Smoking Cancels Out The Benefits Of Caffeine And Antioxidants

Scientists have a good understanding of how coffee and caffeine can help people breathe better. Caffeine is chemically similar to a compound called theophylline, which is found in tea and cocoa beans. This is the active ingredient in many asthma inhalers. Caffeine stimulates the muscles around breathing passages to open up a little, just enough to make breathing easier, sometimes just enough to prevent a severe asthma attack or nighttime wheezing. But smoking cancels out the benefits of caffeine.

These enzymes break down the toxic chemicals from cigarettes, but they also break down caffeine and antioxidants in coffee, so that drinking coffee doesn't help--even though cigarette smokers tend to drink more coffee than non-smokers.

If you just can't quit smoking and you have COPD, what can you possibly do to improve your breathing capacity with diet and other natural means? Here are some suggestions.

• Avoid eating too much, especially eating too many sweets. When your body burns sugar, it produces carbon dioxide. The more carbon dioxide your body produces, the more your lungs have to remove. Especially if you change elevation, for instance, leaving your home at sea level to a mountain resort, you can run into serious breathing problems by overeating or by indulging in too many sweets.

• Keep your home humidified, especially if you live in a drought-prone, dry, or desert climate. Humidity in the air keeps the mucus in your lungs moister and easier to cough up.

• Make sure you drink at least 5, and preferably 8, cups of water a day. Keeping your body well hydrated also makes it easier for you to cough up phlegm.

• Practice breathing through pursed lips to build up your oxygen capacity before strenuous activity. Puckering up your lips when you breathe helps keep small air passageways from collapsing when you do heavy activity, like climbing steps or carrying heavy loads. 

• Practice breathing out twice as long as your breathe in. When your exhalations are longer than your inhalations, your heart and internal organs get the message that oxygen is not in short supply, and they do not have to make energy as fast as they can. You pulse slows, you feel more relaxed, and your body can function better with the oxygen it has.

• Exercise. When you can't exercise both arms or both legs, exercise just one. Building up strength in your limbs, interestingly, helps your body cope with oxygen stress in the inner organs. Even a little exercise can help. Exercise doesn't have to be exhausting to be beneficial.

Read More: Clean Air for a Better Respiratory System