I've broken breathing techniques into five parts; inhaling through the nose, inhaling while expanding the stomach, exhaling through "pursed" lips, attempting to breath as slow as possible and consciously trying to empty as much air as possible out of the lungs with every exhalation.

Inhaling through the nose is important to warm and filter the air before it gets to the lungs. It will also help to keep your sinuses clear.

"Pursed" or "puckered" lip exhaling naturally slows down exhalation but its also helpful to learn to inhale as slow as is comfortable to you. This helps make your respiration system more efficient.

Inhaling by expanding the stomach is not easy. All our lives, we have been inhaling by expanding our chest. I'd suggest learning how to inhale by expanding the stomach by lying on your back and putting a small book on your stomach. Now try to raise the book as you inhale. When you can easily raise the book by inhaling while lying on your back, teach yourself how to extend your stomach while standing up straight by putting your hand on your stomach. When you can easily move your hand forward when standing still when you inhale, it will not be too hard to learn to breathe from the stomach while you are exercising. Lots of practice will make this important technique automatic.

The last breathing technique that I feel is important when exercising is to consciously try to empty your stomach of all air with exhalation. This is difficult. However, it is very beneficial because those of us with emphysema suffer from too much trapped air. Therefore, if we can empty our lungs to the maximum amount that we are capable of, it will increase our ability to get oxygen to our muscles and remove carbon dioxide from our blood.

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