Deep Breathing Technique To Calm Anxiety During A Panic Attack

Saturday, November 29, 2008 12:19
Posted in category Treatment

Sometimes panic attack can be disabling and  very hard to treat. In fact, having recourse to medications may actually end up with several adverse side effects such as withdrawal, relapse, and other psychosomatic conditions such as irritation, agitation, insomnia, and many others. Although recent advancement in the area of bio-psychological research suggests that for calming anxiety during a panic attack suggests different options including medications, and all of them agree about the extensive contribution of slow, abdominal breathing technique. For an individual ,however,suffering from panic disorder may need to put a great effort in learning breathing technique.

Almost all panic attack sufferers experience difficulty in breathing as they simply lack the understanding of how to breathe deeply with their diaphragm. Many of them are very good in chest breathing, but they are simply incapable of breathing deeply and require a great deal of breathing technique training. But once they become capacitated and learn how to breathe using their diaphragm; they have all the chances to come out from their panic disorder problem.

The Advanced Phase of Deep Breathing

During the advanced stages of deep breathing technique, the person gradually becomes facilitated with the training of hyperventilation by opening their mouth and taking deep breathe for 1-2 minutes. As a result, they gradually learn that the seemingly imminent death symptoms are not actually harmful stimuli at all. This way,by practicing deep breathing technique for calming down during a panic attack really helps. Moreover,a more advanced stage includes systematic desensitization during which a professional put her best effort to expose the individual with panic attack to different fear-evoking stimuli ordered from least feared to most fear.

While systematic desensitization and  hyperventilation  can help in reducing panic, it may come back as a relapse if the individual experience extreme stress. However, the person may quickly regain equilibrium at the initial stage of triggering stressor by practicing breathing technique for calming down during a panic attack, preventing the possibility of relapse. Although it is possible for you to try normal breathing practices as described in the following paragraph, you need a professional help for hyperventilation and systematic desensitization.

Breathing Technique Tips

During a breathing session one must lie on the back and put one palm over the chest and one on the belly, perfect between navel and ribs. Then concentrate on allowing the belly to rise smoothly at the time of inhale and fall at the time of exhale. You must,however, hold the chest during the breathing. The focus is to breathe with your diaphragm or your belly, while not doing any sort of chest breathing. You must see to it that you breathe at least 6 times a minute. This is referred to as slow relax process. Do not force yourself while practicing this breathing technique. This is how slow breathing technique is used for calming down during a panic attack.

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