Breathing in posture

It's called diaphragm breathing budahazya. You breath through your nose if possible rather than your mouth. However, if you are a mouth breather it still works. Your lower tummy just above your pubic bone goes out on the inhale, and draws in on the exhale.

You can kick start it by placing your hand on your lower tummy and with the commencement of the inhale just giving your tummy a little push out. You should then just feel the soft pull out of your tummy on the inhale and the gentle fall back as you breathe out.

You don't actually concentrate on the diaphragm itself (the membrane that separates the lung/heart area from the abdomen).

To begin with to make sure you are doing it right, It is so much easier to do if you are sitting/standing in posture with your upper torso held tall or if you are lying down straight. Once you get the knack, just check from time to time that you are sticking to it, especially after some exertion or during an activity where you find you may be puffing.

cheers, Fab

English is the "language of whores and sailors" - a useful mix of words developed and spread around the world at various seaports at a time when the sun didn't set on the nation boasting this language as its own. It continues to develop this crazy, useful way in constant additions and changes. Its lack of discipline is its genius, but it sure makes it hard to learn. I was going to try to help and looked up these words in the American Heritage dictionary and found conflicting definitions. No help there. Besides that, when we use "nicknames" (do you know what that term is?) for body parts instead of precise anatomic labels, each person speaking or hearing can have a different meaning. We're used to it - it doesn't seem like such a big problem. We all know what we're talking about, but I'm not so sure we're really saying it. It shouldn't be surprising that there is so much mis-communication in the world.
I know this doesn't help your physical problems at all or clear up the names of things. Fab has used the language well to define and describe this to you and given you two lessons in one.

Try this, Budahazya.
-find a fascial tissue or a square of toilet paper.
-Stand or sit as you normally would, with your chest more down.
-Now consciously relax your belly.
-Now, close your mouth and hold the tissue loosely over your nostrils.
-Now lift your chest and you will feel that the tissue being sucked into your nostrils. Diaphragmatic breathing works all by itself as long as your chest can lift with inhalation.

This is because lifting your chest makes your lumbar curve larger and pushes your lumbar curve forwards. Your diaphragm is attached to the underside of your breastbone and around the underside of all your ribs, and to your spine at about waist level, where your ribs start. When you lift your chest it increases the distance between your breast bone and your waist, making your (upward dome-shaped) diaphragm stretch, and get tighter, so it moves downwards and out the front (because your breastbone is higher than your waist). This creates a small vacuum in your chest and air flows into your lungs. You don't need to use the muscles between your ribs or your shoulder muscles at all to breathe normally. Save those until you are being chased by a tiger and need more air in your lungs.

As long as your tummy is relaxed, and not pulled in this works just fine, just breathing with your diaphragm, and keeping your shoulders relaxed.

If you pull your tummy in your lumbar curve will straighten. There is nowhere for your diaphragm to go forward and down because your intestines and pelvic organs cannot move out of the way. This leads to loss of the backward bend in the torso and intraabdominal forces from inhalation being exerted on the walls of the vagina and attempting to push the pelvic organs out the bottom of the torso.

Diaphragmatic breathing with a lifted chest therefore has several cascading effects for preventing prolapse symptoms.
1 Keeps your shoulders from getting tense
2 increases your lumbar curve, which leads to
3 the pelvis dropping forwards, which leads to
4 a bigger bend in the torso where the spine meets the sacrum, which leads to
4 intraabdominal forces being absorbed by your relaxed abdominal wall, and the muscles around the lumbar spine, which results in
4 protection of the vagina from intraabdominal forces, and
5 the pelvic organs sliding from a soft, sinewy pelvic floor of muscle forward onto the firm, solid pelvic bones, the true pelvic floor, which leads to
6 less impingement on the vaginal space by pelvic organs,.

There are also other reflex muscle relaxations and contractions that go automatically with this type of breathing, which is really an autonomous, non-voluntary action, but we can confound it by sucking in the tummy and making our body breathe with the shoulders and muscles between the ribs.

Have you ever noticed the square shoulders on muscular women who are coaches on reality TV shows about exercise and losing weight, like The Biggest Loser? They have trained their bodies to have an abdominal six pack, which relies on locking the chest down and holding the tummy in. Their shoulders are permanently tense and contracted. The vagina is at the bottom of the torso, not protected, out the back. Guess what's going to happen later?????

Now, can you see why diaphragmatic breathing is a cornerstone of WW posture?

