For the last 18 months, I’ve been finding it really hard to breathe. It feels like I can’t breathe in deeply enough to inflate my lungs, and it’s impossible to take a full breath. The only way to take a full breath is to yawn. It feels like my lungs are filled with cement, or that there’s something very heavy pushing down on my chest. Sometimes the anxiety is in my stomach, too, and I have this acid, sick, cramping feeling in my stomach.
It’s the breathing that’s the worst though. Has anyone else had this, and how did you deal with it? (I’ve been to the GP and had an X-ray, blood tests etc - all is fine. I had a course of CBT and a lot of therapy, but nothing has helped this symptom specifically).
I wake up every morning with this feeling of dread, too. I open my eyes and then it’s like the Dread arrives and I think, ‘oh, there you are’. I feel so lethargic and like I have no energy, ever.
I think…I feel very unhappy when I consider this might never go away. And if it doesn’t, how will I live like this? I find no joy in anything, and I’ve made terrible choices in my life and destroyed a beautiful relationship with a very understanding man because I felt I was going mad. I just don’t know how to live this life. It’s all too much.
Has anyone else had this chronic breathlessness/ difficulty breathing? And what did you do to help?
Thank you 🙏