Howdies!

So I went yesterday (20110513) to get my new humidifier for my CPAP machine and got a little more clarification on my apnea events.

1. When I stop breathing it is on average for about 19.5 seconds (that is the average)
2. Longest was 55 seconds
3. My blood oxygen dropped to around 51%* during the test

So, I haven’t gotten a chance to try the humidifier yet, but I am excited! Continue reading →

So as a quick follow up to my last post, I did the follow up sleep study last night (20110428), this part involved sleeping with a remotely controlled CPAP machine. The basic premise is that they keep upping the pressure on the CPAP till the snoring and apnea events go away. Once they found the correct pressure for me, they told me I slept well, not that I remember as I was, sound asleep…It’s amazing how long it’s been since I have had a comfortable and full nights sleep, I didn’t know what I had been missing. Couple of things I found out; I asked about the frequency of my apnea events (~133/hr), and asked what classified severe (caveat being it may vary from sleep center to sleep center or what the dr’s agree on) but my nurse said that anything over 50 is considered urgent, since I almost tripled that, I guess that’s pretty severe. Something else I figured out is that everything to do with the CPAP machine from setting the pressure to getting a mask is prescription which for a simple mind like mine is hard to wrap my mind around as *prescriptions* are for *drugs* not machines. Any whoozles, things are getting taken care of, and I should be getting fully restful, and regenerative sleep when I get the machine dialed in correctly. Oh and one side affect of the sleep, I have more energy than I know what to do with right now…

Breathing is, for most, something we take for granted, I know I have. I have been told by many partners that I snore loudly, and have even been told that I stop breathing when I sleep. So I finally decided to do something about it and did a sleep study. I’ll tell you, it was a little uncomfortable trying to sleep with all of the wires (about 22 in all) attached to you, as anyone who has done the test will tell you. So I did the test on a Thursday night (April 21st 2011), and was called on Friday the 22nd and it was confirmed that I have pretty severe sleep apnea. I was also told that I would be getting a call to setup an appointment for my new CPAP machine, while at lunch with a friend I received the call for my appointment, so I called my fiance and asked if she would come along, of course she agreed, as I was a bit of a nervous wreck (it took all of about 3 hours into the study for them to realize that I had sleep apnea, then proceeded to put me on O2, which is a bit disconcerting).

So I have been sleeping with my new machine, and I’ll tell you that I haven’t known sleep like that since I was a little kid. I don’t think that I have slept soundly for the last 25 years. So when picking up the machine a couple of things that I noticed that scared me a little;

1. the paperwork said Urgent at the top, and I got the machine the day after the test (Medicine doesn’t usually move that fast, at least in my experience)
2. I stop breathing, on average about 133 times an hour.
3. all combined I stop breathing for about 25 seconds per hour (doesn’t sound like much, but it’s enough to interrupt restful sleep)

Sleeping with the machine is a little strange at first, as it’s name implies it provides constant pressure so you have to breathe against it with a mask over your nose, so you have to keep your mouth closed (or it feels like you’re gagging), and you cannot talk (as you cannot force the air back through your vocal chords). I am still adjusting to the whole experience, but I am grateful everyday that my fiance pushed me, and gave the courage to do the test.

Remember that we sometimes take for granted the little things, so stop, smell the roses, and enjoy.