Why do quick, deep, breaths cause a feeling like a high?

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Why do quick, deep, breaths cause a feeling like a high?

In: Biology

3 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

Re breathing in a paperback for a couple of minutes restored lost C02 and reverses symptoms almost at once. High is not quite it. More like dizzy or faint

Anonymous 0 Comments

because you’re hyperventilating and you’re body doesn’t like that.

what’s cool, though, is if you intentionally hyperventilate, your hands will eventually become painfully numb and your arms will spasm. the numbness will creep up your arms, almost like when they fall asleep in the middle of the night. we called them “t rex arms” when I got my wilderness first responder cert. if you can stand to not panic and prevent yourself from actually hyperventilating, it’s a cool experience. if you think you’d freak out, you could have a friend be a breathing coach for you to calm you back down.

that’s why it’s important to help someone who’s having a panic attack… the breathing is a relatively “easy” thing to fix, but it can go sideways and scary real fast if they don’t understand going on.

Anonymous 0 Comments

Specifically, when you hyperventilate, you lower the concentration of CO2 (carbon dioxide) in your blood. This changes your blood chemistry; your blood becomes more alkalotic (less acidic — the concentration of H+ or hydrogen ions lessens). As a result of this, you develop a temporary lowering of calcium ions (Ca++) in your blood (they get bound to a protein called albumin).

Calcium ions are important in muscle contraction and nerve conduction. Hypocalcemia (low blood calcium) produces the feelings you are talking about. Nerve conduction is altered (so you get tingling around your mouth, and in the hands, for example), and muscle contraction increases.