Customer Reviews

Freedom from Asthma: The Revolutionary 5-Day Treatment for Healing Asthma with the Breath Connection (R) Program

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I picked up this book for a dollar on the sale table at Barnes & Noble. I've had asthma since I was 3. I've been on inhalers for 25 years. I've been hospitalized twice, have had heart palpitations and other nasty side effects of asthma and inhalers. Sure, I want to be free from asthma!

The ideas in this book sounded crazy when I first read them. Asthma is the result of too MUCH breathing? Carbon dioxide is important, and too little of it causes asthma and other diseases? I think I actually laughed out loud when I read the first few chapters. Then I kept reading. And the ideas started making sense.

This book doesn't give you a lot of practical exercises to work with; it seems to be more an overview of what's taught in the Breathing Connection seminars. That's why I gave it 4 stars instead of 5. But the book does give you enough practical information to improve your own breathing. Breathe less--less deeply and less often. Breathe through your nose. Be consistent with just those two principles and you will see improvement. Although they're counterintuitive, relax and practice them when you feel your asthma kicking in and don't be surprised if oncoming symptoms go away. In 3 days I've cut my bronchodilator use in half, I sleep through the night and my heart rate has dropped from 120 to 60. "Freedom from Asthma" also covers diet, exercise, and a number of other areas where you can improve your health by improving your breathing. Nothing too deep, but helpful nonetheless.

I just finished this book today and tomorrow I'm getting Teresa Hale's book. I'm new to this but hopeful. "Freedom from Asthma" is far from thorough, but it's a good start. If you've been looking for freedom from asthma, you may find it in the principles described here.

This book was very helpful in eliminating my exercise induced asthma. The principles and theory are very valid. I have been suffering from insomnia and mild asthma for many years and I do not like to take drugs if I can avoid it. I was also diagnosed as having sleep apnea and treated for that condition though without lasting results. This book shows why asthma develops in people and how you can control it and then cure it without any drugs. The only reason I gave the book four stars was the fact that this book does not spell out the actual 5-day treatment so I went and bought the book 'Breathing Free' by Teresa Hale. With the help of that book, I could administer the treatment to myself at home and saw some remarkable improvements in my sleep and a complete disappearance of my wheezing during running!! I also lost some weight! I highly recommend both books. I am actually consulting with the the author for a fee to continue my application of the treatment program for maximum and long-lasting results. I start to wonder why our medical establishment seem to prefer expensive drug therapies for everything when there are so many simple and non-invasive treatments out there. Could the drug companies be involved in this attitude ? I wonder.

I have to disagree with the reader from "near Boston" on this book. The Buteyko Method is not "pseudoscience" at all, although it does contradict a lot of conventional American medical understandings about asthma and breathing disorders. The Method works if you work at it, and if you are willing to go through the occasional discomfort of working at it . This approach is not a quick fix, and many people will simply have to take the $500 seminar to properly apply the Method to their individual circumstances. Sometimes a book alone won't do it, which is something both Stalmatski and Hale state only too clearly in both of their books. Contrary to the reader from "near Boston's" assertion, there is some clear discussion of how to use the Method in connection with exercise. It has been used quite extensively with the Australian rugby teams to very good success. I myself have modified my own exercise routines quite a bit, and I also had exercised-induced asthma attacks in my past history. Now if I exercise very heavily without proper warmup I might experience some mild hyperventilation which I usually can bring under control in 5 to 10 minutes. The straight skinny is that I recommend all of you out there with breathing disorders to buy this book and try the Method out for yourself. Make up your own mind. Consider taking the seminar. It will be worth it.

This Book is a good supplement for information on Buteyko, but you will not learn how to do the breathing excercises from this book. I downloaded the James Hooper manual from here http://www.nqnet.com/catalog/paypal.html and after practicing Buteyko for a month, I am asthma free. I even scored 100% lung function on my test yesterday. It was only 60% three months ago. My doctor was amazed and even asked me to give him more information on Buteyko. It really does work, but you won't get the basics on how to preform the excercises from this book.

