Breathing and Buteyko expert Patrick McKeown joins me to discuss the importance of breathing silently through your nose. How can you tell if you breathing "properly"? Why is nose breathing so important? What is the impact of breathing through your mouth? What does it mean if you are getting up in the night to go to the bathroom? Or perhaps even wetting the bed? We answer all these questions and also talk about taping your mouth at night (yes, you read it right) and the amazing Patrick's amazing success stories of working with professional athletes and the changes to their performance.

The secret to a long life is to keep breathing for as long as you can. Obvious, I know. But to healthy for as long as you can, think about breathing well.

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Dr. Ron Ehrlich:                   Hello, and welcome to Unstress. I am Dr. Ron Ehrlich. Today, I am speaking to Patrick McKeown. And Patrick is the world's leading authority in Buteyko. He's authored ... well, I think he's authored about eight books on breathing, Buteyko. One of his books is called "Asthma Free Naturally: Everything You Need to Know to Take Control of Your Asthma." So if you thought asthma was just the way it is, think again. You can take control of that with some breathing exercises. The other book that's he's written is called "The Oxygen Advantage: The Simple Scientific Proven Techniques for a Healthier, Slimmer, Faster, and Fitter You." It gives you clues to what Patrick is on about.

Now another thing I love to ask all my guests is, what's the biggest challenge to us as individuals on our health journey? Now, he's not a dentist, but if you think about public health messages as being confusing, Patrick's comments as a health practitioner are really enlightening. And as you'll hear, then we talk about the importance of nasal breathing as opposed to breathing through your mouth. Now, again, not something you think a lot about. I go through it in my book, but this is why I'm doing this podcast. I describe the book as an exploration, but this is about going deeper into the topic, to expand on those topics, and to talk to world leaders, and Patrick is definitely a world leader.

He also talks about the Buteyko training program, which I've done with my own family when the kids were 8 and 11 years old, and it was a really interesting thing to be going through as a family, and to alert us to the difference between breathing and just breathing well. He'll talk a little bit about improving athletic performance, but I hope you enjoy this conversation that I had with Patrick McKeown.

Welcome to the show, Patrick.

Patrick McKeown:             Thanks very much, Ron.

Dr. Ron Ehrlich:                   You're out from Ireland. Australia's a long way. You've arrived yesterday, and you'll be running some courses here in the Buteyko technique.

Patrick McKeown:             Yes, correct. So, I've always looked forward to ... I've been to Australia just a couple times in my lifetime. I always love coming here. It's a great city, Sydney. It's a pity it's so far away, but you know what? It's the worth the effort, so ...

Dr. Ron Ehrlich:                   Yeah, now, look, obviously we're gonna talk about breathing, but a topic that I feel really is important for us to ... Just, I'd be interested to hear your views on it, is we're in the middle of, well, a health crisis.

Patrick McKeown:             Sure.

Dr. Ron Ehrlich:                   Our chronic diseases are going through the roof, heart disease number one, cancer number two, 80 or so auto-immune diseases going on, diabetes, basically ... What do you think our biggest challenge is in healthcare today?

Patrick McKeown:             I'm aware of the statistics as well, and we have to bear in mind that our life has changed so much from that of our ancestors in absolutely every single way. But there's one factor that has changed. Throughout evolution,