So I went to yoga class today with a friend at the campus rec(reation) center. The style of yoga we do at the rec is a faster flowing style. It is not super intense but not one of the really slow flowing ones either(I always forget the name of the style not that I can spell it anyway). As we were warming up focusing on our breathing I really noticed how many more breaths per minute I took than my friend; yes I know yoga is supposed to be introspective. I was feeling really good today, and she is coming down with something. I have over all had a really nice green run of things as of late. I've been consistently hitting above 90%; hit a 103% first thing one morning this week. I'm blaming this spike in peak flows on getting away from the pollution back home and heading to the cleaner country air where I go to school.

Yoga really makes me realize how tight and breathless I am all the time. I'm feeling good and getting good pf's and fev1's and yet I could really feel my chest being kind of tight and weird(yes I did premedicate). Focusing on my breathing does help me with getting all the air out (yay not air trapping), and definitely does relax me (and my airways... win 111% post workout). Thus far no post workout delayed flaring even though no post medication. This conscious manipulation makes me wonder if/how much of this asthma stuff is in my head. I mean I can definitely tell you that I have more asthma attacks when I am stressed, but I highly doubt there is an asthmatic out there who breathes better when they are stressed.

The other challenging thing that comes with yoga is that since I have a quicker respitory cycle than the average person, I end up either holding my breath to keep time with the class on the first few reps of pose to keep pace with the inhale and do .... exhale and do .... or getting my breaths completely out of sync with the pattern. When I try to keep my breaths going with the rythm it is kind of challenging since then I have to keep pretty brisk pace in the poses to keep up with my breathing. Alas, unless I'm feeling strong and have been keeping up with yoga regularly I generally just let the breathing rhythm fall out of sync from my poses.