As you may know, I spend part of my time hosting Camino de Santiago walking and writing retreats, and another part happily scribbling away with the Wordweavers in the southwest of France writing group, At one of our meetings—daringly scheduled on Friday the 13th of February 2026—I shared the little story that follows.
This is part 2 of the story of a doctor who spent years teaching other people how to breathe… and only much later discovered that she herself had forgotten how. Dr. Anna Vermeer was a competent, respected, thoroughly overworked physician who could diagnose stress in her patients within minutes and prescribe sensible solutions with great confidence. Every day people arrived in her office with tight chests, racing thoughts, insomnia, and the quiet sense that life had become a little too much.
Anna listened carefully, reassured them, and encouraged them to slow down.
Meanwhile, she ran through her own life at a pace that suggested the building might catch fire at any moment. She believed this was normal. Responsible people carried heavy loads. Dedicated professionals stayed busy. Doctors, after all, were supposed to take care of everyone else.
Part 2
The patient arrived late in the afternoon, during that strange hour when the pace at the clinic felt slow and suffocating. You could literally sense it in the air. The receptionist’s cheerful voice had dropped half a tone. The coffee machine had been used so often it now sounded faintly resentful. Even the fluorescent lights seemed to hum with a sort of bureaucratic fatigue.
Anna glanced at the chart. Michael Laurent. Age 42. Chest tightness. Shortness of breath. Another stress case, most likely. Or a heart attack preparing to happen. She stepped into the waiting room and called his name.
Michael stood up too quickly, knocking his knee against the chair with a dull thud. He looked like a man who had been running — not physically, but internally — for quite some time. His eyes were slightly too wide, his shoulders crunched up somewhere near his ears.
Anna had seen this many times. The posture of a nervous system on high alert.
They sat in the stuffy, overheated consultation room. “So,” Anna said gently. “Tell me what’s been happening.” Michael rubbed his chest. “It feels like… I can’t quite get a full breath,” he said. “Like something is pressing here.” He tapped the centre of his sternum. Anna nodded, already assembling the familiar mental checklist. Stress. Overwork. Anxiety. Too much caffeine. Not enough sleep.
The physical exam was reassuring. Heart rate a little fast, but steady. Lungs clear. Blood pressure slightly elevated but not alarming. Nothing dangerous. No impending heart attack. Anna sat back in her chair. “I think what you’re experiencing is stress,” she said calmly. Michael gave a small, helpless laugh. “That’s what my wife says.” Wives, Anna reflected privately, were often excellent diagnosticians.
She reached for the smooth river stones on her desk and slid one toward him. “Let’s try something simple,” she said. “Just a breathing exercise.” Michael looked sceptical, but he picked up the stone. It rested in his palm, cool and reassuring, like something that had been quietly patient for thousands of years. “Close your eyes if you like,” Anna said. Michael obeyed. “Now breathe in slowly through your nose, for four counts.” He inhaled, shoulders rising. “Hold it for four counts.” The room grew quiet. Outside in the corridor, someone laughed, the sound strident before fading away. “And now breathe out slowly. For four counts.” Michael exhaled, and his shoulders dropped a fraction.
Anna watched him, calm and professional. She had guided hundreds of patients through this exact exercise — slow the breath, calm the nervous system, remind the body it was safe. Simple. Routine.
Except that something strange happened next.
In the quiet of the room, as Michael inhaled again, Anna suddenly became aware of her own breathing. Or rather — of the lack of it. Her chest felt tight. Not painful. Just constrained, like a door that should open fully but only moved halfway. She tried to take a deeper breath. The air stopped somewhere in the upper part of her lungs.
That was odd. She tried again, discreetly this time. Inhale. Halfway. Stop. A small flicker of irritation creased her forehead. Perhaps she was sitting awkwardly. She straightened her back slightly. Michael exhaled again, longer this time. Anna attempted another deep breath. No better. Too shallow. Her lungs seemed to have developed an unexpected opinion about the situation.
Michael opened his eyes. “That actually helps a little,” he said. “Good,” Anna replied automatically.
But something had shifted. Her attention had turned inward. She inhaled again, quietly. No better. The realisation crept in slowly, like a draft under a door. She could not remember the last time she had taken a truly deep breath — not a polite, functional breath, but a real one. The kind that fills the lungs completely, expands the ribs, and settles somewhere deep in the belly. She tried again. Inhale. Block. It felt as though an invisible belt had been tightened around her chest.
Michael was breathing more easily now. His shoulders had dropped, and the small panic in his eyes had softened. Meanwhile, Anna felt a strange ripple of unease. This was absurd. She was the calm one. The expert. She guided people out of stress every day. And yet here she was, sitting perfectly still in her own consulting room, unable to take a full breath.
Michael set the stone back on the desk. “That’s strange,” he said thoughtfully. “When I focus on breathing, I realise how tense I’ve been all day.” Anna almost laughed. All day. What a charmingly optimistic time frame. Her own tension had been running a far longer marathon. “Yes,” she said quietly. “That happens.”
But now the realisation had begun spreading through her awareness like ink in water — the tightness in her shoulders, the constant forward lean of her posture, the way her mind never stopped moving from patient to patient, problem to problem, responsibility to responsibility.
Even now, part of her brain was already thinking about the next appointment. And the next. And the charts waiting on her desk.
Michael stood to leave. “Thank you, doctor,” he said. “I feel a bit calmer.” “I’m glad,” Anna said. She walked him to the door, her professional composure intact. But when the door closed behind him, the room felt unusually quiet. Anna sat back down slowly. The late afternoon sun had shifted, casting long amber bars of light across the floor. Dust particles floated lazily in the beam like tiny planets.
For a moment, time seemed to freeze — no phones ringing, no voices in the hallway, just silence.
Anna placed both hands flat on the desk and tried the breathing exercise again. Slow inhale. The air stopped halfway down. She exhaled slowly. Something uneasy stirred in her chest — not panic exactly, but recognition. A thought arrived, calm and unmistakable: you’ve been holding your breath for years. Anna sat very still. Outside, somewhere down the corridor, the coffee machine sputtered into life again. Another patient was probably waiting.
But for the first time in a very long time, Anna did not move immediately.
Instead, she remained there in the quiet consultation room, wondering when exactly she had forgotten how to breathe.