Hello Guest, Welcome to Apnea Board !
As a guest, you are limited to certain areas of the board and there are some features you can't use.
To post a message, you must create a free account using a valid email address.

or Create an Account


New Posts   Today's Posts

Your Personal CPAP Success Story - Post Here
RE: Your Personal CPAP Success Story - Post Here
(05-05-2019, 10:27 AM)matsarge Wrote: Now, I've lost about 25 pounds, I'm on allergy shots, and I've been using the Dreamstation for about 45 days with 100% compliance. I can't see myself sleeping without it. My AHI is around 4.5 on average and I feel much better. Not every day is great, but the "off" days aren't as often and aren't near as bad. Now, I'm focused on better understanding apnea, the data each night, and working to get my AHI even lower. I can't believe I was so dumb to ignore the signs (and what was my wife was telling me), and I got to the point where it was literally trying to kill me. My heart being in good shape was the main thing that saved me. Someone with heart issues may not have been able to withstand the stress I was putting on my heart and body each night. I lost that 25 pounds over a 7 week period during the worst part of this as I could barely eat and just felt terrible 24/7.

Yes it might have helped. My sleep apnea doesn't sound nearly as bad as yours but... for the past few years I've felt my mind was in the clouds and studying for my engineering finals was brutal... imagine how well I'd do had I known I had this condition? (I graduated this year in May with a Industrial Engineering degree). I did work out but not as much as I should have... simply because it took a massive effort to drag myself to the gym. Now is the time to heal.
Post Reply Post Reply
RE: Your Personal CPAP Success Story - Post Here
(05-13-2019, 05:42 PM)spirilis Wrote: I asked the dr a week later how bad my apnea was, they said 16/hour.  Not severe but enough to drive me bonkers apparently.

Depends on the person, I think. Imagine someone disturbing your sleep 16 times each hour. That's about once every 15 minutes!
Sleepster

INFORMATION ON APNEA BOARD FORUMS OR ON APNEABOARD.COM SHOULD NOT BE CONSIDERED AS MEDICAL ADVICE. ALWAYS SEEK THE ADVICE OF A PHYSICIAN BEFORE SEEKING TREATMENT FOR MEDICAL CONDITIONS, INCLUDING SLEEP APNEA. INFORMATION POSTED ON THE APNEA BOARD WEB SITE AND FORUMS ARE PERSONAL OPINION ONLY AND NOT NECESSARILY A STATEMENT OF FACT.
Post Reply Post Reply
RE: Your Personal CPAP Success Story - Post Here
oops, once every 15 minutes would be 4/hr. 16 times per hour is 4 every 15 minutes. or roughly 1 every 4 minutes. further bolstering your point.
Post Reply Post Reply
RE: Your Personal CPAP Success Story - Post Here
Wow. I am new to all this. I am reading all these stories and constantly thinking ME TOO MAN......I am 3 days into using my machine and have no real problems, but hearing about everyone else's success really gets me excited and hopeful about using my CPAP!
Post Reply Post Reply
RE: Your Personal CPAP Success Story - Post Here
It was a complete surprise to me that I had developed also sleep apnea in addition to my other sleep and medical problems, as I had last been tested for it only a couple of years before. I was appalled to find out that my sleep polygraph showed among other things also a three hour gap in measured sleep due to mainly sleep apnea that, I was in no way aware of. The reason I got also sleep apnea may have been due to the fact that I had to start cortisol replacement therapy after very ordinary surgery and as a result also got diabetes. It's also related to my PLMD.

Since the sleep polygraph in 2015 and since I got my ResMed 10 Autoset CPAP machine for free a bit later from the public health system of my country, Finland, I have first actively tried to learn to master the use of my CPAP machine and make it to suit me in the best possible way and later to find out ways I could use my ResMed / SleepyHead data to not only treat my sleep apnea better, but also help to manage my other sleep / medical problems in addition to other data. 

I use a sleep diary for all my sleep sessions, in which I combine my ResMed / SleepyHead, SpO2 meter, Beddit and Emfit sleep mattress data main points in addition to an ordinary sleep diary with my activity, medication and other data that might be useful. If I develop a problem, I can now go back to my sleep diary and ResMed / SleepyHead data to figure out where I may have possibly got wrong in my medication or something else and maybe figure out how to try to rectify the problem.

My sleep doctors are a bit frustrated with my sleep diaries they have now a lot off, since I'm now on number 117 of my two week sheets. The needs of my doctors concerning my sleep diaries are a bit different from the way I use them. Over the years my doctors have learned to see that I have a method to my madness, as we have first met over 20 years ago. They know I constantly experiment with my CPAP machine and medication to make my sleep and health better. While what I do is based on trial and error, my doctors know by now that I know what I'm doing. They may not always like my trials, but they know that I don't try anything stupid and I have also got positive results for my efforts.

