Jen Tiller

My body learned healthier breathing as a habit…. My world changed

Since childhood Jen Tiller struggled with allergies,, migrains, hay fever and sinusitis- but her asthma led her finally to find a neat solution to all these health issues. What a beautiful soul and beautiful healing testimonial. read here and be inspired.

It all started at : 

I grew up in Sydney Australia. In 1961 at the age of a few weeks I had an allergy reaction to my first bottle of cow’s milk, and a few months later swelled up after a drop of egg yolk in my breakfast cereal. Had pneumonia at 4…. I grew up with chronic, severe, sometimes life-threatening bronchial asthma/COPD, hay fever and sinusitis, lots of eczema and migraines, reacting to everything from food, animals, pollens, chemicals, exercise, and pretty much any physical or emotional challenge. The doctors told my parents I probably wouldn’t survive childhood. It was partly genetic, some the stress of growing up in a violent household and then a cement factory was built just a few hundred metres away.

Main symptoms were: 

Over time the docs labelled me quite a few things, including ‘Allergic to the 20th century’ (got that one after a month in an allergy unit), ‘PTSD sufferer’ etc etc. 
 

I tried these modalities but they did not cure me: 

I took sprays, steroids, allergy tabs, antibiotics etc from a very early age, which kept me alive while adding some really nasty long-term side-effects. I still woke up most nights wheezy, struggled to walk let alone run, took weeks or even months off school every year. The symptoms didn’t improve as I grew up, even when I married a kind, gentle man (I had learned something!), became a mum and moved to the country. I continued with the meds and over the years tried lots of complementary medical solutions too, which usually helped for a while but nothing prevented it getting bad again.

Change in the plot: 

At 35, I was still dealing with chronic illness, sometimes life-threatening. I was having a very nasty bout of asthma etc at the time when I heard one of the first practitioners in the country was running classes just an hour away from me. My GP at the time was also a trained chiropractor and family friend, and he came with me the first time I went. He stayed behind and asked a LOT of questions of the physiotherapist who ran it, and assured me it was a safe option and that he would monitor my progress. It was alien territory, but I worked hard on learning to slow my breathing, and breathe through my nose rather than the shallow, noisy mouth breathing I had done my whole life.

The doom of the past versus the glory of my present life: 

A few years later having moved to England in 2000 I was able to go deeper into the Buteyko Method with Alexander (Sasha) Stalmatsky who had worked alongside Professor Buteyko for many years in the Russian clinic where it all started. And since then I haven’t had ANY asthma or bronchitis symptoms nor needed any medication for either for over 20 years! 

My body learned healthier breathing as a habit…. My world changed

Healing Methods that worked in this case

  • Healed with Buteyko method

    Most people assume faster, heavier, shallower breathing gives us more oxygen, but hyperventilation (over-breathing) as a habit is a major health problem. Once that becomes ‘normal’, the body stays tense, with less oxygen reaching where it’s needed, the whole system tends to be more acidic, and depending on a person’s genes can cause havoc with a range of immune system responses. For asthmatics the airways narrow as a protection mechanism. One thing triggers the next.  The basics of... read more here