High Coronary Calcium Score: How do others feel emotionally?

Bluesdoc, I am rooting for you to improve and hoping that I will be able to do the same. Will anxiously await your results before making the final decision on initiating chelation. One thought: Given that calcification is expected to increase significantly year over year, could no or little increase be seen as a positive result of chelation?

Jennifer, thank you for your thoughtful, sensitive, insightful posting.

@mark430 You are welcome. Knowledge is power and can help you overcome anxiety, but it can also make you worry thinking that you must have what you are reading about online. There are times you just have to do your best and trust your gut. I learned about overcoming anxiety because I was very fearful and needed spine surgery. On my surgery day, I was completely calm and interested in what was happening around me when I was wheeled into the operating room. I have a background in biology that helps me understand medical literature that I read and I have a great physical therapist who helps release all those physically tense areas in my body. When you are anxious, you start bracing and tense muscles. that can trigger muscle spasms. I've had them in my chest and it can feel like a heart attack, but it wasn't one. I've had ribs that twist because of a muscle spasm. I have learned from my physical therapist how to release the muscles and fascia. I did go to the cardiologist for testing, and went to the emergency room too over this. You don't really want a cardiologist to find a problem, and it's great news when you get an all clear from them about your heart. As for plaque deposits in blood vessels, that starts because of inflammation that is inside the wall of the vessel first, and later plaque is deposited there. Eating a diet to reduce body wide inflammation is good prevention for a lot of diseases. You can also have elevated blood calcium levels if there is a problem with the parathyroid glands. My mom had that, and had surgery to remove one of the parathyroids that caused the trouble, and her calcium levels returned to normal.

I would encourage you to ask yourself questions about the source of your anxiety. I've done that and learned a lot about myself. Finding the source of the anxiety is finding the event or events from your past or your childhood where you formed ideas about how to cope with fear. I was still thinking like a 6 year old and it just didn't serve me well as an adult. I came to understand the fear and accept it, and comfort that vulnerable part of me. To do this and overcome fear is totally life changing. You might ask yourself why you think chelation is necessary to prevent heart disease or if you believe that there is calcification in your arteries and why. There are lots of other lifestyle choices and diet that go a long way in preventing heart disease. I started by writing down a list a fearful events from my life and why I felt the way I did. that showed me a pattern that was common to all of them. I had a lot of anxiety that came from an accident I had where I broke my front teeth as a kid. That in turned caused many dental interventions that were difficult for me, and restorations that failed and had to be redone. So now, I've had some anxiety because in spite of being a good dental patient to try to fix my mistakes I made as a kid, I might loose one of the teeth anyway. Sometimes you try your best, and it doesn't work. I realized I had to forgive myself for my mistake all those years ago and I found some unconscious beliefs connected to that old trauma that was causing anxiety and it made sense, so I could let it go. I think I'll be fine now, and I'll find out in a few days what my future holds. Here is my Mayo story:
https://sharing.mayoclinic.org/2019/01/09/using-the-art-of-medicine-to-overcome-fear-of-surgery/

I'm grateful for the last couple of days an old friend spent time here Shirley is a great baker ❤️ I have zucchini bread and peach jam she made Um that pumpkin roll was good 👌

Yes Mark, I plan on a repeat CAC score somewhere close to half way through and I will share here. If there's no change or worse, I'll probably stop, at $155 a pop.

Thank you, Tim and Bluesdoc. Very difficult choice. I do feel the way Bluesdoc does. Bluesdoc, you are part way through your course of chelation. When you complete it, do you plan to go for another CAC score? If so, would you be willing to share the results with me? I would await your findings. I realize it would be an n of 1, but it would be helpful to me to know how you fared with chelation.

The ND from whom I'm getting chelation was one of the investigators in the TACT study. It was better than equivocal, but their target was a bit different that this. NO ONE KNOWS ABOUT THIS. If we're trying to decalcify our coronaries in the absence of significant atheroma load, then we're a different cohort than those in the TACT study. And even if we could achieve some degree of decalcification of our coronaries, how does that translate into survival? NO ONE KNOWS. In my case, I just feel driven to do something instead of nothing (to decalcify). When I drop dead, if I have a moment to reflect, I want to know that I gave it my best shot (given no real data - only reasoning from basic principles). Life - whaddya gonna do??

The only study of chelation that I know of, the TACT study, shows equivocal results. It seems to me to be a flip of the coin choice of therapy. It is also expensive, and insurance does not cover it. I should add that I did have an ultrasound done of my carotid, abdominal and ankle arteries, all of which were clear. Thousands of people have this therapy, but my personal choice is to not have it.

Thank you, tim1028, for your reply. I am doing all five of your recommendations. The daily baby aspirin is chewable, so less likely to damage digestive tract. I swim 1,250 yards at a fairly brisk pace 4-5 times per week and usually do something like walk at least once or twice additional. Hopefully, the vitamin K2 will slow or maybe reverse calcification. I feel a strong need to get rid of as much calcium as possible, so am looking into chelation. The propaganda that I have read so far indicates, while there is some risk, it is fairly minimal. Do you (or anyone else) have information to the contrary? Thank you in advance for your help.

Mark--Thanks for sharing your concerns over your high CAC score. I, too, have a high CAC from a CT scan done six months ago. I am 70 and have no symptoms of heart disease or any known risk factors for heart disease. . My initial high anxiety has diminished due to time and knowledge about this condition. I had a follow-up normal exercise stress test with echocardiogram.

What I am doing is (1) taking a moderate dose statin (40 mg Lipitor) to lower LDL (currently 48) (2) changing my diet to decrease saturated fat and added sugar intake and increase fiber. (3) continue with at least 150 minutes of weekly aerobic exercise and (4) use stress-reduction techniques. and (5) taking a daily baby aspirin I am not doing chelation therapy, because I personally think the possible benefits are outweighed by the risks.