Experience Parasympathetic Calm with Nasal Breathing
Have you ever wondered what happens to your body when you experience strong physical reactions to thoughts or events in your life? 🤔
If you’re stressed, scared, or feeling threatened, your blood pressure rises, your pulse quickens, your mouth goes dry, and you start to sweat. Whereas if you’re feeling comfortable and safe, your breathing slows, your heart rate lowers, and you feel calm. 🧘♀️
That’s your nervous system, hard at work. Specifically, your autonomic nervous system comprises two distinct parts: the sympathetic nervous system and the parasympathetic nervous system.
The sympathetic nervous system is the ‘fight or flight’ response in your body designed to keep you safe and flee danger.
However, the parasympathetic nervous system, known as the ‘rest and digest’ response, works to slow down the automatic, involuntary bodily functions (like heart rate, blood pressure, digestion, and sweating) and bring a beautiful state of calm to the body allowing it to rest, heal and relax.
Both states are important to our body, but it’s unhealthy to be in a constant ‘sympathetic’ state. Being in ‘fight or flight’ mode too often or for extended periods of time can lead to chronic stress, elevated cortisol levels, high blood pressure, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease.
Many people have an overactive sympathetic nervous system, so they feel elevated levels of stress and anxiety, plus all the associated physiological symptoms of stress.
Therefore, it’s important to activate the parasympathetic nervous system to relax your body and calm down all the frenetic activity happening within it.
Calming your parasympathetic nervous system will help to reduce any feelings of stress and anxiety, improve your mood, boost your immune system, and reduce your blood pressure.
Aaah … Don’t you feel better just thinking about it?
Unfortunately, many people reach for substances to calm their nerves, which only makes the issue worse.
Rather than turning to prescription drugs, alcohol, or other substances to soothe your mind and body, there is a very simple technique you can use wherever and whenever you need to.
Nasal Breathing!
Most people don’t give their breath a second thought. It happens naturally, without us thinking about it. So, we’re even less likely to be aware of or to consider the differences between mouth breathing and nasal breathing and their impact on our parasympathetic nervous system.
It’s a topic I talk about a lot because it’s so powerful, simple, and gives amazing health results!
There is a huge difference in our body’s response to breathing through the mouth or nose.
Nasal Breathing: A Gateway to Better Health
Nasal breathing has several health advantages over mouth breathing. When we breathe through our nose, it triggers the release of nitric oxide, a molecule known for its powerful health effects. Nitric oxide is known to lower blood pressure, enhance physical performance, and even aid in wound healing (1).
Breathing through the nose also filters, warms, and humidifies the air we inhale, which not only boosts our immunity but also improves oral health, aids in nervous system regulation, and helps maintain hydration.
Mouth Breathing: The Hidden Health Hazard
On the other hand, mouth breathing can put our bodies in a constant state of fight-or-flight mode, especially during sleep. Your body never gets the chance to truly rest, recover, and experience deep, restorative sleep when you're breathing through your mouth.
This heightened stress response can increase our risk of various health conditions, including ADHD, anxiety, Alzheimer's disease, hormonal imbalances, poor sleep, and more.
Nose Breathing Through History
In traditional Indian culture, children were taught to breathe through their noses to avoid becoming mouth breathers. The Indian military even incorporated nasal breathing into their training for exercise and sleep, leading to regiments that had better immunity compared to mouth-breathing counterparts.
This practice was even found among Central American mail runners and the Tarahumara long-distance runners in Mexico, who were trained to run with pebbles or water in their mouths to encourage nasal breathing. Now, modern science corroborates these ancient techniques, proving that they do indeed deliver improved performance.
Nasal Breathing and the Parasympathetic Nervous System, Mood and Emotions
Deep, slow, abdominal nose breathing can activate the parasympathetic nervous system, specifically the vagus nerve, which is the conduit for the "rest-and-digest" response. This activation is like a gentle, internal reset button that starts the body's restoration and rejuvenation processes and plays a central role in connecting the gut microbiome with brain functions, mood regulation, and cognitive performance.
As mentioned, nasal breathing boosts the production of nitric oxide. This is produced in the sinuses exclusively during nasal breathing. It’s a powerful immune booster.
Activating the parasympathetic nervous system also stimulates baroreflexes in the blood vessels, which not only supports healthy blood pressure but is also linked to emotional resilience and mood stability.
While further research is needed, the benefits of nasal breathing found so far are:
Gut Health: Nasal breathing may support a healthier gut.
Digestive Issues: It could assist in managing digestive problems.
Mood Support: Deep nasal breathing has shown potential benefits for mood enhancement.
Improved Sleep: It may contribute to better and more restful sleep.
Heart Health: Nasal breathing can have a positive impact on cardiovascular health.
Mental Well-being: It's associated with better mental health.
Stress Relief: Deep nasal breathing can help alleviate stress.
Muscle Tension: It might ease muscle tension.
Nose Breathing During Exercise
Nasal breathing even works to calm the nerves and increase parasympathetic activity during exercise, improving performance, endurance, and cardiovascular health.
In his book, Body, Mind, and Sport, Dr. John Douillard explores how nose-breathing exercise can induce the body, brain, and physiological functions to respond to exercise stress as if it were meditation. This is a simply and powerful way to harness the benefits of meditation while remaining active.
Not only does nasal breathing give mental and physical health benefits during and after exercise, but it also enhances the elasticity of the ribcage, making it easier for your body to practice deep nasal breathing throughout your daily routine.
