Posted: Oct 30, 2022 4:15 am
Greg the Grouper wrote:Sara4321 wrote:This has nothing to do with the fact that the reflex to breathe through your mouth during sleep when the nose is blocked does not happen during sleep.
It unironically has everything to do with that. Your autonomic nervous system doesn't cease to function when you go to sleep.The body will continue to try and breathe through the blocked nose instead, resulting in hypoxia and then death.
So are you of the impression that you're the only human being in recorded history to have a bad cold, or are you under the impression that every human in recorded history to have a bad cold either refused to sleep until it passed or suffocated overnight?
I think everyone with a bad cold just stays awake, they don't go to sleep. I've never gone to sleep when I have a blocked nose from a cold, I always had this instinct that I'll die in my sleep otherwise.
'' Your autonomic nervous system doesn't cease to function when you go to sleep.''
Yes this is true. But opening your mouth and switching to mouth breathing is a more complex process than simply just breathing, I think you could agree. Babies for example can breathe just fine, but lack the reflex to switch to mouth breathing when they are awake. This reflex only appears a few months after birth. It's why a baby having nasal congestion can be fatal. They will just keep trying to breathe through their nose and they can die from suffocation. There's a condition where people are born without a nose, and they don't make it past infancy because of the same reason.