is it actually a lot worse to mouth breathe and why is it so bad?
In: 1900
I love this topic. I am a lady with WACK airways that I’ve been working on for a few years. I’d love to share this as I understand it!
YES, mouth breathing is terrible for you in the following ways:
* Mouth acidity and tooth decay: As the dentists have attested, mouth breathing causes evaporation of your saliva. This intensifies the acid in your mouth which dissolves your enamel causing weak spots. It also puts cavity causing bacteria at an advantage over healthy bacteria, so you’re more harmed and also less protected. CONVERSELY, a closed mouth can have lots of saliva in it. Saliva, when not too acidic, helps your teeth remineralize by bringing calcium from your food and slowly re-crystalizing your enamel.
* Cranio-facial development: Think of your tongue as your body’s natural orthodentic palate expander. When you mouth breathe, your tongue is down and you’re not wearing your bio-appliance. Over time, without this spreading force across the roof of your mouth, your face will begin to stagnate in its width, then eventually even collapse inward. The floor of the sinuses is the roof of the mouth, so a narrow mouth will lead to…
* Breathing problems: the more your face collapses, the less room you have to breathe through your nose and the more difficult it becomes. Which leads to…
* Missing out on nitric oxide. You produce a powerful anti-inflammatory chemical in your sinuses that helps your body calibrate to how much inflammation it should have at any given time. If you don’t nose breathe, you’re NOT delivering this mood-calming, inflamation-soothing chemical to your body every single breath that you take the way you could be. (Which leads to more inflammation, which leads to more breathing probelmems, which leands to more mouth breathing which leads to …
* Sleep disorders: OSA = obstructive sleep apnea. If your airways are tight and your mouth is open you’re going to start having your airways literally collapse on you when you drop into the deeper stages of sleep. When I had OSA (which has been rectified through surgery and airway dentistry — as shown in my in-lab sleep studies) I lost my memory and was falling alseep everywhere. Which can lead to…
* Car crashes
* Heart disease
* Strokes
* Basically all terrible ways to die.
So, if you CAN breath through your nose, DO breathe through your nose. If you CAN’T USUALLY breathe through your nose, ironically, try irrigating the sinuses with saline spray and hten taping your mouth at night. You can always take the tape off if you need to, but this actually works for most people.
And if you CAN’T AT ALL nose breathe, see a really good ENT and an airway dentist, preferably, who work together.
Good luck, my friend!
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