Learning relaxation and RELAXED diaphragmatic breathing


Normal vs. deep breathing patterns. Healthy people (over 40 s CP) naturally have diaphragmatic breathing while resting. This graph shows a pattern of normal breathing:
Normal breathing pattern in time at rest: 
tiny inhalations, relaxed exhalations, pause. 40 s CP; 6 L/min

Each cycle has a tiny inhalation (the upward straight lines), exhalation (the curved downward lines) and automatic pause (almost the horizontal lines) accompanied by relaxation of all breathing muscles.
If the CP is about 20 s or less, as the case with sick people, the typical breathing pattern is following:
Ineffective breathing pattern, typical for the sick: 
    deep and fast inhalations and exhalations, hypocapnia, reduced CP (body oxygen level)


The inhalations are bigger (deeper); breathing is faster (higher frequency); exhalations are forceful (not relaxed), and there is no automatic pause.

Warning. It is a serious mistake and waste of time to practice normal breathing if your CP is less than 30 s. Why? People start to breathe deeply, while during normal breathing inhalations are tiny (normal breathing is invisible). Dr. Buteyko noticed this effect over 40 years ago (his quote is few lines below). In fact, you will learn soon that reduced breathing, the main part of the Buteyko breathing exercises, is more shallow and, for sick people, more frequent.

“The breathing [retraining] should be monitored by an instructor who had learned the method himself. Our instruction of 1964 was published in Novosibirsk, 1000 issues. We still were naive and thought that after reading this correct instruction, the patient would be able to reduce breathing and then compare when it is normal. It [the instruction] included the information about normal breathing: 2 s for inhalation, 3 s for exhalation, 3 s for the pause, etc. First, he [the student] starts to breathe deeply, secondly, he immediately tries to fulfill that normal breathing. All [final] effects are the opposite, even [for] a [medical] doctor.” Dr. Buteyko, Public Lecture in the Moscow State University, 1969.

Learning relaxed diaphragmatic breathing

This big and deep breathing usually makes chest muscles to do the main job of air pumping. Why? Low CO2 content makes the diaphragm tense. Coupled with slouching, restrict diaphragmatic movements making chest breathing the typical feature of people with low CPs.

If you have been using mostly your chest muscles for breathing at rest during last 5-10 or more years, it would take some days or weeks to restore the normal diaphragmatic breathing.

The process of learning is divided into 5 stages:
Stage 1: Feeling the breath
Stage 2: Relaxation of the body’s muscles
Stage 3: Tensing and relaxing breathing muscles
Stage 4: Relaxed diaphragmatic breathing

Stage 1: Feeling the breath

Focus on your usual breathing for 2-3 minutes at rest while sitting with the straight spine. What do you feel? If the sensations are vague, take a deep slow in-breath and slowly exhale. Do you feel how the airflow goes through your nostrils? Do you have any sensations at the back of your throat? Are there any feelings about movement of air inside the chest and bronchi? What do you sense near your stomach?

Usually, children have good perception about own breathing. Older people notice fewer sensations. Having these sensations makes the process of learning easier. However, even if the student feels nothing at all (rare, but possible), it is still possible to learn the method. How? First, the student can restore the sensations by doing special exercises and focusing attention on own breathing. Second, if these exercises do not work, as in very rare cases, the teacher can use, for the right students, special breathing exercises that do not need the feeling of own breath.

To restore the sensations of own breath, the following exercises can be used.

1. Put the arms around your waist line, as if embracing yourself, and listen to your usual breathing for about 20-30 seconds. You will be able to detect the movements of the diaphragm.

2. Put the arms slightly above the waist (about 10 cm or 4 inches higher) around your waist and listen to your usual breathing for about 20-30 seconds. You will be able to detect the movements of the rib cage.

In most cases, repeating these exercises a few times will solve the problem. If the sensations are still not present, the student should practice the exercise with the books and exercise with the belt described below.

Stage 2: Relaxation of the body’s muscles

The student is asked to tense some parts of his body muscles and then relax them. This is usually not a problem for a particular arm or leg, but is more difficult when more muscles are involved. To learn tension and relaxation of the whole body gradually, the student can start with some muscles and then add other groups. For our future goals, the student should be able:

- to tense the whole body and then relax it;

- to tense the upper part of the body (from the rib cage up) and then relax it.

Stage 3: Tensing and relaxing breathing muscles

As a next logical step, the student tries to tense and relax breathing muscles, which we divide, for our purposes, into 2 groups:

- the diaphragm (other names are “tummy”, “belly”, and “stomach”);

- all remaining breathing muscles (other names are “chest muscles”, “rib cage muscles”, and “thoracic muscles”).

Here all these muscles are tensed and relaxed together. In order to achieve success, do the following simple exercise. Close the mouth and stop breathing through the nose (using our throat lock mechanism). Try to take a strong and big inhale, while there is no way for the air to move into the lungs. This helps to achieve a strong sensation of tension in the breathing muscles. Keep the tension for 1-2 seconds and then relax the muscles and take light inhalation.

Stage 4: Relaxed diaphragmatic breathing

Can you breathe for 1-2 minutes using the tummy or stomach only? If you are uncertain or your sensations are absent or vague, it is necessary to review Module 8. How to develop diaphragmatic breathing 24/7

After the student is able to breathe using mainly the diaphragm, the next step is to learn how to relax it during exhalations. Each exhale should be accompanied by relaxation of all bodily muscles. The changes in the breathing pattern for a person with the low initial CP, who practices relaxation of the diaphragm only (no deliberate air hunger), are shown below.

Reduced breathing for low CP students
Buteyko Reduced Breathing or Shallow Breathing Pattern: 
black line before exercise, blue line during exercise


Your breathing before this exercise is shown using the black line (with forceful exhalations). During this exercise, you have the following goal: take your usual inhalation using your diaphragm only and then relax your diaphragm for exhalation. This will make your exhalations smooth (the blue line for your new breathing pattern). Note that the depth of your inhalations remains the same, but the frequency of your breathing becomes smaller. Hence, reduced breathing for low CP students is achieved using relaxation only.

For most people, this is a transitory (temporary) exercise. (Heart patients should stick with this exercise until they get over 20 s CP.) Practice this exercise for 2-3 minutes so that you get a clear sensation of your relaxed diaphragmatic exhalation. (You can or even should wear the belt during this exercise, if you are not sure about your ability to breathe using your diaphragm only. The belt will prevent you from any chest breathing. Its use is described in Module 8.)

3 comments:

  1. Was looking for Buteyko resources in India.Do you conduct workshops?

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  2. Was looking for Buteyko resources in India.Do you conduct workshops?

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