Stress Reduction and Nose Breathing
Stress is a well-documented accelerator of aging and degeneration, but you can help reduce stress through nasal breathing. It can:
Increase Alpha Brainwaves: Associated with relaxation.
Decrease Beta Brainwaves: Indicating reduced mental stress.
Increase Parasympathetic Activity: A marker of relaxation.
Increase Endurance: Suggesting better stamina.
Increase Brainwave Coherence: A sign of mental focus.
Decrease Breath Rate: A calmer breathing pace.
Decrease Perceived Exertion: The exercise feels less strenuous.
Increase Lower-Lobe Lung Gas Exchange: Improved oxygen intake.
On the other hand, mouth breathing during exercise results in the opposite effects.
Practical Tips for Nasal Breathing
Begin to take notice of your breath. Notice when you breathe through your nose and when you’re breathing through your mouth.
A simple way to get started using nasal breathing in your daily activities is to take a walk and challenge yourself to breathe only through your nose. Count the steps you take for each inhale and exhale, and aim to gradually extend the count. The ultimate goal is to reach ten steps when inhaling and ten steps when exhaling, maintaining the same unhurried breath rate even when walking faster.
Mouth Taping – An Alternative Treatment for Snoring, Bad Breath and Mild Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA)
Another way to encourage nasal breathing is by taping your mouth before sleep.
It’s common for people to breathe through their mouths during sleep. This can be due to suffering from allergies, a deviated septum, polyps, or other nasal obstructions.
However, many people sleep with their mouth open for no particular reason, and as a result tend to snore, have bad breath, and wake feeling fatigued, while some experience sleep apnea.
If there is no medical reason causing your mouth breathing, experimenting with mouth taping during sleep can help reduce or remove the annoying side effects of mouth breathing.
‘Mouth-taping during sleep improved snoring and the severity of sleep apnea in mouth-breathers with mild OSA, with AHI and SI being reduced by about half. The higher the level of baseline AHI and SI, the greater the improvement was shown after mouth-taping. Mouth-taping could be an alternative treatment in patients with mild OSA before turning to CPAP therapy or surgical intervention.1’ National Library of Medicine
What is Mouth Taping?
Mouth taping is the simple practice of taping your mouth closed at night before you go to sleep.
During sleep, your tongue and throat relax, and your tongue falls to the back of your throat, which obstructs your airway.
By using mouth tape, your mouth stays closed during sleep, allowing your tongue to rest against the roof of your mouth, keeping your airway open.
You simply pop the tape across your top and bottom lips and go to sleep - It’s that easy!
Benefits of Mouth Taping
Mouth taping is claimed to help reduce:
Mild Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA)
ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder)
Dry Mouth
Snoring
Cavities
Gum Disease
Bad Breath
Slowed Growth in Children (2)
Decreased Cognitive Ability (3)
If you don’t have any medically diagnosed reasons for your mouth breathing and would like to give mouth taping a try, Simply Breathe has hypoallergenic, gentle lip seal strips to help you sleep better. (Note: I don’t receive any affiliate payments for Simply Breathe, I’m sharing information that may help you 😊 )
Sleep isn't just about feeling refreshed in the morning. It's about optimizing your physical health, maintaining your mental well-being, and preventing chronic diseases.
So, next time you find yourself snoring or waking up with your mouth wide open, remember your body might be trying to tell you something important. It's time to listen.
Meditating, taking five minutes of quiet time regularly throughout the day to focus on nasal breathing, and being aware of your breath are other simple ways to incorporate nose breathing into your days. Eventually, it will become second nature, and you’ll be nose breathing automatically!
Sometimes, the solutions to our problems are surprisingly simple, like the gentle act of closing your mouth and breathing through your nose.
With the potential for significant physical, mental, and performance benefits from each breath, nasal breathing is a powerful tool that's worth exploring further.
Hopefully, I’ve given you food for thought – backed by science – into understanding the benefits of nasal breathing and how it can have a positive impact on your overall health, particularly your nervous system health.
Start noticing your breath today, and experiment with breathing your way to a healthier, happier life! Your body and mind will thank you.
Remember, sunsets 🌅 are the new happy hour, and I’m rooting for you!
Kristin 🫶
References:
1. National Library of Medicine Lee, C., Lu, T., Cheng, N., & Li, Y. (2022). The Impact of Mouth-Taping in Mouth-Breathers with Mild Obstructive Sleep Apnea: A Preliminary Study. Healthcare, 10(9). https://doi.org/10.3390/healthcare10091755
2. Morais-Almeida, M., Wandalsen, G. F., & Solé, D. (2019). Growth and mouth breathers. Journal of Pediatrics = Jornal de Pediatria (Brazil), 95 Suppl 1, 66–71. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30611649/
3. Jung, J.-Y., & Kang, C.-K. (2021). Investigation on the effect of oral breathing on cognitive activity using functional brain imaging. Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland), 9(6), 645. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34072444/
4. Barry, A. J. (1967). Physical activity and psychic stress/strain. Canadian Medical Association Journal, 96(12), 848-853. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1936218/
5. Travis F, Blasdell K, Liptak R, Zisman S, Daley K, Douillard J. Invincible Athletics program: aerobic exercise and performance without strain. Int J Neurosci. 1996 Apr;85(3-4):301-8. doi: 10.3109/00207459608986691. PMID: 8734567. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/8734567/
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