Resting heart rate and the ladies cycle!

[HelsBells81]

Do any of the other ladies notice a trend between resting heart rate and the monthly cycle?? This is my 3 month track of heart rate and shows massive changes depending on where I am in the month! Is this

normal?

[CandyShmandy]

I haven't kept track and paid any attention but I came across this because I do seem to have a really low resting hr during cycles. But I am not active. It seems all of you are really active. My rhr seems to stay from 54-65 but when laying in bed at the deep dozing off stage it drops down in 48 or so. And at those times I have usually just started my period. Crazy and interesting3 month

[nobody84]

I do! It's freaking me out. My heart rate is consistently higher than yours, though. My heart rate is almost too high to be considered healthy...But I have 10 pt changes each month. 

[Piperandlayla]

Mine has had this pattern for over a year. I guess all is well. I have had a couple of checkups

Sent from my iPhone

[Calathea77]

I tried installing a fertility/period tracking app and have been inputting a year's worth of my heart rate data, turned into temperatures, in absolute fascination. Here's how I'm converting the numbers, using °C for the temperatures.

RHR 60 - 36.0°

61 - 36.1°

62 - 36.2°

and so on. It is producing charts which look just like BBT charts. A few suggest that I'm getting anovulatory cycles, and the reason I'm looking at this is because I'm turning 42 and my cycles are starting to change in the run up to menopause, so that makes sense. If RHR really does follow BBT, then I'm getting a more varied luteal phase than I'd have expected, but maybe that happens in your forties as well.

I think the Oura ring uses RHR as well as temperature to calculate ovulation. I wonder how they find the two compare? I'm not planning to get it, rings aren't for me, but I'm really curious now.

While this looks promising, I would urge everyone not to use it for contraception. We have no idea how reliable it is, and even using temperatures for contraception is rather dicey. I'm doing this to keep an eye on hormonal migraines and the like.

 

[Calathea77]

 

[Calathea77]

Aha! Oura Ring have indeed researched this, and there's a graph in this article showing the basal temperature and the resting heart rate superimposed on each other. They're very close indeed. 

[Du92979]

Yes it is happening to me now and I am 4 days from my period.  Seems to be ticking up by one or two each day for the past 3 days.  

[BeeMoeMama]

I track mine as BBT in the WomanLog app as well. It's easy and definitely helpful!

[AvionMarie]

I’ve only had my Fitbit 5 weeks but already can see from the charts my peak average heart rate is 71 around ovulation and average drops to 65 when period comes.

I had endo surgery 3 years ago, they seemed confident it wouldn’t come back as removed it all however it seems to be returning as severe period pains have returned again recently. 
The pain is usually in the night and lasts for about 20-30 mins. Whilst in pain my heart rate dropped to low 50’s!

Has anyone else seen a drop when in pain?! Or maybe that’s just period related and not pain related!

[Star_dust]

Absolutely agree! In fact I did a search on this topic because I noticed on my Fitbit and then looked in the app to track the trend, that my RHR is much higher actually a full week before my period, then slowly goes down after my period and maintains low a while, and then starts over again. I noticed the trend and realized I must finally be on to something as to why my RHR would inexplicably change for several days regardless of my behaviors, did the search, and was surprised to find that this is common in all women; I had no idea!! So yes, I definitely also experience that!

[Star_dust]

I cycle at least 10 beats or more.

[Ninjafrog]

I know this is a really old post but I had been searching to if others saw the same trend I’ve seen. My RHR is lowest during my period and slowly starts to creep up with the highest being mid- cycle (~day 15). Then it slowly starts to decrease as I get closer to my period again. The lowest point is 60 and the highest 67.  Average RHR each month is ~63.  I’m 46, no BC/hormones, etc. So interesting!

[Emma222]

This is happening to me too. Has anything helped you? Are you still feeling the same?

[May93]

Yes, so much. From day 1 of cycle (period starting) rhr declines from 59/60bpm steadily into ovulation 7-16, at its lowest it plateaus at 49/50bpm  and then rises steadily during whole of luteal phase, peaking back to 59/60. That 10bpm difference is insane! I have a week and a half where i can push myself to run 10K but into luteal phase I struggle through 5K. PMS is terrible too. 

[May93]

Hi, 

I honestly have no idea, I just have to assume it's my body's natural cycle and I'm just very sensitive to hormone fluctuations. I don't have any hormone related disorders to my knowledge and am not on hormonal birth control. It feels like an internal thermostat goes haywire, like it's struggling to keep cool so fatigues faster. Least I'm aware of it, at first I kept freaking out thinking I was spontaneously getting very unfit for half my cycle. Exercise definitely helps the PMS though, at the very least it helps stabilise my mood through the emotional spotty bloat phase and I adjust my workouts, if it takes me 45 instead 28-30 mins to do a 5K so be it, or if I can only manage a short 30 minute jog that's ok too, I don't feel disheartened. Hoping to be able to expand my workouts, I suspect that might help too, might also be a case of lower cardio endurance but greater stregth/speed/stability during luteal. Playing to strength! 

[AsdMom]

 Oh yea! Yours is all arched nice as mine is all abrasive! I do have PCOS, Endometriosis and am in my second round of Peri/Menopause. 

 

[Calathea77]

You seem to be worrying about a perfectly natural occurrence. HR varying by 10bpm over your menstrual cycle isn't insane, it's normal. Treat yourself more gently, hon. I know everyone who has anxiety is having a harder time of it with the pandemic. 

[Calathea77]

That's also a perfectly normal chart, it just looks spiky because you're showing three months of data at once. 

[AsdMom]

Not being hard on myself at all. 

[MariekeJ2]

I thought the response was pretty condensing too.