Published on 12, July, 2020
Hello. I suffer from anxiety I have GAD. Lately I'm feeling very stressed and anxious every day and it's affecting my daily life. There's just so much stress everywhere it's really horrible. I dread every day and my body aches and feels tight.
When I feel stressed out and the anxiety causes my body to feel like it's alight I've suddenly started holding my breath. I don't know why. It's almost like I get this feeling that says hold your breath and the anxiety can't touch you. It's weird but it does start to help, I feel my body start to calm itself and everything feels light almost like I'm starting to fly. But the problem is I start to feel unwell after a while and get a little dizzy. I realise I probably shouldn't do this but a bit like stabbing my arms with my nails it's a habit and I can't stop it.
I'm not going out at the moment but soon I'll have to with family and I'm worried that I'll hold my breath then and I'm not sure what to do about it.
Any advice or tips are welcome.
Hi Charlotte,
Have you ever tried meditative breathing techniques? I used to suffer from bad anxiety and I found it really helped me. If you can control your breath then you can control your anxiety (and more).
It is very accessible these days with apps and videos on YouTube, you don't need a yogi guru to teach you, you can do it by yourself anywhere.
There is one called box breathing which is good and very easy to remember. It's 4-4-4-4, like the sides of a box. 4 seconds in, 4 seconds hold, 4 seconds out, 4 seconds hold. Repeat until you feel calm.
You can search for videos on YouTube with more breathing techniques where it tells you when to breathe in and out. Some of them may involve intentional hyperventilation or breath holds, and whilst it can be scary at first, it is a good way to realise how there are natural physiological reactions in your autonomic nervous system which you have control over, so you can become resilient.
The out-breath is the calming one which lowers your heart rate, so when you realise you are holding your breath, take a deep breath in, and then breathe slowly all the way out for as long as you can until your lungs are fully empty.
You may be holding your breath to subconsciously try and stop the natural process of anxiety (which is to take short shallow breaths and breathe in more than out). Your body automatically does this because it thinks you are in a dangerous situation and wants you to be ready for ACTION. By holding your breathe you stop this process. But if you know you are not really in a dangerous fight or flight situation it is far better to breathe deeply and calmly and slowly and this will regain control over how you feel and lower your heart rate.
It is connected with the physiological effect of breathing on blood pressure. The same effect - relaxation and lowering of blood pressure - can be achieved by breathing in more quickly than breathing out. So if you breathe in for 3 seconds, count by elephants or Mississipi -"one elephant, two elephant etc.", and breathe out for 5 seconds, for a few minutes, you will feel more relaxed.
I should say that holding your breath has a slightly different effect, it induces the 'dive reflex' - found in humans and many aquatic animals, such as whales and seals - where to conserve oxygen the heart rate slows down.
Hi Charlotte, welcome to the community. I'm sorry to hear your situation and what you're going through.
It's worrying to hear about how you hold your breath when your anxiety gets triggered. It's important that you know that holding your breath for a long time can be damaging to your health and wellbeing. Your body sensors will detect that oxygen isn't coming in anymore and this will cause a number of things like dizziness, if you continue to hold your breath it will lead your body to reset itself i.e you'll pass out, at which point your breathing will return to normal. But doing this can cause issues for your heart and even seizures. You could hit your head as well if you faint.
The National Autistic Society has a page on anxiety which you may want to take a look at. It has a few resources as well which might help you.
www.autism.org.uk/.../anxiety
Finding something else to do instead of holding your breath is a good idea to. Could be a ball to squeeze or maybe an elastic band to pull.
I hope this is of some help to you.
Please take care.
Luna x