From: John Horrax


My name is John Horrax, I'm 23 years old, a student of law and accounting at the University of Canterbury, New Zealand. Prior to adopting the Buteyko breathing technique I suffered from occurrences of the airways to my lungs contracting, and inflaming etc, reducing the amount of air I could breath; when I was a few years old the doctors diagnosed this as asthma, and I was given Ventolin. As I grew up I continued to use the inhaler, and by third-form ( first year of high school) was using it between 4 and 10 times a day, on average, and continued to have asthma attacks regardless. In fact, they became worse; I went to hospital once with asthma. In the few hours before I was taken to hospital I must have used the Ventolin about fifty times; after about thirty times it did nothing and breathing was becoming harder and harder. Anyway, it took a drip, some steroids, and a few days of fine hospital cuisine (yeah right), to sort me out. They sent me home with my Ventolin and a Becotide to resume over-breathing.

I found out about Buteyko from a surfing magazine which raved about the techniques success. I looked into it and found out that a course was to be conducted in my home town soon. When I started the course I was still sucking on the Ventolin as if it were air itself. Halfway through the course the instructor said try not to use Ventolin. At first it was sort of hard to break the habit, but I didn't use it. Buteyko took hold of me from there on, everything got better. I haven't used any asthma medication since; on the very rare occasion since, that my airways have started to tighten up, I listen to what my body is telling me and so I shallow breath.

Since using Buteyko I believe that I have had better concentration, which could be due to more oxygen getting to my brain. Another benefit I have found with breathing better is significantly increased athletic performance. Prior to Buteyko I had average athletic ability, however, I am now a competitive triathlete, and runner. I have won a number of mountain runs breathing only through my nose, which becomes quite natural after practise. However, because I exercise so much I do slip back into over-breathing a bit; to counter this I shallow breath as I need to.

Overall, I have to say that the change to my life because of Buteyko has been revolutionary, and I recommend it to anyone, even people without asthma.

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