Ever since getting on this journey of reversing extraction orthodontics and remodeling the adult face towards beauty and symmetry and making that the top priority in my life, it seems I keep attracting and learning deeper and deeper insights and knowledge as to what causes the oral/facial disorders and how to reverse it, and how interconnected everything really is with what goes on in our mouth and the rest of the body.
My recent findings has been quite profound.
Just by achieving proper muscle balance between the lips and tongue at rest and during swallowing, the adult face can begin to change.
Before and after one year of orofacial myofunctional therapy treatment
6 month of myofunctional therapy
source: http://www.rdhmag.com/articles/print/volume-29/issue-11/feature/orofacial-myofunctional-therapy.html
Other case studies of Before & After pictures: http://www.tonguethrust.com/about/before-after-gallery/
The leading founder of Myofunctional Therapy is Joy Moeller, she has helped thousands and in this interview she talks about the consequence of open mouth posture (mouth breathing) causing long faces, however correcting this habit and establishing closed mouth with proper tongue posture and nasal breathing will begin to change the shape of the face toward more rounder face. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zaQQdyaymZc
This confirms my theory of getting changes in the face just from the forces of the tongue.
**To note about proper oral posture: The most important thing is apparently the tongue position when at rest, since this is providing the most consistent pressure on the palate all through out the day and night, and the lack of proper tongue posture has the most devastating effects on the face.
My next discovery:
The Buteyko Method: key to establishing Nasal Breathing
In my extended research and pursuit of everything there is to know about how to establish Nasal Breathing, I have come across my next profound discovery and that is the Buteyko Method. It will take too long for me to explain where this method came from and what sorts of miraculous healing testimonies that comes from adopting this method. Basically it radically changed how I view the human breath. We are all taught about importance of deep breathing to combat stress, but we have never ever been taught the importance of breathing Less.
What the Buteyko Method will teach you is that the unhealthy man of the modern lifestyle is breathing 2 – 3 x times more in air volume than the normal person. and the extremely healthy person is taking in considerably less breath volumes than the norm. Apparently the supreme health person takes only 2-3 breaths per minute.
A quote from Buteyko seminar read:
“The Perfect Man breathes as if they are not breathing at all”
What has been most eye opening for me is that our level of body oxygenation level is related to how much carbon dioxide we have within our lungs and blood, and how this is directly related to if we have stuffed noses or not.
Our body needs carbon dioxide to cause chemical reaction within our red blood cells, which allows for the oxygen to be released from the red blood cells into our various organs.
We have been taught that carbon dioxide is a waste product and oxygen is the only valuable gas for us. But this is not true, our air is 20{ae022d2295c0485893c83c8425b5bfafafba893c2d19b1bb9bc4c7c9bf3eeba6} oxygen and only .04{ae022d2295c0485893c83c8425b5bfafafba893c2d19b1bb9bc4c7c9bf3eeba6} carbon dioxide. That means our body has to produce CO2 since it is vital to getting oxygen to transport. This means when we continuously mouth breathe, deep breath, sigh, cough, etc we are breathing out precious CO2 that our body produces out of our lungs. Which means our body is getting less oxygenation, and our stress level increases. Therefore the issue is we do not need to breathe in more air, we need to breathe in less. If your interested in this I recommend you to watch: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J9QMFX4CSQs
It is completely ironic that when we sigh out of stress, we are actually making our stress worse. Next time be aware of your tendency to deep breathe throughout the day like sighing. Because of our stressful modern lifestyle most people are breathing too much (or another word for it is hyperventilating) when a person begins hyperventilating what do they do? they begin to breath rapid and heavy and through their mouth, feeling like they can’t get enough air into their lungs. If a person continues to heavy breath, they will eventually breathe out all of the CO2 out of the body and the body will be unable to transport oxygen to the major organs including the brain. The person will feint as a result of the brain being oxygen deprived. So when someone begins hyperventilating we give them brown bag to breathe in and out of. This restricts some of their breathing and also retains some of the CO2 that they are breathing out. Now it is starting to make much sense as to why the brown bag works.
Dr. Buteyko makes the claim that most modern disease is a direct result of over breathing. That most people have “hidden hyperventilation”
As someone that has suffered from stuffed nose most of my life, this information is incredible. Apparently the reason we get stuffed/blocked noses is because our amazing body is trying to auto correct, since we are habitually breathing too much and breathing out too much precious CO2, our body blocks our nose to make us breathe less, however we then will open our mouth to breathe which makes the condition worse.
