I am a Clinical Psychologist in Private Practice. My clients often share that they have difficulty sleeping during the course of our work together. As I’ve puzzled through how to help them, I have learned a lot about where their difficulties can stem from. It’s salient to look for physical causes.
When you complain about sleep difficulties, your physician will arrange for you to have a sleep test.
These tests can range from a simple device that you wear on your finger for a night night to being hooked up to several machines with a bevy of wires in a hospital bed at a cost of about $1000.
Everyone who completes a sleep test is diagnosed with sleep apnea.
After you complete a sleep test, you will meet with a physician employed by the sleep clinic and sold a CPAP machine for about $1000. Masks and hoses and cleaning fluids are piled on on top of that. You will believe you need to try these gizmos because you’ve been told you stop breathing at night.
The vast majority of people hate CPAP machines.
To me, being hooked up to a CPAP machine feels like wearing scuba gear to bed. Some people stick with it and learn to wear the device. The average period required to acclimate is around four months. The vast majority of people, however, quickly give up using the machine because of discomfort.
However, there is another route you can pursue to address the problem that is 100% organic.
Work with a myofunctional therapist to resolve problems with how you breathe.
A myofunctional therapist will assess whether there are problems with how you use your lips and tongue and how you keep your airways open.
You may be told you are mouth breather. If you are, you will be asked to sleep with a piece of paper tape across your lips. You will need to blow up a couple balloons every evening to strengthen your muscles. You will do exercises that involve popsicle sticks. And you will sleep on your left side, which is the rest and digest position that everyone should adopt.
A CPAP machine only gets air into your body at night.
A CPAP machine doesn’t correct issues with your breathing during the day, so you only meeting your body’s requirements for eight out of 24 hours by using a CPAP at night. Working with a myofunctional therapist teaches you how to breathe correctly all day long.
James Nestor and Patrick McKeown both write about mouth breathers.
I first discovered that mouth breathing is an issue when I read Breathe, the national bestseller by James Nestor. Patrick McKeown has several books that touch on the topic as well. You can google James Nester and Patrick McKeown for more information about how to breathe better. The purpose of this post is simply to introduce you to the topic.
I ask if my clients are mouth breathers when they complain about difficulties sleeping.
Mouth breathing is more common than you think. Most people don’t recognize it in themselves. I personally said, No. I breathe through my nose, when I was asked. But I had started to work with a myofunctional therapist at the time, and Karen told me I was a mouth breather.
One way to know if you’re a mouth breather is to pay attention when you talk. If your lips do not come together at regular intervals to inhale through your nose, then you are a mouth breather.
Watch your breathing while you read aloud. Do you stop speaking periodically to inhale through your nose? Or do you inhale through your mouth? If you do the latter, you are a mouth breather.
Nose breathing can improve your energy level.
Nestor and McKeown both direct you to put a piece of paper tape over your mouth when you sleep, if you are a mouth breather, to force you to nose breathe. Please don’t do this without investigating the topic further because this is not my specialty. Absolutely don’t do this to a child without getting professional assistance.
Wear a piece of paper tape across your lips at night.
A lot of people wear paper tape when they sleep, but you may not be aware of it because it doesn’t gets talked about.
Experiment with different brands of paper tape because some can be more difficult to remove.
Clamp your lips tightly together and roll them in before you put the tape on. This will ensure your mouth is completely closed while you sleep.
Wear a piece of paper tape while you read or watch television to get comfortable.
Practice removing the tape while you are awake so you can quickly remove it during the night. Put your tongue against the tape and push out. The tape will release without using your hands. Get proficient at this before you wear tape to bed.
Wearing paper tape becomes a normal part of your bedtime routine. Most people continue the practice over the long-term because you will revert to mouth breathing if you forget to put on the tape.
Is your tongue suctioned to the roof of your mouth?
If you are saying, What?! at this moment, then you are mouth breather.
Check it out, if you don’t believe me. Ask people whether their tongues are suctioned to the roofs of their mouths. They will all say yes.
If you can’t curl your tongue into a taco shape, that’s a sign that you don’t use your lips and tongue correctly.
A myofunctional therapist can teach you to nose breathe.
A myofunctional therapist will give you an assortment of exercises to develop the muscles in your lips and tongue. The exercises were amusing. You can do them watching television or in your car. They include suctioning your tongue to the roof of your mouth, holding your tongue in the shape of a taco, and running the tip of your tongue around the outside of your teeth in both directions.
If you can’t do these three exercises, you may have a tongue tie.
If you have a tongue-tie, it means that your tongue is attached to the bottom of your mouth by a band of fibres, behind your bottom teeth, to a greater extend than most people. This band limits the utility of your tongue. It can lead to digestive issues because it affects how you swallow food, as well as impacting how you breathe.
Infants with difficulty nursing commonly have tongue-ties. These fiber bundles are routinely cut, or released, to resolve nursing problems.
You can google videos of tongue-tie releases for both infants and adults. The procedure takes under three minutes in a dental chair for an adult.
Being a mouth breather with a tongue-tie can leave you exhausted.
I ask my clients to look under their tongues when I notice they are mouth-breathers. The correlation between being a mouth breather and having a tongue-tie in high. Six of my clients have been mouth breathers over the past two years and four have had tongue ties. All six had been prescribed CPAP machines.
People are told they have to use a CPAP for the rest of their lives.
Being told you have to use a CPAP machine to address your sleep problems is common. But a myofunctional therapist can help you change that, especially if you tried to use a CPAP and failed.
A good myofunctional therapist can help people with severe sleep apnea, so don’t be thrown off seeking help if you have moderate to severe sleep apnea.
One solution for sleep apnea, in part, is to blow up three balloons a day.
You use new balloons to maximize the challenge of getting air into them. You will need to do this daily, along with several other exercises. If you don’t, you will revert back to your old ways.
Consult a myofunctional therapist if the content of this post resonates with you.
I wrote this post because it took me over two years of searching to uncover solutions to these problems. A full assessment can help uncover issues you didn’t know you had. They can all be addressed.
Seek help.
Like every profession, you may have to search to find an excellent myofunctional therapist.
I would like everyone to get a good night’s sleep. Keep looking if you haven’t found a solution. Help is out there.
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Dr Patricia Turner, Registered Psychologist in Private Practice in Calgary, Alberta