Stress Center Peer Support

I am having the hardest time today. I just cant seem to get my breath, this has been ongoing, but some days are worse. I am at work, I work directly w/ the public and am the only one here today to help the front counter. I finally took a .25 xanax, but other then calming me down and making me tired, I am still so fuzzy and still have the pain and shortness of breath in my upper chest. The xanax did help with the feeling like I could not swallow. I am so tired of going to the doctors and looking like an idiot! But I really feel like they should do a chest xray or a cat scan or something! It is not normal to have this pain/pressure day after day, it is even effecting my dreams, last night I had a dream that I was coughing up black paper out of my lungs and that is why I couldn't breath right. I could really use some support to get through the day. I hate when I have to take medicine, and I know I stress too much about that, but when it doesn't take away the symptom that is causing the anxiety that really starts to scare me and all I can do is obsess about how I feel and what could be wrong. Help! (please)

Welcome the breathlessness in, Tee. I'll bet you haven't done that, yet. Just welcome it. Stop the resistance to it. It won't hurt you, but even more importantly, when you welcome it it can't stay that way for long. Focus on your breathing but don't worry about taking a deep breath. You don't need a deep breath right now. It will come when you relax with the breathlessness. Try it now. You don't have to like it. Just welcome it in and make it ok to be there. Then get focused on what you are doing in the moment. You don't need a chest x-ray or a CAT scan. If those were necessary the doctors would have done it. They didn't, so let this go.

Breathe in and out. In and out normally, and get busy at work.

Tee, first let me say that I have prayed for you today even though I dont know you. If I could make a cople of suggestions. First stop, drop, and ask for help. I usually go to the bath room, take a few deep breaths in threw the mouth and out threw the nose (kinda like smoking with out the butt).after my heart slows down a bit , I kneel and pray for help in my situation and ask the lord to help me trew it. I tell my self this is temporary and practice relaxing. I have just come up with a new idea at work, relaxation tapes on my radio. I leave the cd right out for people to see, I tell them it helps me relax.I will keep praying for you and please stick with the program YOU WILL RECOVER.

Thank you for the responses. Boon, you have a really good point with just welcoming the breathlessness, I know I am getting enough oxygen, although I was getting so dizzy and spacey, I was even starting to doubt that. I just can't seem to get past that there is something else wrong, this has bee going on since the beginning of February, it is new symptom and it is constant, alway heaviness in upper chest and shortness of breath, like I cannot fully expand my lungs and a pain in my neck like it is hard to swallow. I can get through about a week of positive talk and no meds and then boom it just seems to break loose and I loose the battle. The xanax calms me and clears my head some so I can refocus, but it is exhausting. So I will try welcoming it and not worry about taking a deep breath rmac, I did go to the bathroom, broke down some and took some slow deep breaths which was hard to do since I was in the middle of breaking down. I said a prayer for strength and went back to work. Thanks for the support, It really helps. Tomorrow will be a better day!