When drinking water and it “goes down the wrong pipe” is that water entering your airways? And if so, how does it go away?
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[This graphic](https://imgur.com/gallery/9KdKYPN) gives a detailed view of the inner workings of your throat. The trachea (gases) and esophagus (solids/liquids) are layered together. There are muscles and valves that close off to make sure liquid or solids don’t enter the lungs while swallowing or vice versa air into the stomach while breathing. And why you shouldn’t try to breathe in while drinking liquids (like drinking while heavy panting after exercise or thinking water will help while choking…) When you either accidentally override the automatic muscle closures or are too incapacitated to close those muscles properly anymore you get what’s called “aspiration”. Small enough and your lungs can get rid of it eventually on their own through coughing and the complex system of blood vessels and such- but a large enough or nasty enough thing gets inhaled and the stagnant aspiration becomes “aspiration pneumonia” and infects your lungs becoming so thick and gnarly you need antibiotics and steroid medications to help solve it. Sometimes the lung ends up with even worse infections or holes, and you need chest tubes or a whole crazy world of life saving treatments. That’s the long, short of it. -source am nurse
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