I have been practicing breathing in less and less and I experience increasing calmness, focus, positive attitude, as CO2 has other powerful effects other than oxygen transport such as it is one of the most powerful relaxative and sedative for nerve and muscle cells.
This only a theory but could it be that when we enter stressful situations we begin to breathe heavily causing less CO2 which induces the muscles to tense up and our mind races unable to relax which we call Anxiety. It may be true that if one is able to control their breath they can control their anxiety.
as I calm the breathing, I just get a general healthier feeling. also the stuffed nose is gone. and Can’t wait to explore this further.
Even further levels of perfected breathing and higher body oxygenation content is said to lead to psychic awareness such as being able to see auras.
Most of us then completely misunderstood breathing in meditation. Meditation was supposed to teach us to breathe less not breathe deep. Breathing Deep is hyperventilation. Breathing slow, and less results in calming effects to muscles and brain.
highly recommend this page: www.normalbreathing.com
Lip Closure Strength – The Importance of the lip muscles
Even though I have learned about the importance of nasal breathing and the Buteyko Method, and I am now breathing through my nose all day long. It seems that during the night while asleep, my mouth seems to come open. I have been wondering how to resolve this, how to make sure to keep the mouth closed during sleep?
I have tried taping my mouth shut and have been doing so for a while but just few days ago even with tape on the lips, I must have been breathing through the corner of the lip, as evident by the fact that I’m still waking up parts of the night and just the other day I woke up with a sore throat and little bit of a cold, heaviness feeling. Which is primary indicator of mouth breathing through the night, because when one breathes through the nostrils it kills 80{ae022d2295c0485893c83c8425b5bfafafba893c2d19b1bb9bc4c7c9bf3eeba6} of bacteria, but when breathe is taken through the mouth there is no protection, the throat could get infected from air borne bacteria and immune system goes down.
Catching this achy throat and little bit of a cold prompted me to do further research. and just as if some supernatural forces were aiding me a long to find the right answers at the right time, I stumbled onto my next big realization.
I stumbled across this product that trains the lip muscles called Patakara. (invented by some Japanese dentist in the year 2000) The page has numerous case studies and testimonials that shows that strengthening the lip muscle results in closed mouth and nasal breathing at night.
Discovering this product came at such a perfect timing providing answers to many of the concerns I was fixated about that it was hard to believe and honestly a little mind blowing.
One of the muscles that is key in establishing closed mouth posture, ESPECIALLY during sleep is your lip muscle. Myofunctional Therapy understands this importance and will use a button attached to a string to strengthen the lip muscle.
I have been neglecting this exercise because I never knew the actual, true function of strong lip muscles. The orbicularis oris muscle.
I had mistakenly thought because I was keeping my mouth closed all day long that I was fine and didn’t need to train the lip muscles however I didn’t know that this was the muscle that determines if mouth is closed at night and one is nasal breathing during sleep with proper tongue posture. Somehow when this muscle is strong, when one sleep on their back the lips remain closed and the tongue stays on the roof of the mouth. When this muscle is weak, when one sleeps on the back, the lips will fall open and the tongue will fall back, compromising the air way. This is what causes snoring and sleep apnea aka restless sleep. To avoid this most people have to sleep on their sides, since there will be less gravity pulling on the tongue and lips.
Astronauts never snore because there is no gravity pulling the lips and tongue back
The amazing negative consequences of mouth breathing during the night is incredible. It is a cause of whole host of issues from various issues in the mouth including gum disease, bad breath, cavities, bleeding gums, etc because when mouth is open saliva(which is nature’s natural teeth cleaner and has anti-bacterial properties) is drying up and bacteria is then allowed to multiply in the mouth and throat. Bacteria multiplying on the back of throat is directly connected to the lymph nose, it negatively impacts the entire immune system. Which explains why my skin would get itchy during the night, and minor spots of eczema that I’m still struggling with.
I am now finding out all of these issues are related to mouth breathing at night and the reason the mouth is falling open at night is because of weak lip muscles.
So this Japanese product called patakara is very effective at training the lip muscles (it is supposedly a lot more efficient than using a button on string technique as shown by picture below, the thermal views after exercises), and the case studies are pretty miraculous as well. So I purchased my very own last night, The Patakara Premium set for $125 and patiently waiting for it to arrive, I plan to provide my testimonial right here on this blog. Personally I can’t wait to try it and I really think it will have tremendous positive effects on me.