1. lie on your back on the floor with your legs outstretched and your arms palm up by your sides (small cushion under your knees and lower back if you like
2. close your mouth and put the tip of your tongue behind your top front teeth and drop it down in the back relaxing your jaw
3. eyes open looking down toward your belly, take a slow deep breath in- try for about 10 seconds in and watch your belly rise as you breathe in and fall as you breathe out- try for about 20 seconds out
4. see how your chest is still but your belly is moving?

Just on that Budahazya, yes Alemama's belly work is safe and soft.

If you happen to be an asthmatic do not concentrate on your chest or shoulders when doing diaphragm breathing. This is strongly recommended against if you are an asthmatic. In fact, experience has shown that concentrating in this way does not result in diaphragm breathing. The diaphragm must come up and down within the ribcage. Lifting shoulders and chest prevents the diaphragm from working. It is something that asthmatics are prone to do in their extremity and in this instance instinct lets them down.

Hold your back straight with the lumbar strong and curved and concentrate on breathing with your belly.

cheers, Fab

Check out Buteyko breathing on Google, Budahazya. They recommend the same diaphragmatic breathing that we recommend. It is about breathing slower, with your mouth closed, breathing less in each breath,and maintaining a little CO2 in your lungs.

My asthma now gone. No more coughing for the past almost ten years. No more medication. You might not get as good a result as I got, but anything that gets you breathing better will be better for your asthma and for your prolapses.

You really need to learn it one-to-one with a trained teacher because the learning process can be uncomfortable, and not very pleasant, with strange symptoms. It is good to be in the hands of a person who knows what is happening. It can seem expensive at the time, for a series of lessons, but it has paid for itself several times over in saved doctor's fees, drugs, healthier skin (no more cortisone), improved prolapses, etc. I also have more faith in my body's own resources to heal itself.

Buteyko was Russian, and I don't think he was a medical doctor, so his work is not published in the normal English speaking academic journals. doctors don't generally give his methods any credibility at all, but 'the proof of the pudding was in the eating' for me. I know that it worked for me.

Ironically, I first learned it to stop the coughing from the asthma, in preparation for having prolapse repairs, so I wouldn't blow the repairs apart with chronic coughing during the recovery period. It fixed the asthma, and the absence of coughing allowed my prolapse symptoms to cease worsening. I didn't have the surgery. My prolapse symptoms continue to improve. My complete story is in the Experienced Members Forum.

Louise

Hi budahazya,
No worries - many people find they're unsure how to breathe well.
For basic breathing, this is what I do:
When you breathe; (inhale and exhale):
Simply relax the abdomen.
In this way, when the breath enters your lungs the abdomen will rise automatically and the abdomen will automatically reduce on the exhale.
Simple, safe and effective.

Once this becomes 2nd nature and natural, then we can start doing more complicated stuff, but that's the basics in my experience.

xwholewomanuk

I walk fast, therefore, lean forward. I've been told this often by my co-workers. In order to keep in posture I have to pretend I'm on a leash and CONSTANTLY being pulled back. This brings my chest up and shoulders back. For the pelvic tilt, I pretend my butt cheeks are bowling balls and, as I walk, they move up and down with each stride. This somehow gives me the pelvic tilt I think I need. Concentrating on both of these things helps me (about 50% of the time) to loosen my stomach muscles.

What a pain in the butt all this is. Sigh.

You must learn posture. Relax belly, chest up, shoulders down (NOT back). Don't lean forward. It takes awhile to get this. Which way is this "pelvic tilt"? Get Christine's book and/or the basic DVD and get started. - Surviving

The pelvic tilt is forward, of course, otherwise it would be what I always do - butt tucked under.

I'm contemplating getting Christine's CD's but can't see spending the money on it when I can Google most of the info.

Thanks!

I wanted to say hello and also to let you know that there is no way you can google the information that is available in both Christine's book and in her DVDs. Much is learned from this site but you will find a wealth of amazing information in both her book and now quite a selection of DVDs. I recommend the book first if money is tight. I recommend them all when you are able. Best wishes to you!

