What To Do About Snoring

Some elementary solutions are:

First off, your sleeping position is important.

In order to stop snoring, I recommend that you sleep on your side since sleeping on one's back tends to narrow the air passage.

When matched with gravity, the tongue and several looser muscles could fall back into your throat, creating even less space.

You can buy products such as a tube or cushion designed specifically to prevent supine sleeping.

I have heard of people sewing tennis balls on their pajama tops to make it too uncomfortable to stay in that position.

A contoured memory foam pillow to stop snoring is another aid. These pillows hold your head straight and support your whole airway during the night, reducing the risk of airway collapse.

What you eat and drink can affect your sleep. Alcohol and sleep medications relax the throat muscles and block the airway.

You should avoid alcohol for at least four hours and heavy meals for three hours before sleeping as a late heavy meal can also cause snoring.

Eat earlier, or have a lighter meal at night as a heavy meal before you go to bed can cause acid reflux.

Lying down brings acid from the stomach back up into the oesophagus, which can trigger heartburn, pain or coughing - not a recipe for restful sleep.

When you ask what to do about snoring, consider elevating the head of your bed 7-10cms by putting bricks under the head of the bed. Pillows aren’t as effective because they slip down and you can land up kinked over, further compressing the throat and chest.

Establish regular sleeping patterns.

Use a pillow that fits your body type and size.

Get the best mattress you can afford.

Keep the bedroom air moist with a humidifier. Dry air can irritate the membranes in the nose and throat.

Excess weight or obesity adds fatty tissue to the throat, narrowing the airway, and so losing weight will help to stop snoring.

This I have personally found to be true! Losing even a little bit of weight can reduce fatty tissue in the back of the throat and decrease snoring.

Exercise in general can help because toning arms, legs and abs inadvertently leads to toning muscles you don’t see in the throat, which leads to less snoring.

Jaw exercises can retrain your jaw not to drop and move back, so your tongue doesn’t fall back to obstruct your throat.

Throat muscles can also be strengthened by exercise, even such odd-sounding things as didgeridoo or singing lessons!

If you smoke, your chances of snoring are high. Smoking causes airways to be blocked by irritating the membranes in the nose and throat.

Surgery is a viable if drastic option to stop snoring.

In a new procedure, researchers find that inserting three matchstick-sized pieces of polyester material in the upper palate is a simple, low cost, and easily tolerated office procedure that provides effective snoring relief.

Ask your own doctor to refer you to an otolaryngotomy specialist (Ear nose and throat) about these snoring or sleep apnea implants.

There are chinstraps to hold your mouth closed and so stop mouth breathing which are effective if there are no nasal obstructions.

Use a nasal dilator like “breathe right” strips or a saline nasal spray.

A large tongue or short recessed chin also impedes the airflow. There are anti-snoring mouthpieces for snoring to solve this problem. These also stop mouth breathing, as they align the jaws so the airway is clear, and force nose breathing.

In my experience you need a good suction grip to keep it in any length of time, but they are effective if fitted correctly. They resemble protective mouth-guards worn for sports.

When you snore, you don’t get a good night’s sleep, and nor does anyone else within hearing range.

This leaves you tired and irritable, which impacts on your family relationships, your work performance and your concentration.

I hope this will help with the question of what to do about snoring.

Remedies and devices: Special pillows and tubes etc for sleeping position, weight control, exercises for tongue, jaw and throat, oral mouthpieces, sprays, audio tapes and last, surgery.

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