and if conditions are not improved after medication I might have to go through endoscopy.

I took the medicine for 10 days ( Bibilac, and some PPI) and stopped taking them further as I realized that taking these medicines continuously was not good.
In the meantime my maid stopped coming and I asked my old maid to come for work.

I went on a google spree and took out whatever I could come across to find out why I suddenly end up having this.
Things worsened on the sleep front, I became too tired because of sleepless nights and poor sleeping in the day time.

My initial suspect was B12, based on what I googled I came to a conclusion that B12 deficiency was causing all my troubles and tried to take some B12 injection, on my first shot I found my urine color changed to light red and I was shocked and so stopped with one shot.
Then I had my second conclusion- Magnesium – I bought even magnesium citrate tablets but did not take them as I decided to wait till my stomach conditions improved.

My stomach troubles continued and I was unable to take much food but managed to take regular intake with porridge made of buckwheat- olive oil, black gram-broken wheat-coconut milk in the morning.
I came across an article / suggestion through a website that cabbage juice improves stomach condition and took some times and started having cabbage soup instead. ( violet cabbage)


There are conflicting theories about the treatment for acid reflux, while the medical community always gives you PPI or proton pump inhibitors to suppress stomach acid production, internet is full of theories that the acid reflux itself is a result of low stomach acid and PPI’s worsen the situation. Dr. Christopher Amoruso provides his alternate healing approach to GERD below.
(https://www.westonaprice.org/health-topics/modern-diseases/gastroesophageal-reflux-disease/)

Finally my Eureka moment, an eye opener article in this link helped understand what the issue was. Before reading this I found that taking Electrol powder improving my palpitation and understood potassium was the second key ingredient after sodium in Electrol powder.

According to the website https://draxe.com/low-potassium/

One of the biggest problems with having a low potassium intake is that the body isn’t able to neutralize acids as well. Non-carbonic acids are generated during digestion and metabolism of both plant and animal proteins, including meats, dairy and grains. It’s potassium’s job to balance these acids in order to keep the body at a proper pH, as low potassium can mean the body becomes too acidic.

According to https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/potassium-deficiency-symptoms

8 Signs and Symptoms of Potassium Deficiency (Hypokalemia)
• Weakness and Fatigue. Weakness and fatigue are often the first signs of potassium deficiency. ...
• Muscle Cramps and Spasms. Muscle cramps are sudden, uncontrolled contractions of the muscles. ...
• Digestive Problems. ...
• Heart Palpitations. ...
• Muscle Aches and Stiffness. ...
• Tingling and Numbness. ...
• Breathing Difficulties. ...
• Mood Changes.
I had most of those symptoms

And it was getting clearer to me,
I have been playing badminton every morning and continued the same in the summer without taking any additional inputs to compensate for the mineral losses including potassium.
I started taking meat thrice in a week for the last four months and it increased my potassium requirement considerably to neutralize the acids
I was losing potassium heavily through strenuous physical activity on one side and my potassium requirement increased considerably due to more meat intake.
And the result was all the horrible things that I went through.

I started taking more potassium and the first thing I noticed was, tender coconut has more potassium. I have been avoiding tender coconut in the belief that it obstructs digestion (very wrong notion, I rue the day I acquired this ill-informed opinion)

There was dramatic improvement in my palpitation after I started taking tender coconut. I had to take at least three or four in a week to have a smooth trouble free stomach. Slowly my stomach condition started improving and there was some disturbance whenever I took more fish curry.

So I adjusted my diet and started taking potassium rich foods like tender coconut, coconut sprout ( sprouted coconut – very costly and vastly improved stomach condition), bananas and increased my porridge based diets like ragi, bajra etc,


Below are some additional links that benefited me during my googleploration on my mystery illness.

https://www.top10homeremedies.com/home-remedies/home-remedies-stomach-ulcer.html
https://www.consciouslifestylemag.com/heal-digestive-problems-naturally/- A very nice article, a must read for anyone hoping to improve their digestion
https://www.ausmed.com/articles/normal-electrolyte-levels/ - Informative and include below pic


Peptic ulcer- Many people describe their panic attack symptoms let them to finding out their ulcers subsequently

https://www.steadyhealth.com/topics/constant-nausea-stomach-ulcers-and-panic-attacks


This explains the dangers posed by high heat exposure
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4629728/


Nice article detailing the digestive process and how to improve yours
https://www.consciouslifestylemag.com/heal-digestive-problems-naturally/


https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/vitamin-b12-or-folate-deficiency-anaemia/causes/
https://www.steadyhealth.com/topics/constant-nausea-stomach-ulcers-and-panic-attacks
https://wellnessmama.com/3610/low-magnesium/

Read of Jhonny and Rajeev Mundra- amazing insights given by these people, and these are my reason for suspecting Magnesium deficiency
https://www.westonaprice.org/health-topics/abcs-of-nutrition/magnificent-magnesium/

After reading this I started taking salted rice water in the morning, things improved but still persisted and palpitation still continued.
https://www.ausmed.com/articles/normal-electrolyte-levels/

Finally my Eureka moment, an eye opener article in these links
https://draxe.com/low-potassium/
https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/potassium-deficiency-symptoms