Hallie BulkinAsk HallieAI:Your On-Demand Mentor in Pediatric Feeding & Myo

The Secret to a Perfect Swallow

6 May 2026 · 1 min

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In this instructional segment Hallie Bulkin outlines the fundamentals of optimal orofacial posture for effective swallowing. She emphasizes that the tongue should rest suctioned against the roof of the mouth, lips closed, and breathing through the nose. Proper swallowing relies on creating a negative pressure seal by pulling the tongue upward, not by forcing the tongue forward to plug gaps. Bulkin distinguishes a true tongue thrust—a forceful, compensatory action during swallowing or speech where the tongue pushes against teeth, lips, or the space between them—from a forward resting tongue position, which is simply the tongue’s natural placement when the oral cavity is at rest. The segment clarifies how improper forward tongue placement leads to compensatory thrusts and undermines the negative pressure mechanism essential for a “perfect” swallow.

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And I mentioned this yesterday, we want the tongue at rest sitting up in the roof of the mouth. Lips should be closed. We should be breathing through our nose. And here's the thing, if the tongue is forward, it's protruding, it's like more of a resting or movement pattern where it's just kind of like sitting there, or when you swallow it thrusts forward. That's when we move into the tongue thrust where it's like this more forceful compensatory-based action where the tongue is having to plug the seal. So I mentioned yesterday we need a negative seal. For swallowing and the negative pressure. But the correct way to get that is by suctioning your tongue up to the roof of your mouth and swallowing. And we can do that with our lips open if we're doing it properly. But if we're not, our tongue has to plug all the holes, whether it pushes against the teeth, between the teeth, between the lips, against the lips. However it's choosing to do that, that tongue is coming forward anywhere from against the teeth to between the lips and anywhere in between. And that's more of a tongue thrust that happens during swallowing, or it could be happening during speech, versus a tongue forward, like, resting position.