Valsalva's Maneuver, Breathing Exercises
and the "Modern" American Toilet Fixture

"Valsalva's maneuver occurs when one holds one's breath and strains. Defecation or urination (many die on the toilet seat), using the arm and upper trunk muscles to move up in bed, or strains during coughing, gagging or vomiting. The increased pressure, immediate tachycardia, and reflex bradycardia can bring about cardiac arrest in vulnerable heart patients." -Above taken from a medical dictionary.

They could have added "holding the breath and exerting" and it would have been even more clear.

You may have done this on purpose as a child: Taken a lot of deep fast breaths and then stick your thumb in your mouth and blow without releasing any air. You get dizzy and pass out. Children can most often handle this, some adults will die from it.

There is a device being sold via email that alleges to be for sports enthusiasts. It is sold as something that can help them strengthen their breathing by having them suck and blow in and out of it. Like a kazoo with an air-flowing in and out control. They can vary resistances and this resistance is supposed to strengthen the breathing. I bought something very similar a year or two ago and tried it. It made my breathing very uncomfortable. I just wonder how many sprinters or people that hold their breath and run or strain and drop dead because of this. Sprinters may be more prone due to the fact that some hold their breath during an entire 100 meters of a race.

So I saw this spam e-mail, viewed the device, remembered I had bought a similar one several months ago, and visited a local respiratory therapist friend of mine. He reminded me of the above Valsalva's Maneuver definition and suggested that with excessively increased pressure on the inhale, people can bust a "bulb" in their lungs as well create "excessive intra-cranial pressure" with this device. That it was something used many years ago in therapy but shelved due the aforementioned reasons. "COPD patients might receive benefits but others may be at risk". There is an FDA approved device that is coming out on the market that is a vast improvement over what is being presently sold. I will let you know when it arrives.

You can also cause inner tubes to constrict from the vacuum created and that this may well weaken the windpipe and adversely effect the voice. Stuttering is one example and I suspect laryngitis is as well. Some of the weight loss videos have exercises that create similar pressures.

For weight loss, exercise, sports performance or whatever, I would prefer you did some safe and simple breathing exercises. Try the Recommended Program

When you change your metabolism you just naturally lose weight.

Cardio-vascular events at defecation are to a considerable degree the consequence of an unnatural (for a human being) seated defecation posture on a common toilet bowl or bed pan. The excessive straining expressed in intensively repeated Valsalva Maneuvers is needed for emptying the bowels in the sitting position. The Valsalva Maneuver adversely affecting the cardio-vascular system is the causative factor of defecation syncope and death. The cardio-vascular system of a healthy man withstands the intensive and repeated straining at defecation, while the compromised cardio-vascular system may fail, resulting in syncope or even death. The squatting defecation posture is associated with reduced amounts of straining and may prevent many of these tragic cases.

Offsetting the tendency to strain while having a bowel movement. http://www.naturesplatform.com