How nasal breathing helps children sleep better and improve brain function
How nasal breathing helps children sleep better and improve brain function
Good Sleep is essential for children. During a good restorative sleep, children grow, consolidate memories, and recharge, ready for the next day. Yet, many children struggle to get quality sleep each night. A factor that often influences sleep quality is how your child breathes while sleeping. We take breathing for granted. But it matters. The more effectively the lungs' function, the more oxygen the body takes in. Oxygen is the brain's main fuel, even when the body is asleep. When children breathe through their noses, they can inflate their lungs and inhale optimal amounts of oxygen.
On the other hand, mouth breathing is less effective. Mouth breathing is considered shallow breathing. Parents must be aware of the importance of observing and addressing bad breathing habits both at night, whilst asleep, and during the waking hours.
Teaching children about proper nasal and diaphragmatic breathing can have profound benefits for sleep, focus, learning, relaxation, and much more.
“Just three days into the nasal-breathing phase, he began to feel dramatically better. He was no longer snoring or experiencing sleep apnoea. ”
Why Nasal Breathing Matters
An experiment conducted by science journalist and author James Nestor, author of the book Breath helped me understand the importance of nasal breathing. Whilst it was a small experiment involving two people, it is a reminder to me, as a therapist, of why I teach these essential skills to all my students.
James spent ten days breathing through his mouth by deliberately blocking his nose, followed by ten days of nasal breathing with his mouth taped shut. Before and after each phase of the experiment, he underwent a wide range of tests, including blood gas analysis, inflammatory markers, hormone levels, blood pressure, heart rate, lung function, and other measures.
The results were astonishing. During and after the mouth-breathing phase, he felt dreadful. He experienced severe headaches, poor sleep, and episodes of sleep apnoea, where oxygen levels drop dangerously low during the night, increasing the risk of heart failure. He also developed memory difficulties and symptoms of depression, began snoring, and showed significant increases in both blood pressure and heart rate. Together, these changes indicated that his body was under considerable stress.
Just three days into the nasal-breathing phase, he began to feel dramatically better. He was no longer snoring or experiencing sleep apnoea, and key measures such as blood pressure and heart rate showed marked improvement.
How much sleep should my child get each night?
Shallow Breathing and Nervous System Challenges
Shallow breathing has negative effects. Our bodies receive signals from our environment and from within our own bodies via the nervous system. When we breathe through our mouths, we take more breaths; this, in turn, sends signals of stress to our brains, alerting the nervous system to a pending emergency. It is not an emergency, but our bodies do not perceive it this way. We have three types of autonomic responses: rest-and-digest, fight-or-flight/flee, and freeze. In other words, shallow breathing makes us feel threatened and unsafe. We need to feel safe.
Some causes of feeling unsafe are related to retained primitive reflexes, and others are due to stressors not coping with the demands from school/learning and academics. All these factors are further compounded by shallow breathing.
My own observations tell me that breathing incorrectly is not only detrimental to the nervous system but also negatively affects cognition. Breathing ineffectively is linked with an active Moro Reflex, and that, in turn, not only loops back to what was mentioned before about feeling more fearful, but also those with an overactive Moro Reflex will be worried about being scared, and a frightened individual does not function with ease. Children with retained Moro have a poor ability to sequence body movement and coordination correctly.
When I ask a child who normally breathes through the mouth to breathe in to make their belly rise, they struggle to make that movement. I may ask them to lie down and just have their hand on their belly, so gravity can help them understand how their belly needs to rise up and down, but they still often don’t get it. It takes a lot of work to get them to feel the correct movement when inhaling and exhaling.
This difficulty often is the result of an ineffective diaphragmatic system, which results from poor usage. Correcting these patterns early in our work together helps them feel calmer and more regulated, ready to learn.
“The first step to teaching nasal breathing is learning to breathe and engaging the diaphragm properly.”
How to Teach Diaphragmatic Breathing
The first step to teaching nasal breathing is learning to breathe and engaging the diaphragm properly.
One of the most effective methods I use to help children understand the correct movement of their belly when breathing in and out is by using a balloon. We all know the effort it takes to blow up a balloon. Not only do we need a lot of air, but we also need to push all that air into the balloon to inflate it. By blowing the air into the balloon with the required force, the diaphragm is naturally engaged throughout.
When breathing into the balloon and having one hand on the belly, children see and feel the contraction as air is drawn out of their lungs and into the balloon. It takes time to practice but this trick is great because I don’t need to use explanations and correct them, they are reminded themselves by practicing with the balloon.
Once they master the correct direction, I teach them to lie on the floor and breathe with their mouth shut and through the nose. Gravity helps as the belly drops down with ease when lying horizontally. They need to practice during the day to keep their mouths shut and do slow and steady breathing through the nose all the time, including at night.
Tools to Support Nasal Breathing
It is difficult at night, so I suggest some tools that encourage proper nasal breathing. Mouth strips, such as Myo Tape, gently encourage children to keep their mouths closed during sleep, promoting nasal breathing.
Nasal breathing offers multiple advantages.
· sleep quality
· concentration and learning
· A calmer nervous system resulting in better regulation
· Better posture, as the chest cavity and lungs need to expand
Encouraging Healthy Sleep Habits
Nasal and diaphragmatic breathing should be combined with consistent sleep routines.
If your child struggles with sleep, shallow breathing, or mouth breathing, early intervention can make a difference.
At Raviv Practice London, our one-to-one program helps children with or suspected neurodivergent conditions learn the basics, such as breathing correctly, part of the foundations to functioning better holistically and being at their optimum to learn effectively.
We invite you to contact us to schedule an initial (and free!) consultation and start improving your child’s sleep and wellbeing.
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About the Author
Usha Patel is a Neurocognitive Therapist and Director at Raviv Practice London. Parents searching to help their suspected/neurodiverse child can get evidence-based solutions with results in as little as 8 weeks. Those in search of jargon-free help can get started straight away.