Freedom From Asthma has been the premier introduction to the Buteyko Method of Breath Retraining up until the introduction of Teresa Hale's book Breathing Free. I most strongly recommend you buy both books, read them and apply their lessons to your own breathing. The Buteyko Method applies to far more than asthmatics, as you will find out when you read these books. If you've ever had any kind of wheezing in your life, if you've ever had an allergy attack, a bout of pleuresy, bronchitis, sinusitus, an anxiety or panic attack, or if you've had any one of a host of other common diseases of everyday life, then you need to learn about the materials in this book. I recommend you read Hale's book as well as Stalmatski's, because there are things in Hale's book about the Buteyko Method that are not in Stalmatski's, and there are things in Stalmatski's that are not in Hale's. In the end, you'll probably want to take a Breath Connection workshop, but I'll leave all that for you to discover for yourself as you go through these two books. I've had a lifelong on-again, off-again history of respiratory disorders, including infantile double pneumonia, childhood asthma, late adolescent pleuresy and panic attacks, and adulthood sinusitus and bronchitis (I don't smoke, by the way). Having started learning the Buteyko Method from these two books, I can say I feel much calmer and healthier than I have in a long time and, by the objective measure of the Control Pause (which you'll learn about in both books), I'm only halfway to where I can realistically expect to go with the improvements in my breathing. By the time I'm done with all this, I'm also looking forward to my wife and three children eventually learning the Method. Buy Stalmatski's book. You'll be glad you did.

I was extremely disappointed, as this book only talks about the Buteyko method and never really gets around to giving you the actual exercises. I felt it should tell you that in the description, because it comes up as one of the first in the searches for Buteyko, but doesn't have the exercises in it. Your money is better spent on the books with the explanations as well as the exercises, such as Teresa Hale's Breathing Free, which I picked up at my local library. It has little pictures and charts, etc., which help you be more self-disciplined - which following the program requires. I'm not sure if it works yet, as I've only done the exercises 3 times on different days, which you are supposed to do them 3X a day, but intuitively, I would say that it probably does. I have severe asthma. I'll write another review and let you know. I've never written reviews, but felt this was important since someone could die waiting for another book, and people with serious health problems don't have money to waste...I know.

I was a chronic asthmatic and the principles enshrined in this book are excellent. The only way that I solved my asthma was to address my overbreathing. This books tells you just that. One downside is that it does not contain the exercises. I have came across two books which do. These are asthma free naturally and Close Your mouth. They are little gems and contain all the information that you need to know. In fact Asthma free is the best book that I have ever read for asthma. It offers a solice of hope and has helped my quality of life improve significantly
in the past while.

Stalmatskis book is good, Asthma free or the more simpler Close Your Mouth are excellent.

What a disappointment. I really wanted this to work. I have had moderate-to-severe asthma for twnety years and would do anything to be free of the medications and the wheezing. This program seemed too good to be true.

It was. I tried it, following the program religiously, and wound up with worse breathing than before.

The overtly promotional aspect bothers me a lot too. For example, the author makes much of the fact that her clinic was "officially opened by the Prince of Wales." Well, every member of the royal family attends about a zillion such openings every year, but she makes it sound like he was a major player in forming the clinic. That's like claiming your product is "officially approved by the U.S. Government" because you got a federal tax I.D. number.

There are other weird statements in the book that I have big problems with, for example the contention that one reason asthma is on the rise is that there are more trees now than there used to be, hence more oxygen. HUH?? Has the author looked out a window lately? Some aspects of this so-called program are described in repeated and tedious detail, but other important ones are simply referred to in passing. For example, there is almost nothing on the topic of exercise and asthma, a very tricky issue for those of us who have wound up in emergency rooms after trying to exercise. And much of the diet information is out-of-date and just plain wrong.

I have to say that as much as we all hate Big Medicine, and would love for this lone voice in the wilderness to be right, there is a reason the idea that more carbon dioxide/less oxygen is good for you is not accepted by the medical establishment--it's a crock.

I am the reader from near Boston whose review appears below--but that review is about the book "Breathing Free," by Teresa Hale. These two books are on the same subject and even look a lot alike. My criticism of Hale's book and claims still stands, though.