Homepage: Norms, rates, CP and body oxygenation
Why normal breathing is imperceptible
If a person with normal breathing is asked about their breathing sensations, they will testify that they do not feel their breathing. Why is it so? Normal tidal volume is only 500 ml or about 0.6 g of air, which is inhaled in during one inspiration. Hence, normal breathing is slow in frequency and very small in amplitude. Sick people breathe deeper and faster. They often feel movements of air in the nose, chest movements, and other effects related to their big and noisy breathing. Their deep breathing reduces body oxygenation and creates tissue hypoxia due to hypocapnic constriction of blood vessels and the suppressed Bohr effect discussed later.
There are, however, exceptions from these general observations:
- Healthy children (e.g., 5-9 years old) with normal breathing are able to feel their breathing (even though it is miniscule in amounts) due to acute conscious awareness about various bodily sensations at this age.
- Vice versa, older people, even when they breathe twice faster and/or deeper than the norms, often do not have any sensations of their heavy breathing due to lack of attention to their breathing for many decades.
- People, who have been practicing breathing retraining (Hatha Yoga, the Buteyko breathing method, etc.), have good perception of their breathing, even when they breathe less and slower than the norms, due to deliberate attention to their breathing process during training sessions.