There are indeed some miraculous case studies with the Patakara, apparently it not only trains the muscles but it begins to fire brain activity in the frontal lobe and increase cerebral blood flow. People with paralysis like bell’s palsy or stroke victims are finding that their paralysis is going away and their movements coming back, and kids with down syndrome their symptoms are fading as evident in dramatic difference in the child’s face…
Here is thermal view of what happened after the use of these Patakara aka lip trainer devices:
Note the increase of blood flow to the head.
I have the Patakara Premium supposedly the latest and greatest which you can buy from here,http://claimingpower.com/store/patakara-store/
remember even professional myofunctional therapists that I talked about above use a similar device (a button attached to a string) to strengthen the lip muscle. And the lip closure strength is one of the first thing that these myofunctional therapists check for, using some sort of device, I know because I had that test done to me by a myofunctional therapist at the DNA appliance office that I was going to when I first thought I was getting the DNA device before I was told the treatment plan that I didn’t like so I left the DNA doctor and found my current orthotropics Dr. So I remember that myofunctional therapist telling me that 1 major goal of the whole therapy is strengthening the lip closing muscle.
I knew about this but I never really understood why it was so important, I thought the reason for strengthening lip muscle was so that one could keep the mouth closed during the day, well I was successfully keeping my mouth closed all the time when awake so I thought I was good. However it is when one is asleep that the strength of lip muscles play a vital role in one’s health by making sure the mouth doesn’t fall open, especially when sleeping on the back.
I feel like the strengthening of lip muscle is one MAJOR key in this whole process, and it is a big key that the Buteyko guys are missing as well as even the most advanced orthodontists out there.
How are these lip muscles trained in nature? how did some people grow up normal while others didn’t fare out so well.
Breast-feeding is nature’s ingenious way to train the lip muscles of your child.
so when the child is bottle fed too much, the consequence is weak lip muscles which results in the baby sleeping with their mouth open.
I really thought nutritional deficiency was the #1 negative consequence of bottle feeding but after understanding the importance of oral muscle function and its effects of creating massive changes even in advanced ages, I may argue that weak lip muscle as a result of bottle feeding has greater implications.
Stay tuned… things have advanced further than I imagined, it is now viewing the whole muscle to oral relationship and not just expanding palate and moving teeth around with braces and appliances. also to my readers that have been following. I will quickly note that it hasn’t been too long (1 month?) since I begin to become mindful of proper tongue posture but already I can see subtle changes in my face for the better, and I presume this progress will continue and increase as I train the lip muscles and adopt closed mouth + nasal breathing at night.
Update 11/13/2014: Lip trainer is one way of that can help the lips to stay closed but it may not be the ideal way.
Yes Patakara did help with this process, but now I no longer need it.
Training the back of the tongue to rest on the roof of the mouth and swallowing saliva few times will create negative suction in the mouth that naturally seals the lips.
In short if the back of the tongue is resting on the roof of the mouth, pretty hard not to have the lips sealed. Catch 22 is if you have a small palate, you may find it challenging to keep up this tongue posture.
In an ideal lip seal you shouldn’t need the obicularis oris muscle to keep them closed.
Think about it, people with attractive faces and good lip seal aren’t using something like a lip trainer yet their lips remain sealed.
It is excellent tongue posture and jaw posture (keeping jaw closed at rest) the lips learn to remain sealed. This is difficult to develop because it involves changing your habits and posture but it is the the best way.
Although patakara was an interesting learning experience, I will take back what I said in this article about it being a complete necessity.
Exercise while breathing in and out through nose….I have been doing this for about 5 months while jogging and it has given me more energy (I previously felt tired and “heavy legs” when doing my daily jog). It’s hard at first and I had to gulp air through my mouth occasionally, but my body adjusted and I can do a whole 4 mile run. I was always told in high school track…breathe in through nose and out through mouth while running(too much breathing as you say).
I’m sorry I never mentioned Buteyko breathing to you. An othotropics dentist I saw in August ’13 mentioned that book to me when I consulted her about having my arch expanded. I read about it and learned about keeping my mouth shut day and night, my nose is always clear now and I previously had a “stopped up” nose the minute I laid down to bed. I’m trying nasal dialators (WoodyKnows/SleepRight) now during sleep to increase nasal flow. Been sleeping on my side for about 6 months also—due to the mouth dropping open and snoring etc…
Thank you again for your research and sharing it!
