Common Causes of Snoring
• Hereditary - Your mouth anatomy can play a vital role as to whether you snore or not. Having a narrow throat or a thick soft palate or uvula (the dangling tissue in the back of the mouth) can limit your air intake. This is the main reason why men snore more than women because their airway passages are usually narrower.
• Being overweight - Having mass tissue in the throat area limits the air intake. Someone who is overweight is usually not fit, resulting in relaxed tissue movement such as the tongue and throat muscles which fall back into the airway. A similar problem is with children that have large tonsils and adenoids that block the airway, causing children to snore.
• Alcohol, smoking and medications - Excessive alcohol and/or smoking before bedtime and certain medications like sleeping pills relax the throat muscles, blocking air intake.
• Sleep posture - The way you sleep can also cause you to snore. People who sleep flat on their backs tend to be snorers because this again this posture relaxes the throat muscles leading to poor air intake.
Sometimes the way you snore can actually identify why you snore. If you snore with an open mouth, this usually indicates that you have problems with your throat tissue. A closed mouth snore can indicate that it is a tongue issue.
Self-help cures to stop snoring
• Exercising - With exercise you do two things at once. You first lose that excessive weight which in turn will reduce the amount of tissue in the throat that is blocking airflow, but at the same time you are toning your muscles in the throat to work more efficiently.
• Stop smoking and reduce alcohol consumption - Reducing your alcohol consumption, especially before bedtime is pretty easy, but to quit smoking can be an issue for smokers. Smoking has many negatives that we are all aware of, but one of them is that smoke affects the membranes in the nose and throat which causes the blockage of airflow.
• Sleep posture and time - Try to keep a normal sleeping pattern that you can follow throughout the week. Sleeping on your side can limit your snoring, but if you unconsciously sleep on your back then here's a little trick - to avoid sleeping on your back, attach a sock with a tennis ball in it either by sewing the sock or safety pinning it to your pajama. This will make you feel uncomfortable when you sleep on your back, forcing you to sleep on your side. Use this technique for a couple of weeks until you make it a habit to sleep on your side.
• Pillow elevation - Elevate your pillow by a few inches (you can place a book underneath your pillow) therefore your tongue and jaw move forward helping you breathe better. I use this trick especially with my kids when they have flu with a blocked nose. If this doesn't do the trick then you need to look for a new pillow that is made especially for snorers.
• Use a humidifier - You can keep the air in your bedroom moist by using a humidifier since dry air can irritate membranes in the throat and nose.
If the snoring continues then it can be a good idea to see your family doctor for a checkup and more advice. Snoring can sometimes be a good indicator of more serious health problems so it can only be good to take a short visit to the doc.
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