Stuck being aware of/controlling my breathing. Feels tight and labored.

[LiveAboveIt]

Is this an anxiety symptom? I feel like I'm stuck in a loop. I constantly have to manually breathe, I can't stop thinking about it nor controlling it. Atleast this is my perception of the problem.

It feels tight and labored in my chest and stomach and I can feel every muscle movement when I inhale, which feels uncomfortable.

It also seems to get worse when I'm sitting funny or laying down to sleep. Especially bad when I'm laying down. Feels like I can't breathe, but it might just be that I'm hyperfocused on it.

I have been trying to make sure I'm breathing through my abdomen, but this is difficult to do sometimes when sitting or laying on my side. I've already had my lungs checked and had a chest x-ray, everything was fine but my anxiety LOVES to run away with it.

Does anyone go through this, or have you heard of this issue before being related to anxiety? :\

[MyNameIsTerry]

Hi LAI,

Yes, I've seen this mentioned on the boards a far few times and I have this issue. I have asthma so part of it has always been whether it's my anxiety or asthma, so an extra irrational worry really.

Your breathing is efficiently controlled by your subconscious from birth and it will continue until death, regardless of your anxiety. You've just become focussed on it for some reason.

Sitting with your back to anything, will add tension to your back and make your breathing slightly harder. Lying down is similiar.

Poor posture can make your breathing worse because you scrunch your body up.

The best way to resolve this is to look at relaxation techniques that involve breathing because they ask you to examine your breathing ans their sensations. So, Calming Technique (7/11 breating), Progressive Muscle Relaxation (PMR) and the best of all is our old friend Mindfulness meditation. Mindfulness meditation uses various breathing inductions to get started and it asks you to 'feel' your breathing.

Over time, you will desensitise to it if you do this.

[LiveAboveIt]

Thank god. I was worried that I was the only one that dealt with these issues.

I was panicked a little bit ago about how I was going to get rid of this symptom. I did a little but deep breathing to try and make it better, but my worrying thoughts just continued to bring it back.

I'll continue to practice what you've mentioned and maybe look into the whole mindful meditation thing. I've heard of it, but never really looked into it to try it.

[MyNameIsTerry]

Honestly, Mindfulness meditation is good for all anxiety disorders. It will help you if you keep at it, it's has helped my OCD far more than CBT ever did.

Try to correct your posture and look up about correct breathing technique in general which might help you. Pilates is good for posture and I suspect it will help with breathing technique as well, plus it can easily be combined with Mindfulness once you get more preficient since it's a slower form of exercise & stretching.