Forms for New Myofunctional Patients

What are the goals of our therapy?

1-Lip Seal

2-Nasal Breathing

3-Correct Tongue Posture

4-Correct Swallowing Pattern

By reaching the 4 goals of Myofunctional Therapy- we are changing the way you breathe, reducing muscle tension, removing body compensations that lead to aches and pains, and restoring proper function of swallowing.  We are checking for a tongue tie, lip tie or other issues that may be contributing to your issues. 

What is tongue posture? This is the place in the mouth where your tongue touches when swallowing, chewing, speaking AND breathing. 

If your tongue is considered “low” and the posture is not touching the palate when swallowing or breathing- you can have some major changes! 

These 3️ symptoms are things we see as a result of low tongue posture. 👎 

🥇Open bite (front teeth don’t touch) / Deep bite (too much overbite

🥈 Orthodontic relapse (teeth shifting after braces)

🥉 TMJ pain (pain in our jaw joint 

Myofunctional therapy can help with low tongue posture! 

Where your tongue rests (tongue posture) can have many negative effects if it is in the wrong position! 

It can:

-change where your teeth are; the tongue is a large muscle and will push teeth one way or another based on the room it needs.

-Even if you have had braces, if the tongue position is not corrected, the teeth will relapse back to their original position or a new one after the braves are off! 

-If the tongue is resting too low at night, it can fall back and obstruct your airway while you are sleeping 🛌 

-Especially in children, the tongue position helps our nose and roof of our mouth develop correctly working as a natural expander. If the tongue is too low, the nose doesn’t develop correctly! 

-Without the nose developing correctly, the tongue will continue to sit low and lead to mouth breathing! And you know how we feel about that!!! 😂

MyoTherapy will help to correct the tongue posture and retrain the muscles to be in the correct position. Even in adults, we may not be able to change the nose development, but we can reduce the chances of sleep apnea, prevent our teeth from relapsing and seal those lips while breathing! 👄

Let’s talk about Nitric Oxide! What is this and why is it important?!?! 🤔

Nitric Oxide is a molecule that is released by the nose 👃when we breathe oxygen.  It dilates the blood vessels, which increases the absorption of oxygen into our blood system.  Nitric Oxide is NOT released into the system when we mouth breathe👄- only nasal breathing! 

The anti-inflammatory properties can reduce inflamed nasal passageways, tonsils and adenoids; anti-inflammation is very important for our cardiovascular system. ❤️

Low Nitric Oxide levels are linked to: high blood pressure, heart disease, heart attack, stroke, digestive tract issues (such as IBS), Alzheimer’s, dementia, and bladder issues. Eeks! So many things!!! 😩

How to help?

⭐️Exercise 

⭐️Breathe through your nose

⭐️Eat foods high in nitric oxide

Mouthbreathing is a compensation we do (when we can’t breathe through our nose) in order to keep our body breathing!  Not healthy!!!  

Mouthbreathing actives our “fight or flight response”. It involves shallow breathing and leads to over breathing and a disruption of our pH. 

Aside from the side effects seen above, the disruption of our pH can have lasting effects in our body. 

Did you know that Sleep apnea often starts as mouth breathing?  

-Gummy smile, small lower jaw “no chin”

-Droopy eyes,  Dark circles under eyes

-short upper lip, narrow smile

-Deviated septum , bump on bridge of nose