Breathing in is an active movement, with the contraction of the diaphragm muscles needed. Even though you normally inhale without consciously thinking about it, you're still exerting some effort. Exhaling, however, is a passive process powered by the elastic recoil of the chest.
Not only do you breath out without trying, you have to make an effort to not breath out, otherwise your lungs just naturally deflate like balloons.
So, everyone dies on an exhale, right? That's a good thing.
Lately I find myself having to constantly remind myself to exhale, or to allow myself to exhale, to breathe normally. It's actually getting to be a real hassle, especially when I'm going to sleep. There's that old joke about the blonde who's listening to a tape that repeats "Breathe in, breathe out" because she's too dumb to remember to do it on her own. I'm totally that girl.
In my head I'm having to dictate breathing patterns to myself, and when I start to think about other things I have to stop because you can only hold your breath for a very short time, and by the time I re-regulate myself I've forgotten what it was that I was thinking about. This is theory number one about why I'm not just breathing like a normal person: it's my body's clever ploy to stop me from ending up in the the ridiculous spurts of emotion and confusion that are a result of thinking too much.
Then I learned some new things today that lead to further theories. For example, humans typically breathe between 12 and 20 times per minute, with children breathing faster than adults. Babies can breathe as much as 40 times per minute. So, as you grow older you get, the less frequently inhale, even though it seems like you would need more oxygen, but then I guess you have bigger lungs. Actually, I remember thinking when I was little that everyone only got a certain amount of breaths that God had precounted, so when I die my last thought might be if only I hadn't gone to PE that day I would have at least another half an hour left to live. But back to the thing about adults breathing less, I'm maybe trying to be a grown-up whether I like it or not, and this is part of that plan. That's theory number 2.
Theory number 3 is that I have some rare disease (besides any sort of anemia, which does cause shortness of breath, but I've been anemic for a long time and this is not the same kind of breathing trouble that it causes) and I'm probably going to forget breathing one day and then we'll get some doctor to give us some real evidence for Theory number 3.
Bo ran away. Or walked away. Or crawled away. Or fucking flew away, the point is he's not here, and he hasn't been here, and it's raining. My dad took him outside to get some fresh air on Wednesday morning, and left him alone for less than 5 minutes, and he's gone. (Exhale.) How the hell does a cat who can barely walk get so far in 5 minutes? I have no idea, but I looked for him for hours and hours, and all I can guess is that he just really doesn't want to be found.
I think that he crawled away so that he could die alone.
The thing is, he was pretty healthy other than his leg, so he might not die at all, but just be in a lot of pain.
The other thing is, I want to see him and I don't care if he wants to see me, and that's very selfish of me I know and I feel just awful about it but I need to see him very badly, and my parents had even decided to pay for his surgery, and he was going to be okay, and (Exhale.) now all I can do is sit outside and call his name as if he's going to answer and it's almost worse than being 3 hours away because at least I never felt the urge to look for him in Tuscaloosa.
The other other thing is that I knew I should've come home on Tuesday night then everything would be fine right now and in the future when I review my priorities, things that I love will be so much ahead of all the other things that you'll need one of those skewed graphs just to view it, and I will skip ten thousand tests if it means that I can have just one more day with anything that I love a forth as much as I love Bo, and god damn it why didn't I already do that anyway?
Exhale. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale.
Not only do you breath out without trying, you have to make an effort to not breath out, otherwise your lungs just naturally deflate like balloons.
So, everyone dies on an exhale, right? That's a good thing.
Lately I find myself having to constantly remind myself to exhale, or to allow myself to exhale, to breathe normally. It's actually getting to be a real hassle, especially when I'm going to sleep. There's that old joke about the blonde who's listening to a tape that repeats "Breathe in, breathe out" because she's too dumb to remember to do it on her own. I'm totally that girl.
In my head I'm having to dictate breathing patterns to myself, and when I start to think about other things I have to stop because you can only hold your breath for a very short time, and by the time I re-regulate myself I've forgotten what it was that I was thinking about. This is theory number one about why I'm not just breathing like a normal person: it's my body's clever ploy to stop me from ending up in the the ridiculous spurts of emotion and confusion that are a result of thinking too much.
Then I learned some new things today that lead to further theories. For example, humans typically breathe between 12 and 20 times per minute, with children breathing faster than adults. Babies can breathe as much as 40 times per minute. So, as you grow older you get, the less frequently inhale, even though it seems like you would need more oxygen, but then I guess you have bigger lungs. Actually, I remember thinking when I was little that everyone only got a certain amount of breaths that God had precounted, so when I die my last thought might be if only I hadn't gone to PE that day I would have at least another half an hour left to live. But back to the thing about adults breathing less, I'm maybe trying to be a grown-up whether I like it or not, and this is part of that plan. That's theory number 2.
Theory number 3 is that I have some rare disease (besides any sort of anemia, which does cause shortness of breath, but I've been anemic for a long time and this is not the same kind of breathing trouble that it causes) and I'm probably going to forget breathing one day and then we'll get some doctor to give us some real evidence for Theory number 3.
Bo ran away. Or walked away. Or crawled away. Or fucking flew away, the point is he's not here, and he hasn't been here, and it's raining. My dad took him outside to get some fresh air on Wednesday morning, and left him alone for less than 5 minutes, and he's gone. (Exhale.) How the hell does a cat who can barely walk get so far in 5 minutes? I have no idea, but I looked for him for hours and hours, and all I can guess is that he just really doesn't want to be found.
I think that he crawled away so that he could die alone.
The thing is, he was pretty healthy other than his leg, so he might not die at all, but just be in a lot of pain.
The other thing is, I want to see him and I don't care if he wants to see me, and that's very selfish of me I know and I feel just awful about it but I need to see him very badly, and my parents had even decided to pay for his surgery, and he was going to be okay, and (Exhale.) now all I can do is sit outside and call his name as if he's going to answer and it's almost worse than being 3 hours away because at least I never felt the urge to look for him in Tuscaloosa.
The other other thing is that I knew I should've come home on Tuesday night then everything would be fine right now and in the future when I review my priorities, things that I love will be so much ahead of all the other things that you'll need one of those skewed graphs just to view it, and I will skip ten thousand tests if it means that I can have just one more day with anything that I love a forth as much as I love Bo, and god damn it why didn't I already do that anyway?
Exhale. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale.
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