Sleep Apnea

[Uturn]

TL/DR:  If you even think there is an outside chance that you might possibly, maybe have sleep apnea, get tested.

About 8 months ago I started putting on weight, dealing with depression, diabetes getting out of control, generally not caring about anything.  Could not pull myself out of it, started seeing various doctors, changed diabetes meds, tried some anti-depressants.  Nothing was working.  My diet didn't suddenly go downhill, but I was always tired and still putting on weight.  I even changed jobs thinking it was all stress related.  My new job is the least stress that one can have and still call it a job.  Things still got worse.  Now I was having problems with memory and concentration.  I would get lost driving home, could not pay attention in meetings, would lose track of hours at a time.  Depression so bad that I would just sit and cry.  More doctors, more drug changes. 

A friend suggested that I might have sleep apnea, so I asked my doctor if that could cause any of my problems.  He says it could cause ALL of my problems.  I had a sleep study and they found that I had an AHI of 37, my blood oxygen levels would drop to the low 70's.  Severe Sleep Apnea. 

I started using a CPAP a month ago.  Holy Fuck, life is great!  Within 3 days I had so much energy that I was doing two workouts a day just to burn it off.  My thinking cleared up.  Confidence in myself that I haven't felt in 15 years.  I'm down 10 pounds, yay I don't have to go buy fat clothes!  I'm dating again and motorcycles are fun again. 

I have basically been walking around dead for at least 10 years.  It seems sleep deprivation and oxygen starvation really are bad things.   Combine those two with glucose levels that make your brain function like a drunk person, and it gets worse.  Go get a sleep study people!  I might even get to the point where I can form proper sentence and paragraph formation that does not drive the grammar nazi's crazy. 

[marty998]

Nice to hear. Sleep Apnoea is the cause of so many afflictions.

Snoring is connected with this too.

Friend of mine gave her father a great solution to that problem... strapped a tennis ball to his back so he was forced to sleep on his side.

Crude, but it worked. Whole family got a good night's sleep after that.

[ender]

does not drive the grammar nazi's crazy.

Nope, not yet ;-)

[EMP]

Good for you! Adjusting to using cpap is hard, but so worth it.

[aperture]

Glad to hear that you have put some health problems in the rear view mirror Uturn.  Sleep apnea is a collapse in the airway that can occur during sleep.  Excess body weight can contribute but genetics plays a role (skinny people with bad airway configuration are susceptible).  Marty is right that snoring is connected.  When the sufferer experiences airway collapse the breath becomes turbulent and makes the snoring sound.  That is followed by a halt in breathing (this is when blood O2 levels drop, and then often a gasping return to breathing.  All of this messes with sleep and just about everything else. 

The most common signal of sleep apnea is snoring (ask your partner).  It can also present as feeling unrested in the morning, headaches, depression and low energy.  Sounds like Uturn you got hit with the knotted end of the sleep apnea stick.  I am really glad you got the CPAP to work for you and that it has reversed your symptoms so markedly.  Best wishes, Ap.

[JLR]

My husband is one of those "skinny people with bad airway configuration". It was actually his dentist who suggested he may have sleep aponea. Speaking with another friend since, it was his dentist who suggested it to him, too!

When he was tested, they found my husband would stop breathing 20 times an hour. No wonder he was always tired! They also told him that the reason he had trouble getting to sleep in the first place was because his body recognised sleep time as a danger time.

[Uturn]

They also told him that the reason he had trouble getting to sleep in the first place was because his body recognised sleep time as a danger time.

Huh, I wonder if that is why it takes me so long to fall asleep.  On a good night, it will take just over an hour.  It doesn't matter if I'm in my bed, hotel, camping, on the couch.

[CowboyAndIndian]

Yeah, I have sleep apnea too.

I snored a lot and would gasp for breath in my sleep which would wake up DW.

