Really get a good extension on that rearward push.
#Wim hof breathing method reddit how to
This book first taught me how to unblock my chronically-stuffy nose, and then I applied these breathing techniques to running.
If you want more info on this, check out The Oxygen Advantage by Patrick McKeown. You're going to want to begin running (and exercising in general) with your mouth CLOSED breathing through your nose. I used to run way out of breath, and be wheezing/huffing the whole time and come back from my run dehydrated, nearly passing out. Speaking as someone who's hurt themselves running many, many times, there's several ways to tackle the method which I'll list here.Ī. I'm bringing it up because I struggle with daytime breathing in addition to sleep apnea, and I've had to tackle both in different ways. I know that's a lot of info, much of which might not be directly related to sleep apnea.
Just don't beat yourself up if you are feeling tense and struggling, though, because these things are completely normal in this state. You have to trust the system, because anxiety will only make the "desperate for oxygen" feeling worse. That is totally normal, because you won't have restored your CO2 balance in a couple breaths. The first few times through the cycle, you might not feel like you are getting enough breath. Through all your breath, really try to focus on your diaphragm, deep towards the bottom of your lungs. Just go as long as you can under those, but try to keep it relatively consistent (ex: if you only held your breath for 5 second, try to exhale and have no breath for about the same amount of time). It's okay if you feel like you can't get into this exact cycle at first, like if you are struggling to meet the 7 or 8 second holds. That's a a four second inhalation (through nose), hold breath for seven seconds, exhale fully (through nose), then have no breath for 8 seconds. This is a vicious cycle because now your brain is creating the sensation that you are oxygen-deprived to try to counter-balance that reduction, when really what you need to do is slow down your breathing to restore Oxygen/CO2 balance.Ī good rate of breath to shoot for when you feel you're not getting enough air is the 4-7-8 breathing technique. This causes a rapid reduction in carbon dioxide in your body.
When you hyperventilate, you upset the Oxygen/CO2 balance by exhaling more than you inhale. Strangely, the answer to feeling out of breath (especially in resting periods) isn't to breathe more it's to breathe less. The ironic thing is that hyperventilating exacerbates the problem of feeling like you're out of breath. More often than not, oxygen is getting to your lungs in a sufficient amount. I know that feeling of breath not getting to your lungs and satiating you. It goes a lot into the science of hyperventilation. That being said, the book DOES have a lot of great advice, tools, and techniques for improving your rate of breath. The downside to his book is I think he treats correct breathing a little too much like a silver bullet answer for all health-especially for it solving all weight and mental health problems-which is a bit of marketing exaggeration I think. This has insights not only for regular breathing but also has athletes specifically in mind as well. I highly recommend The Oxygen Advantage by Patrick McKeown.
But as far as your normal daytime breathing, I can put forward some advice here with a book recommendation. As far as sleep apnea is concerned, it's certainly something to address with a primary doctor and/or sleep study.