After all those years of stress, I had basically retrained my body to be chronically hyperventilating, something I didn't directly noticed when I was trying to recover.
Basically everyone has this idea of hyperventilation with someone holding a paper/plastic bag and gasping for air.. but it doesn't have to be that way.
You can be hyperventilating all the time, feel tired as h#ll, dizzy, stressed, anxiety etc.. without really noticing that you're breathing too fast because of a retrained/'stuck' breathing center!
Really, I was breathing like 20-25 times a minute in rest ..crazy, it's like riding a bicycle at >20 KM/h all day long!
It's very easy to check your breathing though. E.g. via the 'Control Pause' test from the Buteyko Method:
It takes determination and time to learn how to breath properly again and unwind all that stored stress.
Currently back to breathing 6-14 times/min. at rest and already feeling sooo much better, happier, more energetic, sleep is much much better etc.
Proper breathing is wayyyyyy underrated. Every GP seems to follow the "you're stressed out? psychosomatic complaints? here have some $neurotransmitter_modifying_medicine" route without looking at the _real_ cause(s).
I can't think (memory still goes and comes..it sucks) of the famous ancient Greek who said it, but paraphrased:
"You cannot fix/heal anything if you don't know the underlying cause."
One more important tip that I'd like to add:
After all those years of stress, I had basically retrained my body to be chronically hyperventilating, something I didn't directly noticed when I was trying to recover.
Basically everyone has this idea of hyperventilation with someone holding a paper/plastic bag and gasping for air.. but it doesn't have to be that way.
You can be hyperventilating all the time, feel tired as h#ll, dizzy, stressed, anxiety etc.. without really noticing that you're breathing too fast because of a retrained/'stuck' breathing center!
Really, I was breathing like 20-25 times a minute in rest ..crazy, it's like riding a bicycle at >20 KM/h all day long!
It's very easy to check your breathing though. E.g. via the 'Control Pause' test from the Buteyko Method:
http://knol.google.com/k/buteyko-control-pause-cp#
It takes determination and time to learn how to breath properly again and unwind all that stored stress.
Currently back to breathing 6-14 times/min. at rest and already feeling sooo much better, happier, more energetic, sleep is much much better etc.
Proper breathing is wayyyyyy underrated. Every GP seems to follow the "you're stressed out? psychosomatic complaints? here have some $neurotransmitter_modifying_medicine" route without looking at the _real_ cause(s).
I can't think (memory still goes and comes..it sucks) of the famous ancient Greek who said it, but paraphrased:
"You cannot fix/heal anything if you don't know the underlying cause."
The rest is just the suppression of symptoms..