The day (actually night) I got tested, they put a load of sensors on me (very uncomfortable). At about 2AM, the technician put a CPAP on me (too many interruptions..).
When driving home (at about 6AM), I felt so good. I had maybe 2-3 hours of great sleep with CPAP. I knew then that I definitely had sleep apnea and did not need any confirmation from the doctor.

Quick Tip:  If the mask is just not right, it becomes quite uncomfortable. So, try a few different masks. I have found that the Phillips one is much better than the respironics ones.

[cityfolks]

For those of you with sleep apnea, did it "show up" the first time you were tested? I had a sleep test several years ago, and no symptoms were found - but I'm still dealing with issues of persistent fatigue/low energy levels. My husband says I snore rarely and it's usually when I have sinus problems, and his father does have sleep apnea and uses a CPAP, so it's an issue he's familiar with - though obviously not able to make a medical diagnosis. Maybe I'm grasping at straws but I wonder if it's worth getting tested again and if anybody had different results or took longer to figure it out after a test.

[Uturn]

I only needed one sleep study, but mine was quite obvious.  My understanding is that it gets worse as you age, so it might be worth doing again. 

[retiringearly]

Following

[EMP]

For those of you with sleep apnea, did it "show up" the first time you were tested? I had a sleep test several years ago, and no symptoms were found - but I'm still dealing with issues of persistent fatigue/low energy levels. My husband says I snore rarely and it's usually when I have sinus problems, and his father does have sleep apnea and uses a CPAP, so it's an issue he's familiar with - though obviously not able to make a medical diagnosis. Maybe I'm grasping at straws but I wonder if it's worth getting tested again and if anybody had different results or took longer to figure it out after a test.

The diagnostic criteria focus almost entirely on how men present with sleep apnea, and women often go undiagnosed until they hit menopause.

Women have less snoring and will tend to have more problems during REM. If you snored during pregnancy and had PIH chances are good you have sleep apnea. If you have another study, you want to find a doc that knows these things. Keep in mind, there are a while host of other sleep disorders besides sleep apnea, you may have one of those.

When I was screened, I had an AHI of four, but I also had 9 respiratory event related awakenings or RERA's. I've got a cpap I bought off craigslist, but compliance is much easier if you can have a trained professional observe your stats to see what it takes to keep your airways open and help you find the best mask fit. I didn't have $5K to pay OOP for a titration study, soooo, yeah.

In any case, Medicaid is no longer paying for cpap, so private insurance is beginning to drop coverage too. They'll still pay for screenings/sleep studies.

[Dicey]

C-Pap Silver Lining: It is approved medical equipment, thus qualifying you for higher utility baseline levels. We used to routinely hit Tier 3 & 4, but since we completed the necessary paperwork (MD must complete a portion and send directly to utility co), we never get past Tier 1, hence: lower utility bills for completely legitimate medical reasons! Mustachian win! There's a thread around here somewhere, but it's old and a cursory search didn't locate it.

OP, be sure to look into this!

[Choices]

The main question I get about CPAP is how the partners cope because the machine is so loud. Well, would you rather sleep next to a rhythmic machine or loud, irregular snoring and gasping? The partners LOVE it when patients get CPAP :)

[PFHC]

May be worth it for all of you with sleep apnea to look into analyzing your diet. The anecdotal evidence is strong for a connection. I personally know several people who solved their apnea through allergen elimination. Their improvement in lifestyle was dramatic, because there are other side effects other than apnea that result from food allergies/sensitivities.

[EMP]

May be worth it for all of you with sleep apnea to look into analyzing your diet. The anecdotal evidence is strong for a connection. I personally know several people who solved their apnea through allergen elimination. Their improvement in lifestyle was dramatic, because there are other side effects other than apnea that result from food allergies/sensitivities.

Links please. The inly thing I could come up with was OSA being exacerbated by hay fever.

