A few years ago before I got married I was a stressful mess. I was so worried about money and about paying for the wedding my husband and I were going to have. 6 months before I got married something happened to me that freaked me out. I started having heart racing. I went to the ER and they said it was just stress. They gave me something to calm down and sent me home. A couple days later it returned again. I would be up half the night freaking out which made the heart racing even worse. One morning I called my mom and told her I needed to go back to the ER. We went and this time they kept me over night. They did all these tests on me and determined the issue was stress/anxiety again. They said I need to stop drinking caffeine and relax. They gave me Xanax and sent me home the next day.

My point of this story is that here it is a few years later and I haven’t had any issues with the heart racing since. I started doing yoga three years ago and because of that I think it played a major part in helping me with my stress. In yoga we started this thing called alternate nostril breathing. It’s when you hold your thumb to one nostril and you inhale in the other nostril and then you exhale. Then you repeat on the other side, close the other nostril and inhale and exhale. When I did this it really helped me. If I start getting an episode which I rarely do, I do this and it really helps. I actually swear by it.

Anxiety and panic attacks are no joke! I would do anything or try anything to help me out!

M.