Hyperventilating: Hypnosis to breathe normally
Hyperventilating means breathing (too) fast. Most people do know that when you exercise it causes you to breathe faster and even pant. Why would this happen if you don't exercise? In that case, it is often due to your mood or emotions[1]. There is a connection in how your brain deals with the stress hormone and hyperventilating. In this blog, we will take a closer look at hyperventilating and what hypnosis can do if your breathing is still problematic for you.
So what is hyperventilation?
When you suffer from hyperventilation, you breathe too fast and may even take in too much oxygen. In any case, the amount of C02 in your body becomes too low. The ratio of oxygen to other substances in your body must remain correct. If that gets disrupted, you may even develop other symptoms because of it.
Do you suffer from chronic hyperventilation? If so, you regularly suffer from breathing too fast. So this is often due to emotions such as anxiety and feelings of breathlessness and even prickly limbs[2].
Other symptoms of hyperventilation include:
- Dizziness.
- Feeling limp.
- Chest pain[3].
Unfortunately, chronic hyperventilation syndrome is also often confused with panic disorder (source 3).
A doctor may volunteer to hyperventilate you to see if some of the symptoms you are experiencing can be explained by breathing too fast. These might include dizziness, inability to see properly and the like[4].
Asthma and hyperventilation
People with asthma hyperventilate more often than people without asthma. This makes perfect sense, since the breathing difficulties associated with asthma can sometimes make it necessary to breathe more rapidly for a short time.
About 25% of people with asthma also suffer from chronic hyperventilation. These tend to be younger people and women[6].
Treatment chronic hyperventilation syndrome
Treatment of hyperventilation can focus on 2 things, namely:
- Reducing the number of hyperventilation attacks.
- Stopping the hyperventilation attack when it is in progress[5].
Mostly this focuses on reducing anxiety.
Treatment hyperventilation
There are several treatments for hyperventilation. These mainly focus on your behavior, knowledge about breathing and reducing anxiety.
Breathwork against hyperventilation
Knowing what normal breathing feels like and being aware if you are unconsciously hyperventilating is important so you can normalize your breathing.
This requires a certain degree of mindfulness, so that you become more aware of your emotions and your body. Research shows that mindfulness training helps you breathe more consciously and be more mindful, even if you lead a busy life[7].
Breathwork also helps counteract disturbed breathing, such as hyperventilation, and it can even reduce anxiety. This is even before any therapeutic intervention to overcome anxiety.
There are all kinds of breathing exercises people can do, such as:
- Deep breathing.
- Breathing through the abdomen.
- Inhale through the nose, exhale through the mouth while pressing it together a bit (as if you were going to blow, but without blowing).
- Breathing through the mouth.
In many Eastern traditions, such as yoga, breathing also plays an important role.
Studies show that this can help with stress, anxiety, depression, trauma, addiction, obsessions, compulsive behavior, and even lack of focus[8].
Hypnotherapy against hyperventilation
As mentioned, treatment can focus on reducing hyperventilation attacks or stopping an attack.
When it comes to reducing the number of hyperventilation attacks, the key is often addressing the underlying problem. These are frequently anxiety and stress. After all, hyperventilation is also a symptom of anxiety and stress.
Stress is often nothing more than a kind of anxiety response to a specific trigger, such as how busy your work is or certain thoughts you have. Hypnotherapy can reduce the symptoms of anxiety and stress[9].
A hypnotherapist always conducts an initial consultation first to see if there are any specific patterns. For example, are there certain situations in which hyperventilation is always a problem—such as at work, at home, or when you’re simply outside somewhere?
This can, in fact, provide an indication of the type of limiting belief that causes anxiety and stress, which in turn leads to the problem.
Examples include:
- Beliefs about people in leadership positions and how to deal with them, such as whether or not to set boundaries .
- Beliefs in dealing with people you have to live with.
- Beliefs about your own abilities.
- Beliefs about your self-worth and self-confidence.
After all, if there is an idea of that, the hypnotherapist can then start looking more specifically for the possible cause and techniques that will help you remove the impeding belief.
Sometimes a technique that works with symbols and metaphors is enough to eliminate certain fears and feelings. For example, a suggestion might be for someone to color a certain feeling and then give this positive feeling another color. Then a visualization can be used to have the color associated with the fear replaced with the color of the positive feeling.
Regression for better breathing
However, it often happens that more is needed than that. In that case, a regression is usually performed first to determine where the problem first arose.
Usually, you end up with a memory in your childhood, because that is the period in your life when you define how the world works and how you are "supposed" to function in it. However, those rules never get a conscious update, so sometimes in your adult life those rules can bother you and cause you to hyperventilate.
If you know what the problem is, a hypnotherapist can help you update the impeding rule (or belief) so that it no longer bothers you. The belief is then repaired, so to speak[10].
That update, in turn, can be given in a variety of ways, such as:
- Empathize with the other people who were there at the time.
- If you're young yourself start the conversation with the people at the time.
- Engaging your younger self with your current self.
A hypnotherapist helps people start this conversation. You still have the conversation all by yourself, but you are given hints about such things as questions to ask and what to say in such a conversation to change the limiting belief.
This can be particularly helpful if you get stress and anxiety from other people.
Self-confidence for better breathing
Sometimes it’s also a matter of low self-confidence and self-esteem, which can cause anxiety and stress, leading to hyperventilation. In that case, helpful techniques—such as the “dream” technique—can be used to improve your self-esteem.
In this technique, a hypnotherapist helps you gain the realization that you are totally awesome, that you deserve to have love, to allow good things into your life and to take opportunities that life offers you.
This also brings greater peace of mind, as you approach life with more confidence.
Normal breathing anchor
To regain normal breathing during a hyperventilation attack, it is good to realize as soon as possible that you are ventilating and have a means of normalizing your breathing again.
Regression can also be used for this initially, to retrieve the feeling of breathing normally. This feeling can then be linked to a small movement, so that you can bring the feeling to the surface at the time when hyperventilation may begin or is already underway.
This is also known as an NLP anchor.
This allows you to return to normal breathing fairly quickly, stopping the hyperventilation attack.
Hypnotherapy can thus be used to reduce the number of hyperventilation attacks and to stop a hyperventilation attack.
Learn Hypnosis
Do you want to help people who suffer from hyperventilation? Then knowledge of hypnosis and hypnotherapy is incredibly useful. Come to the free masterclass for an introduction.
Want to know what hypnotherapy looks like first? During our events, you'll also get demonstrations of hypnotherapy and different techniques. You'll even get to work with a few small basic things so you can make yourself and other people feel better.
Want to get started right away and learn how the techniques named in this article work? Then enroll in our training. You can take the training in class and live online. There is plenty of assistance for 1-on-1 attention, so you can master the material.
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