Breathe In, Breathe Out

I had my first panic attack last night.

Well, at least I think it was a panic attack.

I have been going in a million directions, prepping things for the holidays while also trying to maintain regular life. I'm sure you have, too. Yesterday was crazy. I woke up knowing I had to be productive (and I prayed my boys would comply!) Things went well and I got everything done on my list that I "had" to get done yesterday. But at the end of the night, I was increasingly overwhelmed by everything more I had to do.

But the more I thought about what I had to do, the more overwhelmed I became. I shut down the computer and decided it was better for me to turn off my brain and just go to bed.

Yeah, like I've ever been able to do that.

So instead, I sat on the bed (I was too wound up to even lie down) and verbally went through my exhaused list of things I had to do. Andy listened. Poor guy, he's been here many times before. As my list grew, I kept making up things. Things that I hadn't thought of for a while but all of a sudden, I decided they had to get done! And this week, of all times!

The more I went on, the more excited I got and the harder it was to breathe. I literally felt like someone was sitting on my chest, cutting off my air. I couldn't get a good breath. I stood up and tried to increase my air flow. No luck. It felt like I was going to suffocate. My husband noticed something wasn't quite right, so he encouraged me to sit down against the wall and breathe. Breathe in. Breathe out... Breathe in. Breathe out.

So not only do I have a gazillion things floating around in my head - a million loose ends that feel like they are unraveling before my eyes - but I'm getting a lesson how to breathe. Rather than snapping his head off, I decided to listen. I tried to yawn, knowing it would give me a deep breath. "No Mindy," Andy kept saying. "Just breathe."

Well, as it turns out, he was right. I tried to regulate my breathing and asked him to talk. "Just talk to me," I said. "Tell me anything. What else is going on at work." Andy complied - still visibly concerned about his wife's inability to control the air around her - but told me more about his day. And do you know what happened? The moment I started thinking about something other than myself and everything I had to do, I could breathe. I was fine. Competely fine.

Today, I still feel a tightness in my chest that I can only imagine has to do with the weight of things I still have to do. But it doesn't take me long to get back to normal. I'm much better than how I felt for those few minutes last night. Here's what I learned: this has less to do with breathing and more to do with me being overly concerned with ME.

I got myself so wound up thinking about everything I had to do that my body couldn't even take it. It was as if that was my subconscious attempt to say, "Listen to yourself! There are other people to think about than YOU!" How interesting, that I could breathe when I started feeling empathetic for my husband's day rather than exaggerating my agenda.

I am now going to make a renewed mission to take it easy this holiday season. I'll still work hard to see that everything that reeeeeally has to get done, get's done, but I'm not going to make myself sick about it. Because literally, I've been there. And I don't want to go there again.

So, I'm going to breathe in, breathe out... breathe in, breathe out... ;)