Clear Stuffy Nose

How to Clear a Stuffy Nose

There are lots of ways to clear a stuffy nose. A lot depends on the reason why your nose is stuffy. For example, your nose could simply be stuffy because of build up after a long sleep. The way that you would treat this, however, would be very different from the way you might treat the same condition if it were due to allergies. Moreover, the way that you would treat allergies is different from the way that you would treat a stuffy nose due to a cold.

Here are some basic tips on how you might clear a stuffy nose.

Take a Shower

One good way of helping to clear a stuffy nose is to take a shower. Taking a hot shower has two very positive effects in terms of nasal congestion. First, the heat of the water when pressed up against your nose will help to loosen the congestion and to reduce inflammation of the blood vessels in the nasal passage.

Second, if your stuffy nose is due to allergies, taking a hot shower will help you to rinse off the pollen or other allergens that may be clinging to your body. This will help your nasal passage to clear more quickly—especially if you have taken allergy medicine before your shower.

How can you tell if you have allergies? A good sign that your stuffy nose is allergy related is that your symptoms appear or get worse during the early days of spring when various kinds of pollens are likely to be thick in the air. If you get other allergy-related symptoms like headaches or eye irritation this is the likely cause. There are now some over-the-counter medications that you can try for this, or you can get a prescription from your doctor. In addition, if you really want to know exactly what you are allergic to, you can have your physician test you for possible allergens. Most people prefer not to go to this expense and discomfort, however.

Spicy Foods

Another way to treat your stuffy nose is by eating spicy foods with pepper or onions. Both will help your nose to clear itself out naturally. Therefore, if a good spicy meal appeals to you, having a stuffy nose gives you just the excuse to order out.

Change Your Sleep Habits

Many of us get nasal congestion during the night when we are sleeping. This can be caused for several reasons. If you want to reduce the amount of congestion that you get while lying in bed, one thing that you can do is prop you head up on pillows so that gravity helps you to keep you nose clear over night.

In addition, you can reduce the intake of dust in your room by getting an air humidifier and running it during the night. With less material for your nasal congestion, you are likely to wake up much less stuffy.

Exercise

One of the best ways to clear a stuffy nose is through vigorous exercise. The reasons for this may not at first be obvious. However, when you exercise, you are doing several things that help you to clear your nose. First of all, as you increase your heart rate and breath intake, you enlist your respiratory system to take in more air than in a resting state. This, in turn, helps to open your nasal passages to take in more air. Second, exercise helps increase circulation and raises your body temperature, which helps to liquefy nasal congestion. Finally, just the act of vigorous movement can help you to dislodge much of material in your nose.

Along similar lines, sex has similar effects to exercise (not that you should need an excuse). Sex raises body temperature, increases blood flow, relaxes the nasal passage and certainly increases breathing. However, I would not recommend that you approach your partner and offer clearing your nose as reason to get it on.