Does anyone else get the blood pooling in abdomen area symptom ?
So, my big realization that I have POTS starts here:
My childhood friend that I hadn't seen in years told me she had been experiencing health problems as well. We both had asthma growing up pretty bad and when we met up, we reminisced about how semi-abusive it was that we were made to do things in PE class that gave us asthma attacks or risk failing the class and henceforth not graduating. She brought up POTS into the conversation as something she had been researching, and at the time I didn't really grasp what it was completely, but after researching it myself, and seeing that it can cause a symptom that could be related to a mysterious pain that has landed me in the ER twice, that the cause of still remains unknown.
The pain I get feels like a huge crampy gassy pressure in my abdomen. Almost like I don't have enough muscle to support my abdomen in an upright position. Or like I'm filled with gas, but I can't let it out. Since this new revelation of this pain maybe being related to POTS, I thought that if it is indeed blood pooling in the abdomen, then I need some sort of compression. It's strange and it looks strange but the thing that I've found helps me the most is tying my pashmina around my waist. It looks silly but it's nice being able to adjust it when I move around and it's not stretchy fabric which I think is what holds you up the best. And it's also nice that I can wear it on top of my clothes and take it off and on whenever cuz sometimes I need to be immediately not restricted, otherwise I would love to wear a nice, beautiful corset and I am thinking about trying a waist trainer to see if I like them.
Things that make my pain worse: Standing up, eating, menstrual cycle. I recently started a birth control to stop my periods but the first month on it I ended up having an 11-day period fml.
(Sidenote: does anyone else hate the fact that they have to stand up so often to go pee because of how much water they have to drink because of POTS and the standing up every 30 minutes to go to the bathroom gives you POTS symptoms like lightheadedness, nausea, abdomen pain, etc. ?)
Just so you know this isn't the only symptom of POTS I experience, it's just the oddest and seemingly prevalent, since it has caused me such pain at times that I felt like I wanted to die because the pain would not stop. My nausea is constant, im on two anti nausea meds. I sweat so easily and so often, usually related to anxiety. Overactive bladder like WHOAH, and you know that 3 liters a day dont help. Vertigo all my life I thought, but maybe it was just me getting lightheaded from standing. I could go on... All of this along with the fact that I had always felt like a "weak" child, like I couldn't keep up with other kids; I would always have asthma attacks if I ran too much or heatstroke or dehydration if I was in the sun too long.
I really could go on... But I would like to ask you guys, the POTS community of Reddit, if anyone else experiences the abdomen swelling, and how they handle it.
Posted Aug 7, 2025, 4:45 PM UTC