Short of breath feeling

[KatieRichie94]

I started feeling this shortness of breath yesterday at work. Its more that i cant take a deep breath. Then my mind was freaking out since i couldnt feel my heart beating when i was in bed..im fine for a week or two then i start getting anxious out of nowhere.

[rpg1982]

I've been having the same thing. I finally realized that when i was trying to take a "deep, slow breath" I was breathing too much into the top of my lungs and actually causing myself to hyperventilate. I found this morning that breathing into the belly really makes a difference for me. Here's a repost of something that I replied with in another thread. Try closing your eyes and doing about 10 "Calming Breaths" as explained below. This had such an impact on me this morning that I'm going to make sure I spend time regularly making sure I'm breathing into my belly more (the "Natural Breathing" below).

Hope this helps!

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I have been waking up around 3 hours after going to bed for the past week or so (usually around 3am), and then unable to fall back to sleep. This morning I was having a panic attack and I came across some information about how to normalize your breathing for anxiety symptoms. It said to calm down from panicked breath as follows (Calming Breath):

1. Take a long, slow breath in through your nose, first filling your lower lungs, then your upper lungs.

2. Hold your breath to the count of "three."

3. Exhale slowly through pursed lips, while you relax the muscles in your face, jaw, shoulders, and stomach.

When it talks about filling your lower lungs it's referring to what they called "Natural Breathing". Here's how they explain that:

1. Gently and slowly inhale a normal amount of air through your nose, filling only your lower lungs. (Your stomach will expand while your upper chest remains still.)

2. Exhale easily.

3. Continue this gentle breathing pattern with a relaxed attitude, concentrating on filling only the lower lungs.

I used the Calming Breath I described first with my eyes closed to actually calm me down so I wasn't having a panic attack and hyperventilating, heart pounding, tingling, etc. then when I tried to sleep I focused on the "Natural Breathing" only. Even if it takes 30 minutes of focus on this breathing to get there, it's much better than laying there for hours in a panicked state.

Here's the article I read: anxieties.com/57/panic-step4

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How are you feeling now?