When it comes to breathing, you definitely don’t want to be short of breath. If you can’t breathe well, you won’t be able to work as well throughout the day. Congested breathing through the nasal cavity and through the bronchi causes your heart and lungs to work harder, tiring you throughout the day. If you’re more tired throughout the day, you’ll be less productive at work and at play. This traffic jam not only troubles you during the day, but also at night. Having trouble breathing at night is even worse than struggling throughout the day because you’re not getting a good night’s sleep, which makes you more tired the next day. While there are many symptoms that cause this congestion, allergies are generally the trigger.

A remedy for this nasal congestion are nasal plasters. They are bands that work from the outside of the nose, gently opening the Noson nasal passages and clearing the way for more oxygen. There is a sticky adhesive on the back of the straps that connects them to your nose. The resistance in the band forces the sides of your nose to open wider, allowing more oxygen into your nostrils for your lungs.

Another remedy for your stuffy nose is saline nasal sprays. These can be very beneficial to you if you don’t mind using medication with them. This type of spray is inserted into the nostrils and uses a pumping motion to deliver a mist into your nose. There are different types of solutions that you can use for your pump spray. The saline solutions are the most basic of all the solutions you can use and their main purpose is to moisturize your irritated nostrils. The three main types of medications that are available are antihistamines, corticosteroids, and topical decongestants. These drugs should clear your nose to allow more oxygen to pass through.

Anxiety, asthma, weight gain and high blood pressure caused by these 2 breathing defects

In this article, you’ll learn about two common breathing mistakes you’re likely to make that put your body under chronic stress, decrease your mental acuity, and create a host of health problems. You will also learn a simple remedy. It is so simple that you can put it into practice as you read.

Have you been paying a lot of attention to your breathing? Maybe you did during meditation, in a yoga class, during exercise or when you were constipated. Most of the time, however, you probably take breathing for granted. It’s something your body does naturally on its own, without your conscious involvement. It’s good – and amazing – how your body takes care of itself without you having to pay attention to this basic, life-sustaining action.

On the other hand, your body can fall into bad breathing habits – and this prepares you for:

• Anxiety
• Insomnia
• Brain fog
• Asthma
• Inflammation
• High blood pressure
• Heart disease
• COPD
• Weight gain
• Digestive disorders
• Chronic lack of energy

Two breathing errors

Did you know that your body may be making two breathing mistakes without you even knowing it? These mistakes can lead to a whole host of seemingly unrelated symptoms, such as anxiety, insomnia, brain fog, asthma, inflammation, high blood pressure, heart disease, COPD, weight gain, digestive disorders, and chronic lack of energy. Do you suffer from this? If you haven’t already, would you like to prevent this?

The two errors are “mouth breathing” and “overbreathing”. By mouth breathing I mean inhaling and/or exhaling through the mouth and by overbreathing I mean taking too many or too many breaths.

Now that may sound counterintuitive. Shouldn’t you be taking deep, deep breaths and exhaling through your mouth to release carbon dioxide? In yoga class, you may have been told to take a “cleansing breath,” where you exhale forcefully through your mouth to release tension. Aren’t these good ideas?

It turns out that as normal habits, they are not healthy. Here’s why: If you exhale through your mouth regularly, you’re exhaling too much carbon dioxide. Excessive and frequent breathing aggravates the situation.

Why is this a problem?

It turns out that a certain level of carbon dioxide in your blood is necessary for the delivery of oxygen from your blood to your cells, for dilating your blood vessels and airways, and for regulating body pH. (Source: “The Oxygen Advantage”, by Patrick McKeown , 2015, p. 28). Carbon dioxide is necessary to ensure that the oxygen you breathe gets to your cells. Without enough carbon dioxide in your system, your body becomes oxygen starved.

When your body senses that it’s lacking oxygen, it signals more overbreathing and more mouth breathing, which only makes the problem worse and eventually leads to all of the health, energy, and mental acuity issues mentioned above.

(If you want more information and research on this, I recommend The Oxygen Advantage by Patrick McKeown . He travels the world educating doctors, athletes, and patients about these breathing defects and offering a simple cure and a set of exercises to turn it into to do the deed.)

The cure

So what’s the cure?

Nose breathing and gentle full breathing. Nose breathing means breathing in and out through your nose only. Gentle, full breathing means breathing only as much air as you need and allowing your breath to fill your lungs completely from the bottom up.

Nasal breathing is important for numerous reasons. First, breathing in and out through your nose warms and clears the air on the way in and clears your nasal passages on the way out. Second, nasal breathing stimulates the production of nitric oxide, which dilates your blood vessels and airways, allowing more blood and oxygen to flow.

Nasal breathing also limits the outflow of carbon dioxide, allowing you to keep more CO2 in your system. CO2 stimulates red blood cell production and is necessary for red blood cells to carry oxygen to deliver oxygen to your cells. The end result is better oxygenation throughout your body.

Work out

To practice nasal breathing, simply close your mouth while you breathe. So you can start reading right away.

You can practice letting your breathing become gentle and full by placing your hands on your abdomen and chest and noticing a slight expansion of your abdomen and then chest as you inhale. Apply light pressure with your hands to encourage your breathing to be full but minimal. This will ensure that you breathe deeply but don’t overbreathe.

Once you are comfortable practicing gentle, full nasal breathing while sitting and relaxing, try it while you go to sleep. ( McKeown actually has his clients tape their mouths shut during sleep to adjust their bodies to nasal breathing.) Finally, try walking and then work your way up to doing it during more vigorous exercise. This takes some practice and should not be forced. Allow your body to gradually adjust to nasal breathing through consistent, progressive practice.

My experience

I first learned this breathing style in Qigong meditation years ago, but until I read McKeown’s book I failed to apply it more broadly. As a result, I was a chronic over and mouth breather for years. In my fifties, this led to trouble sleeping, lack of energy, more aches, tension and inflammation in my body, and difficulty breathing during exercise. Noson Nasen Dilatator I found myself sighing, yawning, and taking a lot of really deep breaths. My metabolism also slowed down and I felt colder. These are all signs of chronic mouth breathing and overbreathing.

When I first tried nasal breathing during exercise, I had to reduce my exercise intensity to around 50%. It took me about 3 months to retrain my body to full intensity nasal breathing. It takes time for your body to get used to more carbon dioxide.

Now I’m breathing through my nose all the time and I’m noticing that I have a lot more energy, I’m sleeping better in general, my practices are stronger, and my meditations are deeper. I am more relaxed and at ease throughout the day. My head is clearer, my body is warmer and I have much less pain and discomfort.