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A Texas bodybuilder has been hospitalized more than 20 times for a rare heart condition caused by, mind you, drinking a glass of cold water.
"I'd take a sip of cold water and when I'd sit back down, I'd feel a thump," Franklin Arrivana, 35, told ABC News about his apparent heart-related hydrophobia.
The Houston native, who is part of the International Federation of Fitness and Bodybuilding, first noticed the worrisome symptoms at age 18 while at the gym.
"It's a day I'll never forget," he recalled, saying that he felt a "significant thump" while drinking water.
Shortly after that I fainted."
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However, it wasn't until 15 years and 25 doctor's appointments later that Arivana pieced together the details and discovered the seemingly innocent trigger for his condition - ice cold water.
The fitness trainer said he realized the truth one day after drinking a lot of cold water at the gym, after which he noticed his heart beating uncontrollably.
Genetic tests conducted afterwards revealed some surprising results: the muscle of the muscle suffers from a genetic aberration that caused him to suffer from atrial fibrillation, a disruption of the electrical signals that causes it to beat at an unsynchronized rate.
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The doctors felt that the arrhythmia was triggered by cold water touching the vagus nerve, the part of the nervous system that regulates heart rate, among other things.
This was due to an irregular and extremely rare response to the "diving reflex", in which exposure to cold water causes the heart rate to slow down in order to conserve oxygen and energy, the "Daily Mail" reported.
This reaction usually resolves when the person is no longer exposed to the cold.
However, due to Arivana's existing condition, the reflex caused his heart to beat erratically and his blood pressure to drop, resulting in him fainting.
Unfortunately, this allergy becomes more severe after high-intensity exercise such as weightlifting.
Arrivana even recalls one instance where he passed out while on a golf course on a hot summer day.
"I took a sip of cold water, and the next thing I remember, my heart was literally pounding out of my chest," he recalled.
"They took my shirt off, and you could see my heart beating out of my chest, and then I passed out."
Many sufferers of the condition experience much more subtle symptoms, including mild fatigue, shortness of breath and general chest pains.
Doctors were able to correct the patient's H20-induced heart problems through ablation, which burned the connection between the vagus nerve and the heart.
Since the surgery, Arrivana has made a full recovery without hospitalization, although he is still taking medication.
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