On occasion I just stop breathing.

[SnakeMama]

A quick background: I grew up healthy as a horse, one of those always skinny and always healthy/athletic girls. In college I gained quite a bit of girth in college and started having trouble with my thyroid very slowly growing. I was able to drop a good bit of weight for a period of time by being on a 400/500 calorie a day diet with 6 days on/3 days off work outs. It wasn't living well personally restricting myself so much. I have since gained a good bit of the weight back... I don't know if my weight issues are related to my breathing problems but I do feel it might be related.

Since I was about 12-14 years old I have had strange breathing problems. I will be walking along (always while awake, never while asleep), and suddenly without warning I am unable to really breath in. I have to work very hard to breath in probably sounding very much like a person choking on something. It almost always happens when I have a half a breath in. To get breathing in I have to suck hard to fill my lungs and get myself to cough as hard as I can. I have been to a doctor several times for it - They did different tests, had me run up and down a hall, and attempted to listen. Unfortunately they usually wanted to coach me into saying "it feels like a baby elephant is standing on my chest." It really doesn't feel like that, it feels like I am being strangled - Like I am having some sort of spasm around the throat area stopping me from breathing in. I can have long periods of times between incidents from months to a few years - But with such a thing you DO remember them. I have been brought to my knees only once, the rest of the time I get air in. The doctors just throw inhalers at me to "see if that helps anything," which never helped with the length of times between incidents. They do hurt when it happens... I am 36 now and have just had another one, it knocks me down energy wise when I finish fighting through it. Help? Any ideas? Anyone relate?