According to Urban Dictionary, the team “mouth breather” might imply the person is unintelligent.
I have some trouble breathing through my nose. I’ve tried sometimes but it becomes a bit too difficult after several minutes so I give up. In the past I’ve been prescribed nasal sprays but I can’t be bothered using them.
About a year ago I became aware that I was eating noisily… a person mentioned something and I talked to another guy and he explained it a bit. I had also been eating with my mouth open. My wife later told me that I did eat noisily but she rarely says anything bad about me.
I think I’m fairly intelligent though because I was the top of my class in high school and I joined Mensa for a short time.
Nasal rhinitis runs in my family. In the past I’ve gotten allergy shots, but not for the past 15 years or so (not as bad a problem now).
However, I still have problems breathing through my nose at times. But due to social expectations (as you mentioned, breathing through your mouth makes a person look less than intelligent), as well as physical aspects (mouth-breathing will dry your mouth out), I do make every effort to breathe through my nose. Whether by blowing it as needed, or using a nasal spray that’s just to alleviate dryness.
I just wanted to say yes, there are a lot of us that have to fight this. Sometimes it feels unnatural to HAVE to breathe through our nose. But it’s 100 times better for us (see above) than mouth breathing.
I will admit that at night (while sleeping) I’m not always as strict on myself, though!
I also have a younger brother that is a mouth breather and while I love him, it does make him look, well, not as intelligent as I know he is.
I was a mouth-breather as a child. After I had my tonsils and adenoids removed at age 9, breathing through my nose was a lot easier. Nobody ever told me I had to breath through my nose, it just seemed like a normal thing that I should be able to do. It still took years to break myself of the habit though. Now it comes natural except when my allergies are bad.
That has always bothered me, too. I’ve got a deviated septum and I block up at the slightest hint of a cold or allergies. I can breathe through my nose a decent amount of the time, but if I’m sick or exerting myself I will start to feel like I’m suffocating unless I switch to mouth breathing.
If people want to think I’m stupid because of that, well, they can go to hell.
I was a mouth breather as well until I had my turbinates reduced and my deviated septum fixed. During allergy season I still get stopped up, but nothing as bad as I was before the surgery.