Yes I am now weight lifting with mouth closed and breathing with my nose only.
I am getting more and more accustomed to it, sometimes it is a struggle but I truly believe it is the proper way to breathe and seem to be having less fatigue this way, amazing how I look around everyone is mouth breathing through their exercises.
Hi, I love your blog, I read it from your beginning. It helps me a lot, and I appreciate your searching. Regarding this post, I have some doubts:
* The proper tongue posture is with the tongue right behind the front upper teeth, or the tongue right in the roof of the mouth (past the palate “hill”)?
* And how is the proper swallowing technique? Could you describe it?
Thank you!
William
continuing to the previous questions, I think I found a good analogy for keeping the tongue in a good posture: you can make the sound “nnnnn”. Do you think this is the right posture of the tongue or is it more in the back? Thank you
Hey Claimingpower, I got an idea. How about you put up some pictures to back up all of these claims of yours you have made throughout the duration of this blog?
You have gone into incredible detail about the supposed benefits of various therapies and techniques. Surely you must have seen some physical results that would be visible to your readers. Unless of course its utter bullshit and you are just peddling these products/services.
maybe in the future but Im not sure if I am ready to make an online identity out of this yet. I would like to share in a more private manner, not have my pictures all over google image.
I am still in progress changes are subtle but I do notice them from time to time when catching a glance in the mirror.
I’m not making any $ from this blog or any commission from any product or services I talk about. My intent is to just share my journey with others that may find it useful because I know what it is like to struggle with this.
Hi I was wondering if you could give me some help on where to find dentists who do the procedure you’re talking about with reversing the extractions. I have set up an appointment to one dentist who advertises the procedure and got a quote of about $10 thousand to $14 thousand. It seems like a lot compared to the $5 thousand you said yours is costing. Also I have talked to one orthodontist who said that I have a perfectly normal dental arch even though I kept telling her that I am just not satisfied with my outcome. So she refused to do treatment on me and especially said that it may relapse afterwards. I am so frustrated and at my wits end. I am so tired of having speech problems and unable to communicate properly with people. I am like 100 percent certain it has to do with my teeth being pulled and changing the shape of my mouth and lips. Could you please maybe email me privately with how you found the success in finding a dentist and being treated? I would so very much appreciate it. Thank you.
I have the same question as anon about finding a good Orthodontist and who you have visited with etc. I have had several consults and the only one I could find who uses lightwire forces (ALF) also has never used Damon braces and wants to use traditional braces in my treatment. I am frustrated and have spent a lot already on consults; and am thinking I will need to fly pretty far to get the best treatment and would sure appreciate any help you can offer. If you can email me privately I would sure appreciate it.
Also do you have any feedback yet on the lip trainer?
One important piece you are still missing is the impact of oral restrictions on the shape of the face and on mouth strength.http://www.mobimotherhood.org/what-we-have-learned-from-our-tongue-tied-babies.html gives a thumbnail overview I know you will find interesting. I too use the mouth trainer. I have used it for about one year since my oral restrictions have been released.
I have just came across “myofunctional orthodontics”. This alternative to orthodontics develop the jaws and align them, improve function of facial muscles, correct tongue trush, align teeth and can be used for children and adults. They claim to correct crossbites, underbits and overbites too. So far I have found two of these removable appliances, which happen to be inexpensive and easy to use: the myomunchie and the myobrace. Personally I found the myomunchie more interesting. Our dentist who uses the ALF and runs the ALF lab recomended to use the myomunchie in conjunction with the ALF to treat my sons undeveloped jaw and crowded teeth.
Let’s trust our body natural ability to heal and if it is needed, lets get son help from non invasive methods like the Myofunctional therapy and myofunctional orthodontics.
I converted to nasal breathing about four months ago, its now become natural 24/7, I’ve had no problems at night and now sleep like the proverbial log, I had no trouble nasal breathing at night, I know others who struggle but you mentioned lip strength, something I did not know about but I think I know the reason I had no problem, I’ve played saxophone and clarinet since my teens and I’m now 75, this has probably strengthened my lip muscles, what is interesting is my speech is much better and the tonguing on my instruments has improved in articulation and speed considerably, my tongue new position has obviously retrained my tongue, I hope this is of interest.