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blue lips, warm red face and DR

Thread Status: Hello , There was no answer in this thread for more than 90 days.
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qsys

New Member
Apr 29, 2014
15
1
3
49
Hey all,

I started about three weeks ago with breath-holding exercises 'cause I really want to improve my apneu skills. I'm using CO2/O2-tables, and things are going pretty well, as far as I'm concerned :). Last week, in the plane home, I was practising and during my last 2 breathholds of doing an O2-table (ending with 3'15"), my wife told me my lips became blue. I suppose that was at the same time I felt very warm in my head. Contractions usually start about 1' earlier. I never hyperventilate, unless one deep, but not full breath before doing the apneu is considered hyperventilating...
I shouldn't worry too much about the blue lips. They area sign of much CO2 binded to hemoglobine, which doesn't necessarily mean lack of O2, as far as I understand - I don't have any sings of tunnel vision, tingling anywhere in my body/skin, ... .
However, I couldn't find anything on getting really warm on my head (on this forum or anywhere else). I suppose my head must be tomato-red or something. Could that be bloodshift kicking in? So, in that case, does this mean it takes 2'30"-3' before DR kicks in, which seems pretty late to me. Anyway, I hardly ever feel a large drop in HR (at least not a very large drop; it drops down to 40-50 bpm, but that's not much lower than usual, being 55-60 max when I'm relaxed). What I really would like to know: how do I know how DR really kicks in (lower HR, bloodshift, ...) and well, should I worry about getting really warm in my head (I feel the warmth going from neck to top in like 3-5 seconds)? The thing is: I don't know if my biggest issue right now is high CO2 tolerance or low O2 tolerance... I can resist contractions, but I don't dare the moment I have the feeling my head's going to explode.

fyio: I'm doing 1 or 2 of each table per week, and while I walk somewhere, I now and than just do some apneu untill I have a few contractions, nothing extreme. At work - I'm having an office job - I'm holding my breath each 4-5 minutes for 40 seconds, no matter where I am in my 'breathing cycle' (I have a small popup thing telling me I have to hold my breath and it stays there for 40 seconds). I go swimming once a week, do some fitness 2-3h/week and have scuba training once a week. Scuba training consists of dynamic apneus of 25-50m, static apneus up to max 2minutes (now and than +25m dynamic), but mostly it's about 1'-1'30" statics (5m depth) and physical training.

Thx.
 
I'm pretty sure partial pressures are different in the plane (about 0.8bar, if I'm correct). The question remains: should I worry that my head will explode, or not :)? If I hold my breath long enough, even not in a plane, I also get that warm feeling after a while.
Oh yeah, while I'm doing O2 tables, my wife is just checking now and than that I'm not passed out, so she's not continuously checking if my lips are turning blue. It's in the plane she noticed it for the first time...
 
Could the 'warm red face' you just getting really hot? I don't know about everyone else but in my dry statics I get really really warm for whatever reason. I do have the opposite problem with wet statics though!
 
Well yeah, it really feels like my head's about to explode, that hot ;). So, I don't have to worry about it? Does it last?

And just for my understanding: why does it happen? - I found out I can relax way better when I know why things happen to me. I couldn't do statics >2 minutes untill I found out that I shouldn't worry too much about contractions.

Thx! Glad I'm not the only one, it makes me feel somewhat more confident.
 
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