T has a good friend who teaches mindfulness. Yesterday he gave me a CD that his friend did-- it is a mindfulness body scan. T and I are talking about doing work to help me slow myself down rather than always getting caught up in my intense emotions, agitation, and anxiety. Hopefully mindfulness will help to reduce my SI.

I tried it today. It was horrible. I couldn't stand any of the body sensations that I felt when focusing on the particular body parts that the guy was talking about. When he said to focus on the top of the head and the forehead, I couldn't stand it, and ended up pulling my hair. The CD guy said that if you experienced any unpleasant sensations or emotions to just return to focusing on your breathing-- to make that a safe place. The breathing was driving me crazy, as it always has during panic and anxiety attacks-- I begin to feel as though I am "making" myself breathe and something feels "wrong" with my breathing. I felt like jumping out of my skin.

I know that this requires practice, but I don't even know if I wanna try it again. I didn't like any of the things it brought out.

[jacq10]

oh dear I'm in a Mindfulness class and we're doing the "body scan" on Tuesday ....

I find I too have a hard time with the breathing, if anything it only makes me MORE anxious!

Hopefully (for both our sakes), it does just take practice, and we will eventually get it..

[sidony]

I don't know much about mindfulness, but I sure never understood meditation. I've had friends talk about how great it is to "calm the mind." And I'm always thinking "why the hell would I want to do that? I want to speed up my mind and think about 8 million things at once and be suffused with energy." I'm pretty sure mindfulness would be something I didn't get either. If I focused on my head, it would immediately start to itch. If I focused on my breathing, I'd start sighing and yawning and thinking that I couldn't get enough air, etc. I predict in advance that I'd fail at mindfulness. I like the word you made up.

Sidony

[bipolar_bear]

Maybe practicing it when you are with your T will help? Then as you are having these feelings possibly you can work through them.

BB

[ECHOES]

there's a body scan on this site that I have and I like: www.wholeperson.com

There are other relaxation CD's there too, progressive relaxation is what your T's friend's CD sounds like.

It can feel really uncomfortable at first. Try it a few more times; each time it won't be so new and so odd.

Even when the breathing doesn't come realy smoothe for me, it still helps me relax very much and I can recall parts of it to do anytime I need them. Not only that, but learning what if feels like to be relaxed also can help us learn more about what our body feels like in panic mode, so we can recognize when we are beginning to experience that. Then we can catch it before it gets too far along.

[Perna]

The most relaxation/whole body stuff I get into is when I get in bed at night and everything lets go and I realize how tired I am and how good it is to let go holding it all together. Lasts about 30 seconds and then I either have to pick up a good book and read for awhile (so I have something to think about as I'm falling asleep) or I realize I'm too tired to read and I turn out the light and attempt to go to sleep.

[MissCharlotte]

Hey PInk,

I like the new word. Yes, crapfulness has a certain ring to it. You know, Bellaruth Naparstek of www.healthjourneys.com does a body scan exercise that is pretty ok. It's in her general anxiety collection.

I don't think you will find it distressing.

Hmmmm

Mindfulness is unnerving?

xoxoxoxoxooxoxoxox
Peace

[Perna]

Pink, new thought; you're not having trouble with it because it's by T's friend are you? You only want T, not PT (Pseudo-T)? Since T's a Ghost, maybe you're punishing him in some way?

Actually I felt closer to T listening to it because he disclosed about how he used it when he hurt his back a couple of months ago and he was telling me how when the body scan got to the part where he had to focus on his pain he was thinking, "There's no %#@&#! way..." I loved that he told me this. He's not ghosty anymore. I am just not mindful.

[Flowerb]

I can't do a body scan with a voice in the room with me. But if i use safe, familiar music, it works pretty well. The voice just weirds me out - not quite a trigger, but almost.

When I work with little kids to teach them self-calming, I use Sesame Street songs - especially Ernie singing "Up Goes the Castle" which is a breathing song. It makes them smile but they all focus on their tummies and breath in and out. So it works.

The other thing I learned is to let your toes and fingers be your outlet. So if you start to feel weird breathing, breath out all the way through your toes or fingers. It lets you concentrate on pushing the anxiety out, out, out or down, down, down and out.

I hope you find something that works.

[tsha]

I'm going to tell you something that seems contrary...you need to slow down on the slowing down. If you're driving 60 mph and you slam on your brakes its not going to feel to good.

Slowing down and learning to breathe is beneficial for us. Its the easiest, safest way to calm ourselves.

Start out by just noticing your breath. When you breathe, where is it going? Do your shoulders or stomach move? When I started this process I was breathing into my shoulders and this was irritating my already high anxiety, which drove my racing thoughts which compounded my anxiety which which which....

If you take a deep breath you will notice your chest puff out which is better but still not the action we are looking for. When you inhale, you want it to feel like you are pulling the air in by extending your belly and filling up from the bottom up.

Just doing this a few times each day you will find it easier to breathe and later will help you to relax while you do your body scan.

Now, when I find myself in an anxiety provoking situation I find my breathing takes care of itself. But I started out slowly.