While I've honed together with my doctors my sleep apnea therapy and other medications better over the years, I am not able to live a completely normal life, as my medical problems can't at present be treated well enough to make that possible. This doesn't mean that I and my doctors have stopped trying. On the contrary, we are always trying to find ways to do things better. In addition to my doctors work, I'm myself constantly trawling the internet, when ever I have time and energy, to find new research and possibly new ways to try to treat my medical problems. While I'm not a medical doctor by education, but an engineer, my doctors have adopted some of my suggestions and they have proven useful to me and sometimes to also someone else.

My advise to all sleep apnea or other medical problem sufferers is, while I know many people may not be able to be as active as I have been in their own treatment option selection, to try to keep a positive mind set despite problems and actively try to do your own part in your treatment as well as you possibly can. It may not always feel so, but If you keep trying hard and long enough, things may indeed get better, not just worse.
Post Reply Post Reply
RE: Your Personal CPAP Success Story - Post Here
well put, NoRestForWicked!
Post Reply Post Reply
RE: Your Personal CPAP Success Story - Post Here
(05-13-2019, 05:42 PM)spirilis Wrote: Hi folks, introduction...

...

I purchased a 32GB SDHC card this weekend and installed it.  Have 2 days of full data and downloaded OSCAR to peek at it.  AHI is <1.0 most days.

Update on my progress since my first post-

Over the past few weeks I've discovered that my mouth opens when I sleep on my side, so I've tried sleeping on my back as much as possible, but eventually had to figure something out for those nights when my back is sore.  Last night I tried using tape over my mouth, and it worked great.

I used Nexcare sensitive skin tape from walmart (1 inch wide).  Quickest thing I could access.  Stuck strong enough, peeled off without residue.

I'd noticed over the past few weeks a few minor incidents of waking up sweating, a "full" feeling in my body probably from elevated heart rate, basically waking up from an apnea.  These tended to happen after tossing & turning onto my side.  I think mouth-leaks were related to this.  None of that last night and I felt really good, in fact I woke up early, but then I also went to sleep early.  Consistently sleeping over 7.5 hours a night now.  I don't feel like I remember 3 dreams anymore, maybe 1 or 2, but that might be because I don't wake up to remember them as much either.

AHI numbers still consistently below 1.0 except once in a while, but never seen one at or above 2.0.
Post Reply Post Reply
RE: Your Personal CPAP Success Story - Post Here
(06-06-2019, 11:27 AM)spirilis Wrote: AHI numbers still consistently below 1.0 except once in a while, but never seen one at or above 2.0.

Not bad at all. Well-done
SuperSleeper
Apnea Board Administrator
www.ApneaBoard.com


INFORMATION ON APNEA BOARD FORUMS OR ON APNEABOARD.COM SHOULD NOT BE CONSIDERED AS MEDICAL ADVICE. ALWAYS SEEK THE ADVICE OF A PHYSICIAN BEFORE SEEKING TREATMENT FOR MEDICAL CONDITIONS, INCLUDING SLEEP APNEA. INFORMATION POSTED ON THE APNEA BOARD WEB SITE AND FORUMS ARE PERSONAL OPINION ONLY AND NOT NECESSARILY A STATEMENT OF FACT.


Post Reply Post Reply
RE: Your Personal CPAP Success Story - Post Here
(06-06-2019, 11:27 AM)spirilis Wrote: I'd noticed over the past few weeks a few minor incidents of waking up sweating, a "full" feeling in my body probably from elevated heart rate, basically waking up from an apnea.  These tended to happen after tossing & turning onto my side.  I think mouth-leaks were related to this. 

I urge you to start a new thread in the main forum and show us your OSCAR charts. For one thing, your pressure range is wide open (4-20) and narrowing it may help with this problem. For another, we can look at your leak rate graph to see how much mouth-leaking you're doing, and how bad it is. Try a chin strap for the mouth-leaking. If that doesn't work, go to a full face mask. Taping your mouth is ill-advised.

Quote:None of that last night and I felt really good, in fact I woke up early, but then I also went to sleep early.  Consistently sleeping over 7.5 hours a night now.  I don't feel like I remember 3 dreams anymore, maybe 1 or 2, but that might be because I don't wake up to remember them as much either.

AHI numbers still consistently below 1.0 except once in a while, but never seen one at or above 2.0.

