Breathlessness is not nice at all :-(

[blondinou]

Hey everyone,

Tonight I am feeling BREATHLESS. It is horrible and scary. I feel like I could suffocate or stop breathing or go into fast crazy breathing any minute now. But this feeling can last for ages - hours or even most of the day. My throat feels all tight like it's not going to let enough air through it. Sometimes even the air feels too thick to suck into my lungs (especially if it's hot or in a small/crowded space).

I have been feeling like this on and off for weeks, and have been fine every single time, not dropped dead or even got remotely ill. But still it scares me so much. I think it's hard to deal with because we can control our own breathing and can monitor it any time we want to tune in to it, it's there all the time and so easy to become too aware of it!!

I don't want to feel uncomfortable in my breathing for the rest of my life. I want to walk around doing my day normally, not feeling weighed down on my chest, not even thinking about my breathing once for a whole day.

Sorry I just needed to sound off!
Anyone else feel like this... Is there anything that makes you feel better?!

[Mirabelle]

Try some exercises for hyperventilation. It helps a lot. Breath from you belly and keep your chest still
xx

[ronski]

Hi blondinou, I think breathlessness is one of the worse symptoms of anxiety and one of the worst to truly accept. Breathlessness can have many causes within the anxiety state, it can be caused by tension of the muscles within the chest and shoulders or it can be caused by a form of hyperventilation.
Other signs that intimate it might be hyperventilation is that you might yawn and clear your throat more than usual. Let's go through some checks. Lie on your bed or sofa, put one hand on your stomach and one on your chest and now monitor your breathing.your hand on your stomach should move a lot more than the one on your chest. This means you are using your diaphragm which is the correct way to breath. Upper chest breathing is unnatural but is seen often in anxiety sufferers.
Try this for calming and relaxing your breathing
Lie on your back, bend your knees and bring your heels up to your bottom
Right hand on left shoulder, left hand on right shoulder
Breathe into a count of four and exhale to a count of four
Do this for five minutes
Everytime you get breathless, monitor your breathing rate and depth of breathing. Rapid and shallow breathing bring on panic attacks and increase anxiety. Your breathing rate should be about 10 to 12 breaths per minute at rest, if you find it's 16 plus a minute you are certainly hyperventilating
Have a look on the web at the article CHRONIC HYPERVENTILATION SYNDROME a diagnosis waiting for recognition.

[Fly away Katie]

Hello.

There other night I had breathlessness. I got myself into a right state. But when I forced myself to calm down, I managed to take ONE deep breath and it made me realise I was ok again.

So you just need to relax xxx

[potato11]

Hiya Blondinou

breathlessness was one of my prime symptoms / focus when suffering with anxiety. Whilst 'belly breathing' does help, I personally still found it difficult to counteract the feeling of breathlessness. But a couple of tips that did help me - whenever you feel anxious about your breathing, consciously relax your stomach - can you feel how tense it was? that will then relax the muscles around your lungs and diaphragm to make your breathing easier - you'll feel the air being drawn in by itself. Secondly, you need to lose your fear of 'something being wrong' with your breathing. Prove to yourself that your body won't 'stop' breathing by this simple exercise - hold your breath for as long as you can. It won't be long until your body automatically forces you to breath, proving to you that it is quite capable of regulating your breathing!! and you go to sleep every night don't you... who controls your breathing whilst you sleep? :P proves it's a mental thing.

However I do appreciate how horrible it feels, honestly, sometmes you can just feel like your suffocating or something. But really, you aren't - it's just tension and misunderstanding. Recognise this and it will disappear :)

The techniques i've described are related to CBT - theres a fab online course that really helped me with my panic/anxiety and i'm almost 100% recovered. It's been recommended here on NMP which is where I found it

http://www.nomorepanic.co.uk/showthread.php?t=91696

:)