7 Mindfulness Exercises That Can Help Metastatic Breast Cancer Patients

Women with advanced breast cancer might find mindfulness can ease their pain, anxiety and depression, a new study suggests.

Mindfulness is the ability to keep your mind focused on the present moment.

"Mindfulness helps us relate to our thoughts, emotions and physical symptoms in a different way," according to study author Lauren Zimmaro, a postdoctoral fellow at Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia.

How mindfulness helps

"Not judging or reacting to symptoms may be helpful to the physical body by lowering the fight-or-flight stress response and inducing a relaxation response," Zimmaro said in a Fox Chase news release. "Over time, people who are more mindful can buffer their stresses, and that may have a more beneficial impact on the body."

This study included 64 women with metastatic breast cancer who completed questionnaires to assess their cancer symptoms and five aspects of mindfulness: observing, describing, acting with awareness, non-judging and nonreactivity.

Overall, higher levels of mindfulness were associated with less pain, fatigue, anxiety, depression and sleep disturbance, according to the study published Nov. 8 in the journal Psycho-Oncology.

However, certain aspects of mindfulness -- nonreactivity, non-judging and describing -- were more strongly associated with these benefits, while observing had the weakest association. Nonreactivity was defined by Zimmaro as "being able to allow any thoughts, feelings or sensations to come and go without being carried away by them."

The finding that nonreactivity was most strongly associated with lower symptom levels suggests it may be a particularly important aspect of mindfulness.

"Mindfulness is a good resource for dealing with the physical and psychological symptoms of metastatic disease," Zimmaro shares. "Women who were more mindful tended to have lower symptoms of metastatic breast cancer, including pain severity and interference, fatigue, psychological distress, and sleep disturbance."

Mindfulness exercises to try

If you feel overwhelmed by the emotions of having metastatic breast cancer, mindfulness can help you take a step back from those intense feelings. Here are some tips to get you started:

Observe

When practicing observe mindfulness, remember to allow your immediate experience to just happen. Do not try to push it away or try to change it.

Listen to the sounds around you, noticing what you hear without adding any commentary.
Watch your breath. Observe the sensation of inhaling and exhaling. Notice your belly rising and falling as you breathe.
Sit outside on a bench and watch what passes in front of your direct line of sight, without turning your head or labeling what you see.

Describe

When practicing describe mindfulness, remember to describe what you observe by just sticking to the facts. Do not add your own interpretations or assumptions.

For example: Feeling like you are unlovable or a burden because you have metastatic breast cancer.

The facts in this example is that you have metastatic breast cancer – that’s it.

Describing the facts only, helps you refrain from jumping to the conclusions that make you feel bad about yourself or your relationships.

Acting with awareness

Much like with describe mindfulness, when we judge something, they are not facts. For example, if we say something is ugly, that is a preference not a fact. By becoming aware of your judgmental thinking, you will reduce emotional reactivity. Before you pass judgement, remember to:

Focus on your language: During stress and crisis it may be more difficult to remain non-judmental. Try identifying judmental words and phrases that trigger you to stop and observe your thinking. Common judmental words include: right, wrong, fair, unfair, should, shouldn't, stupid, lazy, wonderful, perfect, bad, and terrible.
Identify your common self judgments. (Im bad, stupid, lazy, weak, not worth it etc.).
Turn your self judgment into a nonjudgmental descriptive statement.
Focus on your breathing. Breathing enables us to get in touch with the present moment and let go of all the thoughts and judgments about the past and future.
Notice your thoughts. Learning to think non-judgmentally takes practice. By paying attention to your thoughts, you'll be able to notice when those judmental thoughts occur.