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Recover from Long Covid - very wonky body battery

Kazza
3 months ago

Hi

I have had Long Covid for 16 months.  Initially I was getting better, but had a huge relapse 4 months ago, and I've been awful ever since.

Two weeks ago I bought a Vivoactive 5 to help me manage my daily activities.    

My max body battery was 50-80 for a few days.

Then one day the screen went blank. By pressing the top button for a few seconds I managed to get it on again. Once on again the body battery dropped about 20 points. Since then the max was 49. For the past week the max has been 35, and it's about 5 when I go to sleep. I'm tired, but not that bad - I can still walk and talk !

Not sure how much this is my wonky Long Covid body, and how much could be a glitch.

Should I worry about this, or just keep going?     (I suppose if it shows a negative body battery it will be time to do something drastic !) 

Body Battery aside, I've learnt a TON just by watching the heart rate, so it's been invaluable in getting on top of this horrible illness.  

Cheers

  • 0 3 months ago

    It took a few weeks longer for me than 2 weeks, before the body battery became more accurate (for me, I don’t know if it’s really accurate, scientifically I mean). But still, sometimes when my autoimmune disease flares up, my body battery first rrises really high and my HRV status as well. And then it catches up a few days later. So I also learned that, for me, a sudden rise in body battery (so when it suddenly charges to 70+ at night instead of to +/- 50) means I’m getting sick or I’m getting a flare up. 

    and the same for the HRV status. For me it always goes sky high when I’m sick. And then it drops down pretty fast after a few days. A sudden high HRV is also ‘bad’, just like a sudden drop. 

    also, I’ve learned that listening to your body is more important than to a wearable. I’m now using it to look back and to see patterns  but those patterns won’t be visible after only a short time of course.  I’m now the most interested in HRV and my resting HR, as indicators how my body is doing. While at first I was most interested in the body battery :-) HR data is, like you also wrote, very valuable! 

  • 0 3 months ago in reply to Esther

    Thanks for your reply, Esther.  What you say makes a lot of sense.   I will keep watching the body battery.  So far my resting  HRV has been pretty stable, but will watch that too. Someone I know with Long Covid also says that her HRV goes up quickly before she has a 'crash'.   

    Good luck with managing your symptoms. 

    cheesrs

  • 0 3 months ago in reply to Kazza

    You’re welcome.

    Regarding my hr, I have pots for over 20 years already (for me another infection I had in my teens started it), and I started walking more in March, since then my hr slowly declined  so the peaks are much less severe.  first my hr went up to 170 when I just stood up from my chair. Now my max hr is 135 when I just walk to my bathroom, for example. And lately some days while doing dishes it only goes up to 88 or so! That’s really a miracle for me. Because doing dishes was very difficult for my pots symptoms.

    For most long COVID patients exercise is not good, but I think pacing really can help. I did pace since January and when I’m walking I also stay under a certain hr to prevent PEM. I also never fully recovered from my covid infection. But I’m getting closer to my crappy ‘before covid’ baseline, so I consider it a win!

    My resting HR also got lower since March. It went from 64bpm to 55-57bpm. When I’m having a flare up then my resting hr creeps back up to 64-65 and when I start to feel better it’s going back down again. It’s very interesting.

    I wish you all the best as well!