One of the first problems that you will probably encounter when mewing is an inability to breathe correctly. This problem could be because you’re not yet used to breathing properly through your nose or some other nasal obstruction. It can get challenging at first, but you should nail the breathing just fine with enough practice.
If you struggle with breathing while mewing it could be because you haven’t practiced enough. In that case, the only solution is to keep trying until you get the hang of it. However, if the problem lies somewhere else like a blocked nasal passage or narrow palate, practice alone will not help and you should get medical treatment.
There are many possible causes as to why you cannot breathe properly while mewing. The most common one is just a lack of practice. However, there are still a lot of other causes out there. For example, you could have a blocked nose or have nasal problems. That issue in itself may be what led you to mouth breathe in the first place.
Another reason is the probability that you don’t have enough mouth space and breathing while mewing feels uncomfortable. You can’t really solve this with enough time and practice, so it’s best to consult your doctor. If you can’t mew properly, it’s almost not even worth doing it.
The Right Way to Breathe While Mewing
If you’re already familiar with mewing and how to do it, you know that mouth breathing is a disastrous habit. It can elongate your face and give you a recessed chin that you don’t want at all. But it’s not just an attractive face. There are also other reasons why you should breathe through your nose.
Before anything else, nasal breathing doesn’t mean breathing through your nose all the time. Mouthbreathing is there as an option in certain situations such as allergies, colds, or extremely stressful physical situations. No person who can breathe normally should ever resort to mouth breathing.
What problems do mouth breathing pose exactly? There are quite a lot, but here are some more notable ones:
1. Dental Malocclusions
Just by being here, you likely already know that dental problems are an issue with mouth breathing, especially in children. The manifestations of breathing problems show up even at younger ages. This is also why mewing works best on children.
2. Bad Breath
Nobody likes bad breath. A terrible downside of mouth breathing is that your chances of having bad breath increase. The culprit of bad breath is bacteria that accumulate in your mouth if it’s dry or not moisturized.
3. Improper Facial Growth
For mewing, facial growth is probably the most important aspect. If a person breathes through their mouth, it will result in a less than ideal growth direction. Instead of an attractive face, those who mouth breathe are likely to grow up with the opposite.
If you still doubt how mouth breathing affects the face, there is a study conducted by Basheer et al. (2014) that studies that very topic. The study concluded that all those who mouth breathe out of all the study subjects tend to have a convex facial profile: a shape that we know of as the recessed chin look.
If you don’t want any of those effects, you have to breathe the right way. The proper way to breathe while mewing is, of course, through your nose. Nasal breathing is the default that humans should be operating at. It helps in so many things. For one, you’ll be breathing healthier. You will snore less and won’t be as stressed.
Most of all, nasal breathing while mewing is necessary to achieve the look you want.
Why You Can’t Breathe Properly While Mewing
If you are having trouble breathing while mewing, there is a reason for that. Most likely is that you just aren’t used to the feeling of always breathing through your nose. It’s not strange that you will have difficulty with it at first. After all, habits are notoriously hard to break. However, there are also several other reasons, such as:
Nasal Problems
Nasal problems might be what got you into breathing through your mouth in the first place. In these situations where your nasal passage could be inflamed or congested, simply trying harder won’t cut it. Take a look at these other nasal problems that might have led to mouth breathing:
- allergies
- asthma
- chronic colds
- deviated nasal septum
- jaw size and shape
- nose size and shape
- enlarged tonsils, turbinates, and/or adenoids
- tumors
Some of these problems are quite severe and could pose serious health issues. It is my recommendation that you always check with your doctor if you cannot breathe properly. If you know that you have allergies or are prone to them, then there’s nothing to worry about it, and you can just get on allergy meds. However, if it is something more serious such as enlarged tonsils or tumors (though that rarely happens), professional advice is required.
Lack of Tongue Space
Proper mewing requires precise placement of your tongue. If your mouth does not have enough space or your tongue is too large to achieve this position, you might be blocking your airway. Dr. John Mew explains this phenomenon in one of his YouTube videos.
Now, how do you fix these problems?
Practice
The first thing to approach is to practice more. Mewing is largely all about breaking bad habits and forming new ones. Because of this, mewing will never be an overnight process. You might feel some discomfort at first, but it will go away in a matter of days.
Never underestimate the power that practicing can give you. It might take you some time, but eventually, your tongue’s new position will become second nature.
Even if you lack tongue space, you can still mew if you practice constantly. For most of the issues that crop up with breathing while mewing, practice is a good enough answer.
Of course, a substantial consideration for this is whether you can breathe through your nose and have trouble doing so. If you can’t breathe through your nose or feel more than just a slight feeling of discomfort, forget about mewing for a moment. Go and get it checked out by your doctor.
Palatal Expansion
If you’re an adult, even years of practice won’t significantly expand your palate because you can’t mew properly with a narrow palate to begin with. In this situation, you need professional help and an orthodontist to give you palatal expansion.
One of the best methods for palatal expansion is the MSE (maxillary skeletal expander). It’s a device that gets screwed into your upper palate and actually splits your midpalatal suture:
Yes, this is painful. It can also create some asymmetries. But the fact that it creates new bone is something that traditional palatal expanders cannot do for adults. By widening the roof of your mouth, you have more area to mew properly with.
But the roof of your mouth is also the base of your nasal cavity. MSE will expand your nasal airway as well and make it much easier to breathe.
Allergies/Colds
If your nose feels congested due to allergies or colds, those only need simple fixes. Most allergic reactions (if mild) will go away with time. If you are hard-pressed for time, then you can take medication for it. Make sure that it is a medication that you are cleared by your doctor to use.
Conclusion
In the end, mewing is a process that takes a lot of work. Having difficulty with mewing, in the beginning, is nothing strange. With time and practice, you will eventually breathe properly through your nose. All that said, no two situations are the same. There are cases when you need medical intervention to help you breathe.
In cases where practice alone is not enough to help you, the best advice is to go to your doctor. Sometimes, it could be a serious problem that needs tending. They could give you a prescription for medicine to reduce inflammation, for example.
