Cure for Hiccups

Last year, a student gave me a few pages from the newspaper because there was an article about Yoga or Meditation in it. The article was fine, but what really interested me was on the other side of the page.

There was an article about a new devise that you could purchase (for a high price) to stop hiccups. The devise stimulated the vagus nerve and thus stopped the hiccups. The writer went on to discuss how the vagus nerve was related to hiccups.

Being a Yogi and frequent hiccup sufferer, I found this fascinating. The Throat lock or Jalandhara bandha in Yoga has many purposes. One of them is to stimulate the vagus nerve.

So, I put one and one together and tried Jalandhara bandha the next time I got the hiccups. It worked! I used to get the hiccups at least every other day and sometimes it would last for over 30 minutes. No fun at all. I had tried all kinds of crazy stuff, but none of it worked.

Finally, something that works! For over a year now I've only had two cases where my hiccups lasted more than a minute, and even then they disappeared within a few minutes.

If you suffer from hiccups, stimulate your wondrous vagus nerve with Jalandhara bandha. Here's how:

1. Take a comfortable seat with a long straight spine.
2. Exhale as you gently drop your chin towards your chest. The back of the neck will become long. Be careful to NOT drop the whole head forward which can strain the neck muscles.
3. Inhale as you fill the chest with air and allow the sternum (heart center) to rise up towards the chin. The shoulder blades soften down the back as the chest stays lifted.
4. Hold this position and continue to breath.

I find that it only takes a few breaths and the hiccups are gone. If you try this, please let me know how it goes.

Good luck!

Kris
www.TotalHealthYoga.com
www.TotalHealthYogaClasses.Blogspot.com

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