That's awesome. Things will continue to improve as you adapt. For many people, the use of a chin strap becomes a training device, needed only until they learn to keep their mouth shut. Laugh-a-lot

But seriously, that is true. There's also a strategy of some kind of tongue tucking that many people swear by. But I could never get it or anything else to work for me. My biggest immediate impact experience was when I switched to a full face mask. That nagging tired-all-the-time feeling finally went away. I must have had it for decades.
Sleepster

INFORMATION ON APNEA BOARD FORUMS OR ON APNEABOARD.COM SHOULD NOT BE CONSIDERED AS MEDICAL ADVICE. ALWAYS SEEK THE ADVICE OF A PHYSICIAN BEFORE SEEKING TREATMENT FOR MEDICAL CONDITIONS, INCLUDING SLEEP APNEA. INFORMATION POSTED ON THE APNEA BOARD WEB SITE AND FORUMS ARE PERSONAL OPINION ONLY AND NOT NECESSARILY A STATEMENT OF FACT.
Post Reply Post Reply
RE: Your Personal CPAP Success Story - Post Here
I have a couple of points about adapting to use your CPAP machine I stumbled on my own, perhaps a bit of the norm, path.

First about the pressures used. I'd discourage people to limit the maximum pressure unless talked over with you specialist. If you limit the pressure to limit leaks you at the same time limit what your CPAP machine can do to help you. If you get large leaks you should check first how well your mask fits and works for you. Looking at your SleepyHead/Oscar charts, you can probably see how limiting the pressure cuts not only the leaks, but also other pressure tops off. 

If the leaks wake you despite using a well fitting and tight enough mask, you can always switch the machine off and back on to cut its pressure loading, which I think is a problem with at least the logic in the ResMed 10 Autoset I use. You can't really adjust the excess pressure loading off unless you limit the maximum pressure. Like I said, this is Ok, if you are checked you really don't need the excess pressure. 

I do need high pressures and have to live with the excess pressure loading, pressing the mask tighter with my hand, when needed, not knowing it any more most of the time and sometimes having to switch the machine off and back on. I've tried different pressure settings and the ones I now use give the best results so far. Mine a are now about 7-20. I still get AHI numbers over 10 sometimes, but that is at least partly because mine is not a pure sleep apnea, as it's complicated by my other sleep problems. There has even been talk about trying some oxygen to see if it helps my sleep. While my neurologists are on the fence and I'm for trying oxygen, my sleep apnea/lung specialists are dead against it, not really taking into account my other sleep problems. I may have buy the expensive oxygen generator full prize to have a try. More important than numbers is how you feel when you wake up. If you feel rested and can go on the whole day (in my case even this is more complicated..), then you are Ok.

This takes me to my second point. One of the writers described the problem about keeping your mouth shut. The answer mentioned ways to learn to keep your mouth shut. 

Why do a lot of work to try to learn off something that may be natural to you for some very good reason? People want a small mask, because they think it's more comfortable etc. Many don't want a full mask, because they think it hinders them, is hot, and so on.

I'd encourage people to try all available mask types before they make their choice. I have all Resmed 10 series masks and by trying all of them longer periods decided my, without any doubt, best option is to use a full mask. It doesn't matter if I open my mouth, which helps to equalize the pressure in my nose, ears and mouth and in general makes it easier to use the maximum pressures I need. I've also tried the 30 series masks, but they don't fit me as well as the 10's. Many other full masks have a support bar between your eyes, which I don't like.

Learning to get used to your CPAP machine takes work and sticking to using it. In the end using it becomes a second nature, as you learn to put the machine on or off, your mask on and off and adjusting them if necessary, without putting lights on to bother your possible significant other. If using your CPAP machine makes your nights and days better, it's well worth the effort you have to put in to make things work the best way possible.
Post Reply Post Reply


Possibly Related Threads...
Thread Author Replies Views Last Post
  [CPAP] First Post - Can't stay asleep with CPAP DKane 9 163 Yesterday, 12:03 PM
Last Post: SarcasticDave94
  Help - 1 year CPAP - not success - help very welcome! leono85 41 2,628 03-25-2024, 09:32 AM
Last Post: Macka
Question [Diagnosis] First post-CPAP visit to Sleep Doc - What to talk about? FlyAU98 6 188 03-23-2024, 09:08 AM
Last Post: HalfAsleep
  r4robin - Therapy Thread (Help with BiLevel settings-post #5) r4robin 42 1,838 03-11-2024, 01:26 PM
Last Post: bertchintus
  First Post - Help with Settings Ideas jrudicel 3 173 03-10-2024, 12:10 PM
Last Post: jrudicel
  Has anyone had success with ONLY a soft cervical collar? ranvanman 7 550 02-26-2024, 09:49 AM
Last Post: ranvanman
  Long story short chronic 5 384 02-18-2024, 03:43 PM
Last Post: chronic


New Posts   Today's Posts


About Apnea Board

Apnea Board is an educational web site designed to empower Sleep Apnea patients.