Breathwork

If there was ever a week that checked every box of emotions, the most recent one would have been it. Highs, lows, disappointment, and the finale on Saturday a car that decided to join me in the lane I was driving in and then get mad at me for not getting out of his way.

Midweek I met a friend for happy hour. I should have cancelled but I’d already cancelled once so I met her at a packed restaurant where everything felt like too much. I told her how my week started by seeing Beyonce with my kids on Sunday night only to get a text before the concert started that made me want to go home and cry. She listened and we drank wine until I had to cut our visit short because I told another friend I would take a breathwork class with her. I didn’t want to go to that either but she has been my hairdresser and dear friend for nearly twenty years. This spring she got a virus which led to a diagnosis of Guillian Barre Syndrome and has been unable to feel her hands or feet since. There went her career, her confidence, and her stability until her nerves repair themselves which could take 1-2 years. We have told each other the most intimate details of our lives, so when Amy told me she thought a Breathwork class might be good for me I listened even though I didn’t have a clue what it was about.

We met at the yoga studio she is working at now because her friend who owns it needed someone to work the front desk and Amy is able to use a computer. She was so happy I actually showed up for the class as did her son who I have heard about for years. The three of us settled on mats in the front row which I immediately disliked because it makes me think I’m going to be called upon to answer a question to something I should know but don’t because instead of paying attention I was taking a trip to LaLaLand. We would stay on the floor throughout with a blanket on, a lavender-scented eye mask to completely darken the room, and listening to the rhythm of our own breathing.

In a very quiet and soothing voice, the instructor set the mood by saying, “Relax your forehead, your eyes, your jaw,” and I was concentrating way too hard on all of that until a “Relax your ears,” and I was like now you’re just making shit up because there’s no such thing as relaxing your ears. Then I checked myself into LaLaLand and imagined a bunch of witchy healers with dreadlocks in their gypsy robes reeking of patchouli sitting around a campfire saying, “I know you guys!!! What if we say to relax your back molars,” and everybody laughs hysterically, writes it in their notebooks with an owl feather dipped in ink, and passes a joint and a jug of Gallo wine around the circle.

I stayed on the floor not relaxing as we went through different kinds of breaths until I decided I needed to refocus because I’m pretty certain I barely breathe all day. I’m upright and functioning but that’s more due to coffee, a handful of Hot Tamales, and a lot of sighing which I’m told is not the same as breathing. The instructor had a voice like butter and I listened and took deep breaths in and swooshed them out over and over, convinced that I am an utter failure at breathing. This went on for nearly an hour, my chest moving up and down, near constant trivial chatter inside my own head, and me wondering if it would be rude to take my eye mask off, sit up, and look at the clock because I’m feeling trapped by the sound of my own breath.

She walks us to the end of our class, our breathing slows down, it is back to a steady in and out, the room is quiet, and she tells us to place our hand on our heart. We say sweet nothings to it which feels awkward, and then she says, “As your hand is on your heart, make a vow that as the days go by you will not forget to be more tender with it,” and I take those words in and turn them over and over.

I will be more tender with you.

I willl be more tender with you.

I will be more tender with you until I want to sob because I am more tender towards my dead husband’s heart than my own, the one that has survived the unimagineable, the one that clings to hope, the one that kept a broken family intact, the one still very much alive, beating, and trying to breathe .