Breathe Daniel San

It's been a while since I have posted but things have been crazy. Work has been putting the hurt on me and I have just not felt like doing any extra typing on the computer. I would say the last month has gone pretty decent. I survived my trip to Michigan and I have to admit it was the easiest one yet as far as dealing with my issues. I was able to make the hotel room my "safe place" and relax at night. I didn't end up eating as much as I would have wanted but I don't know if the nasty burger I ate the first night was the culprit or not.

Luckily I get to test myself again when I head to Virginia here soon. This trip I get the added fun of having to be on an airplane. I have been trying to block it out as much as possible. I find if I try and ignore it I am ok. My problem is around the events leading up to it so it is very important to block it out. I have been playing a lot of video games lately so that has been helping.

One of the things I have been struggling with lately is fighting off the winter blues. What really bothers me is the crappy weather and less sunlight. I have been doing research and I talk to my doctor all the time about certain lighting conditions or changes in lighting conditions that spark anxiety for me. I used to be in a band and for some reason RED stage lights would cause me anxiety. If it was blue I was ok it was just something about red. Sometimes when I am driving on the highway and I turn and the lighting conditions change drastically it causes me anxiety or my personal favorite shadows while driving. What I mean by that is the trees casting shadows and you sort of get a strobe light type effect.

There is some science on this mostly around over-illumination but I know myself and I know what it does to me. I know when its that greyish color outside right before the sun goes down that I feel weird. I don't need to read it in a medical journal to know that I have issues with it. It's something I talk to my doctor about all the time but I am not sure if there is anything I can really do about it except to break out the coping techniques.

So I will leave you with today one of the easiest coping techniques I use. It's free and if you can breathe you can do it. (Which I assume since you are reading this you know how to breathe :) ) Breathe in through your nose for 5 seconds, hold your breathe for 5 seconds, then breather out for 10 seconds. Even if you don't have anxiety and you just feel stressed you can try it. The science via http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16624497 :

Pranayamic breathing, defined as a manipulation of breath movement, has been shown to contribute to a physiologic response characterized by the presence of decreased oxygen consumption, decreased heart rate, and decreased blood pressure, as well as increased theta wave amplitude in EEG recordings, increased parasympathetic activity accompanied by the experience of alertness and reinvigoration. The mechanism of how pranayamic breathing interacts with the nervous system affecting metabolism and autonomic functions remains to be clearly understood. It is our hypothesis that voluntary slow deep breathing functionally resets the autonomic nervous system through stretch-induced inhibitory signals and hyperpolarization currents propagated through both neural and non-neural tissue which synchronizes neural elements in the heart, lungs, limbic system and cortex. During inspiration, stretching of lung tissue produces inhibitory signals by action of slowly adapting stretch receptors (SARs) and hyperpolarization current by action of fibroblasts. Both inhibitory impulses and hyperpolarization current are known to synchronize neural elements leading to the modulation of the nervous system and decreased metabolic activity indicative of the parasympathetic state. In this paper we propose pranayama's physiologic mechanism through a cellular and systems level perspective, involving both neural and non-neural elements. This theoretical description describes a common physiological mechanism underlying pranayama and elucidate the role of the respiratory and cardiovascular system on modulating the autonomic nervous system. Along with facilitating the design of clinical breathing techniques for the treatment of autonomic nervous system and other disorders, this model will also validate pranayama as a topic requiring more research.

When I was younger and I would go to my GP he would say take this drug and come back in 6 weeks and see if it better. They never told me breathing could have the same effect as popping certain medicines. I am by no means anti-drugs but this is a nice freebie to try without having to get a prescription. :)

Until the next time.