> The one thing I did notice, that was really weird, is that as I fell asleep I'd have trouble "remembering to breath". Which was quite a strange experience.
Have you considered getting tested for sleep apnea?
Have you considered getting tested for sleep apnea?
In addition, the therapy they recommended (bi-pap or something like that, basically a two-way assisted breathing machine) did absolutely nothing for me.
What finally helped was a min dose of an SSRI, which I started for totally unrelated reasons. Guess it was anxiety, never got any confirmation from any doctor that this is a known presentation of it, but swear to God literally two days on the stuff made me sleep easy with no breathing problems whatsoever. After six months I got off and once the withdrawal symptoms broke (real bad in my case, which is super weird for a min dose, but :shrug:) I've never had the problem again.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleep_paralysis#Threat_hyper-v...
As one falls asleep one loses the ability to voluntary breath. This can cause sensations of suffocating and resulting in panic if experienced when still conscious.