A question often arises from participants after guided breathwork sessions: What was I yawning so much?
When your breath begins to slow down, we may begin to yawn. Breathwork can encourage the mind and body to relax, and as this happens, the vagus nerve is activated. If you have been stressed, anxious, overwhelmed, suffering with lack of sleep, living with chronic fatigue, ME or long covid, breathwork practices may make you yawn more as your nervous system calms down.
So, essentially, yawning is sometimes the body's antidote to the stress response. When you notice you are yawning more, your oxygen-to-carbon dioxide ratio isn’t optimal. It might be simply that your breath has been faster., shallow or higher in your chest (predominantly in the upper lobes of your lungs). Or, it may be a result of chronic fatigue, ME or long covid symptoms, perhaps dysautonomia.
However, frequent yawning is also indicative of a breathing pattern disorder. You blow off excess carbon dioxide because your body is saying it wants or needs less in the body, but we need carbon dioxide to dilate blood vessels so that oxygen can be absorbed. When you yawn, you are changing your breathing chemistry. Something you can try if you do find yourself yawning is to follow each yawn with a 5-second breath hold after exhalation to restore CO2 levels.
The vagus nerve regulates the function of the internal organs: digestion, heart rate, respiratory rate as well as vasomotor activity and certain reflex actions like coughing, sneezing, swallowing and yawning are all under control of the vagus. This is a vasovagal response and can also be due to fatigue and/or drowsiness.
So there are two reasons we may be yawning - an offloading of carbon dioxide as much as a response to your body beginning to relax. Increasing our tolerance to carbon dioxide through breath holds and other breathwork practices will result in a more efficient uptake of oxygen optimising our oxygen uptake.