[Perna]

Oh, Flower, I love the idea of using Sesame Street!

[jacq10]

Wow... thank you tsha!

I never realized, but I too breathe into my shoulders! That could very well be why I tense up even more when I focus on my breathing! Thanks!

[confused4ever]

Hey Pink,

I am doing this also, it took some time to get it to work and not wig out trying it . What I do to help my breathing is have a private saying, and on my exhale I repeat my mantra to myself, so I am not always focusing on my breathing. I had to do this with my T's help because the breathing alone would wig me out, and I would start to hyperventalate and then start a full blown panic attack. See if that helps you, just pick a saying, something calming to you, I use my T, I ask him to help me as I exhale it works. Also Flowerb has a good thing also, I also use the exhale out the toes and fingers while doing the mindfulness cd, it helps you focus on something other then breathing. The body parts and feeling them takes practice, it took awhile for me also it is something we are so used to NOT doing.....it is hard to unlearn something that we have used as a survival technique for so many years......good luck!!

[okiedokie]

Hi Pink,
I had the same reaction you had when I first tried mindfulness! I felt like I was ready to hyperventilate!

Now, it is my most favorite skill ever. I don't breathe differently than I normally do. I just let the air hit the back of my throat, go in my body and let the tension go when I exhale.

Letting the tension escape through your fingers and toes is a great idea and one that I use.

I asked my T to record a CD with her voice on it putting me thru the PMR and it works great. I actually do a bit better when I'm listening to a crackling fire and just walk myself through it.

My advice would be to try to stay open to it and try it again. I thought it was crapfulness too when I first started using it! BTW, I love that new word and do plan to use it again, that is of course, if I have your copyright permission to do so....
Best,
Okie

I always do gown up grounding exercises before doing any mindfulness stuff or I actually can get scared in my own head. So I ground in the here and now for a while, then I can let myself relax knowing I'm all grown up. It helps me a lot.

c

[Kiya]

Ooooooooo Pink - I am with you on this!!! I have a horrible time with that stuff. Totally throws me into a painc attack and i run from the room.
But to be honest, I do use the Belleruth Naparstek one for PTSD. It is the only I can use (and i've tried many, including classes). There is a trigger for me at the end if I am still conscious, but usually i am not - or i tuen it out or close my ears. I've listened to it so many times that I wore out the tape, and have the cd memorized. I fall asleep to it every night.
kiya

I didn't like it to start with, either, but it grew on me immensely.

Maybe it was too intense an exercise to begin with. When I was starting out I started with 30 second exercises that were externally focused. So... Being mindfully aware of a flower or a stone or a leaf or something like that. Then gradually built it up over time so that I could do it for a longer period or so that I could focus on my body or my breathing.

[Gracey]

I don't know if this is anything like progressive muscle relaxation therapy but it sounds like it.

I had T make a cd for me of HIM coaching. . .I had a hard time "letting go" to the voice on the cd.

Worked like a charm.

[pachyderm]

I have never liked the ideas of relaxing parts of your body, imagining a safe place (there is no such place for me), and so on. When I try that I actually get MORE anxious. That is NOT what I consider mindfulness. To me, mindfulness is being aware of what my real thoughts and feelings are, as opposed to the false thoughts and feelings I have been taught to have in order to obtain "approval." It is hard to get onto those real thoughts and feelings, since we (I, anyway) have been so thoroughly brainwashed to have only the "correct" thoughts that would not bring down ruthless punishment. One technique is to slow down your thoughts so you can examine all of them without judging them. If I can work on mindfulness long enough it starts to become very rewarding. I begin to feel genuine and my thoughts are quite non-standard and they produce lots of insights. But it is hard to hold on to that mental state, because there is so little quick reward for it in this world.

I was on the phone with T a little while ago and I was telling him about my experience with the mindfulness CD. He said that it mimicked exactly what I was going through in life right now-- everything is just too painful and intolerable. He said to stop doing it for now and that we would work on mindfulness together in session. That it would be easier to have him there.

Wow. I even %#@&#! up mindfulness.

[splitimage]

I find mindfulness mediation really helps me - it was taught in both my addictions program and the psych hospital I was IP in. But it can be very triggering / make things worse for people with trauma histories, according to my pdoc. so it's definitely not for everyone. I use Jon Kabat Zinn's Mindfulness for Beginners Cd's and really like them,

--splitimage

[gardenergirl]

Excellent advice!

[tulips30]

I don't know anything about "mindfulness" but I know plenty about "crapfulness", especially when I am listening to it!

Unfortunately, my mother comes to mind

GOOD WORD!!!

[Kiya]

I don't like being very aware of my body - brings up too much pain, panic, anxiety, too much feeling... like i can feel my skin rubing against my muscles and it grosses me out. It is easier for me to do the BR Naperstak tape of feeling how my body feels on an emotional or pain level, then breathing out the tension - whereas it seems different when asked to actually become aware of feeling the body. Somehow the two are seperate for me.
make sense?
k