What has mouth breathing, tension in the neck and shoulder area, tight chest and diaphragm and digestive problems have in common?...These symptoms are produced as a result of breathing from the chest.
While breathing, we use the diaphragm as the main organ to create movement for the air to get in and out of our body with help from the supportive muscles which are found in the ribcage, neck and shoulders. When we breath from the chest, we reverse these roles, we use the supportive muscles as the main aid for breathing creating bad posture, high energy consumption and straining the spine.
Since diaphragmatic breathing creates vacuum to aid the movement of air while massaging the abdominal organs, exchange of blood and oxygen, circulation of blood, lymph and Qi throughout the body. Breathing from the chest would reduce these movements resulting in stagnant energy flow in the abdominal area and in long term possible inflammation. It will also affect the stability of the lower back and pelvic floor muscles resulting in rigidity since there is less movement in the abdominal area. It has been obsrved that during diaphragmatic breathing, the kidneys could move as much as 3cm up and down.
Another restriction would be caused to the vagus nerve which is our social engagement nerve, it innervates the diaphragm and all the organs exchanging information with our brain - 80% of the information travels from body to brain and 20% from the brain to body.
This nerve comes out of the back of the head then passes between the neck muscles, right behind the sternocleidomastoid muscle (SCM) and in front of the scalenes, in order to supply the lower abdomen, it passes through the diaphragm so when there is tension in the neck and shoulders for a long time, it will affect the tightness in the diaphragm, communication between the brain and our gut, digestive issues as well as cause anxiety.
Whe your therapist emphasises on the importance of diaphragmatic breathing, it isn't only for relaxation reasons. The lack of it creates far more disturbance in our system than we could imagine.
Why not book yourself in a session of CranioSacral Therapy or a Transformational Distant Healing to help with your healing journey.
Connect with me on seta.curatherapies@gmail.com