[With This Herring]

For those of you with sleep apnea, did it "show up" the first time you were tested? I had a sleep test several years ago, and no symptoms were found - but I'm still dealing with issues of persistent fatigue/low energy levels. My husband says I snore rarely and it's usually when I have sinus problems, and his father does have sleep apnea and uses a CPAP, so it's an issue he's familiar with - though obviously not able to make a medical diagnosis. Maybe I'm grasping at straws but I wonder if it's worth getting tested again and if anybody had different results or took longer to figure it out after a test.

I am not a doctor.

What symptoms do you have besides persistent fatigue?  I thought there were all sorts of things that could cause that, such as thyroid issues, so I'm not sure how helpful we internet people can be.  It seems that it would be worth going back to a doctor no matter what the cause might be.

[Dicey]

The main question I get about CPAP is how the partners cope because the machine is so loud. Well, would you rather sleep next to a rhythmic machine or loud, irregular snoring and gasping? The partners LOVE it when patients get CPAP :)

Oh, amen sister! BTW, DH's new CPAP is smaller and quieter than his old one, plus the face mask is much smaller. Love everything about it!

[PFHC]

May be worth it for all of you with sleep apnea to look into analyzing your diet. The anecdotal evidence is strong for a connection. I personally know several people who solved their apnea through allergen elimination. Their improvement in lifestyle was dramatic, because there are other side effects other than apnea that result from food allergies/sensitivities.

Links please. The only thing I could come up with was OSA being exacerbated by hay fever.

Food related:
Link 1
Link 2: Food is first on the list
Link 3
Link 4
Link 5: "Some patients have sleep apnoea because of food intolerance. The commonest foods are wheat and dairy products."
Link 6

Related to obesity, which is the abuse of food:
Link 7

So, seems to be a fairly strong correlation between food sensitivities or unhealthy eating and OSA. My father and FIL were both chronic snorers, FIL with severe OSA, father with a more mild case. They both removed dairy, wheat, and added sugar from their diets and not only lost weight, but stopped snoring completely and the OSA disappeared. It's not a magic bullet, but its definitely worth a try since its so easy to do and it would make such a marked improvement in an OSA sufferer's life.

[Lski'stash]

Following. Thank you for the links!

[cityfolks]

@With This Herring, thanks for your thoughts. I'm mostly curious because when I discuss my fatigue, I get a *lot* of people talking about apnea, so I was mostly wondering if people had found different responses from sleep studies at different times.

Fatigue is my main "symptom", accompanied by related symptoms such as difficulty waking up in the morning, "excessive sleepiness", etc. - mostly the issue is a generous amount of sleep not resulting in feeling rested. This could also be a function of mental health issues (though it hasn't cleared up after a solid 18 months of treatment), though a variety of bloodwork hasn't found anything to do with thyroid, iron levels, and so on. Some elimination dieting (caffeine and alcohol were off the table for a while, both together and separately) didn't have an impact, though it didn't involve wheat or other possible allergens/irritants.

[JLR]

The main question I get about CPAP is how the partners cope because the machine is so loud. Well, would you rather sleep next to a rhythmic machine or loud, irregular snoring and gasping? The partners LOVE it when patients get CPAP :)

To me the machine makes me think it is raining. Sometimes I wake up thinking "is that rain?" then realise it is the CPAP and go back to sleep. It is probably good that I'm not the one who has trouble falling asleep. :) And I have to agree, the CPAP noise is much better than snoring/gasping/worrying your partner is going to die in the night.....!

[TrMama]

They also told him that the reason he had trouble getting to sleep in the first place was because his body recognised sleep time as a danger time.

Huh, I wonder if that is why it takes me so long to fall asleep.  On a good night, it will take just over an hour.  It doesn't matter if I'm in my bed, hotel, camping, on the couch.

Give it a bit more time and this may resolve too. Within 6 months of my DH getting his CPAP he started falling asleep within minutes of putting it on. It's like his own personal off switch. His body now seems to associate putting on the mask with falling asleep.

As the low-sleep needs, insomniac in the relationship, I'm seriously jealous.