Many women come here hoping for a fast, easy fix, something to be handed to them on a platter. I spent over a year studying the book. I started getting real results in the second year. I am 3 years now, still working, still studying, still improving. You get back in relation to what you put in. Christine has given many of us our lives back. To come on her site and make a statement like that, first off, shows you are lacking in basic good manners and consideration. You also don't sound too serious about prolapse management. We've all been there and felt that anger. Get some manners, and get to work. Good luck truffle. - Surviving

Ms. Nightingale - Thank you. Yes, I figured I couldn't Google some of the things on her DVDs, but there is a lot of info. online. It's just finding the correct info. of course.

I have placed a hold on her book at the library, so this will help.

The reason I'm hesitant on getting the DVDs is because I fear they contain minimal info. This is by no means a dig at Christine and her work, so please don't take it that way. I wish we could check them out at the library, too! Which one would you suggest getting first?

Thanks again!

Who doesn't want a quick fix? We'd all be lying if we said no! HA!

I don't consider what I said rude at all. It wasn't meant to be. I'm just a very blunt person. So I apologize for saying what I was thinking. None of what I said was directed to Christine. I appreciate that this forum exists. It's certainly a wealth of information.

QUESTION - I see that most people say it takes 2-3 years to see some improvement/stability in their condition. Is this because it takes a while to learn the techniques? Or other?

Thank you!

Great that your library carries the book! Both her book and all of her DVDs (I have them all except the Elders one) have such a wealth of information. It is not digestible the first time around. As a matter of fact, I am one year into this and every time I reread or reconnect with a DVD (I am busy and unfortunately I drift away from them here and there) there are new layers of learning and new ways of understanding. If you can buy just one, I would start with First Aid for Prolapse and branch out from there. I just bought the bundle since you save a bit and I knew I wanted them all. This is a life long work and to have the variety and the amazing sharing of knowledge from each was something that I knew I wanted in my life. My recommendation is to buy the bundle! Also, for your information, within 6 weeks of posture work I was already markedly improved. The improvement continues with setbacks here and there. We are all different, but with the tools (book and DVDs) you will learn what is good for you and what isn't. How you dedicate to posture will dictate largely the rate of your success. Best wishes to you!

"... when the breath enters your lungs the abdomen will rise automatically..." ... if you are lying down. If you are standing or sitting your abdomen will expand forwards and to the sides, and lift your chest automatically ... "...and the abdomen will automatically reduce on the exhale. ..."

:-)

hi girls im new to this n only been on site for a few days. iv got a grade 3 bladder prolapse n im trying to do the right posture and breathing from info.iv seen on here (cant afford to buy books/dvds at the moment)
i went for a walk today n tried walking with shoulders down head high n breathing into my stomach. im not sure i did it properly as like many iv been taught to suck my belly in. i kept tryin to relax my belly n breathe but my chest felt really tight and sore like i cudnt breathe in fully n i kept getting stomach pains n pains at my sides. cud i make prolapse worse if i do it the wrong way? sooo hard to relax stomach muscles n hard to try do it on my own. x

This is a natural process and I was much like you in the beginning, in that the breath felt tight and everything felt sore. I did remain stubbornly dedicated to trying to get the posture and within a 3-4 week time, I had no more soreness and I just started to trust that the breath was right. You might want to practice the awareness of your breath while resting lying down. Then it is easy to feel the breath come into your belly, and to see it too. Since you too were used to sucking the belly in, that step may take a bit of time. Stay with it, you will get it. I was still trying to sort that out for several weeks. There are muscles in there that you may have been tensing for years and years and not even knowing it. As long as you stay dedicated to finding the posture and the breath, you will do no harm. It will be a process and along the way you might find some ups and downs. Best wishes!

Hi Kam

Lying in bed while going to sleep, or even better, first thing when you wake in the morning, is a good time and place to practise your breathing, when you are snug and comfy, and don't have other things on your mind. Being aware of your breathing with a particular technique, usually a variation on this method, is a common form of meditation, so by practising your breathing while you are very relaxed, you get two benefits for the price of one. Combining the learning of the breathing is made unnecessarily hard by trying to combine it with a new posture.

An explanation of the experience you had with the tight chest, is that when you lift your chest your lungs spontaneously half fill with air. When you try to inhale deeply you can't, because there isn't room for much more air. This seems like a tight chest, but it actually isn't. By keeping your chest lifted at all times you are ensuring that you get plenty of oxygen. You might be thinking that the air in you lungs will get stale and poisonous, but actually it is good to keep plenty of CO2 in your lungs. CO2 is a by product of respiration, but it is also an essential gas for transferring the oxygen from the bloodstream into the organs. It's all good.

Louise