Quote:
Originally Posted by Mark in Idaho
I don't think one can self-administer a Buffalo Protocol test accurately, especially if one is experiencing problems with anxiety. The usual threshold for exertion is based on headaches and dizziness, not a sense of fatigue.
I think everybody should have a home blood pressure system, either wrist or upper arm style. They are only $30 to $40 US. A PulseOx finger tip monitor can also be useful to check just pulse, without BP. Learning to relax to lower pulse and BP is an important skill, especially with PCS and anxiety.
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You'd be right in the
accurately-part, but I achieved something that at least resembled the Buffalo Protocol test the other day. I actually found that I could raise my heart rate higher than I'd thought possible, without symptoms returning. After getting up to about 172 (without concious experience of significant symptom increase, the Buffalo Protocol sets the bar at an increase of 3 points of symptoms on a scale of 1-10), I stopped the test and sat down to cool off. The rest of the evening I felt some symptoms returning in a way that felt very real but that could of course have been the anxiety. Anyway, I've used a cross trainer to get my pulse up to 80% of 172, and I use that value as a point at which symptoms returned. Then I've stayed around that heart rate for 6-7 minutes. No symptoms returning, and I feel like such an increase in heart rate could be beneficial for my excretion of BDNF and thus synaptogenesis and therefore restructuring of my brain.
(I got the idea from this study, and even though it's only a preliminary one it provides some guidelines to how one can approach cardio exercise with PCS. I've also read a bunch about white matter density improvements from cardio which should be relevant for us, but BDNF is the main thing I'm after.
A preliminary study of subsymptom threshold exercise training for refractory post-concussion syndrome. - PubMed - NCBI)
Quote:
Originally Posted by Bud
I never did look into or read about the Buffalo Protocal.
I sort of felt my way through the whole recovery, and did a lot of praying looking for guidance.
I know I will never really understand what and why things happened the way they did, it took the better part of two full years before I could return to any consistent exercise without debilitating symptoms, I'm just glad it's over for the most part.
Bud
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I'm glad to hear that. Finding a beam of support to lean on mentally seems to be key for recovery and though I'm not religious I'm trying my best with rigorous meditation practice. I've never seen myself as an anxious person but I'm realizing that I've been carrying a lot more anxiety than I thought I did, and now I don't have the resources to ignore it in the same way I used to.
I used to do a lot of weightlifting before I hit my head but I remember reading something Mark said about heavy lifting secreting chemicals in the brain that impairs our recovery. I feel like it will take some time before I can lift again but I'll ever so slowly try to ramp up the cardio to my best ability to get myself the best conditions for recovery.