Can't stay asleep

[SleepyMatt]

Thank you pugsy & hades not only for the help but also for writing so much! I'll give myself more time to adjust. After reading some of your posts I thought that I should narrow the pressures too. I know how to change it but I'll let my doc know when I do. My Dr., I think is new at this. I'm 38 & he's only a year older than me but he seems really interested in helping me & doesn't treat me like a number. My DME on the other hand treats me like a number. Anyway...

About waking up, I seem to wake up only for a moment then I'm right back asleep. My concern is that I don't think I'm getting into the N3 stage of sleep. It's incredibly hard for me to lose weight even when working out 5 days a week. I can only assume that since I'm not getting into that restful sleep stage, my cells don't get a chance to fully recover. Now I don't have a college degree so I could be completely wrong. I feel like I'm always dreaming.

Oh and I don't use the ramp & the pressures seem to be okay with me. I understand what the graphs represent just not sure how to put it all together. I guess I have a scientific kinda mind & looking for an absolute answer when there may not be one.

Could this all just be my body getting use to this like the first week or two taking a new anti-depressant?


About me:
5'7" thick build 190lbs. 29% body fat
My testosterone levels are low
Cholesterol 210
Like to sleep on my stomach but forcing myself on back & side for Cpap.
Desperately want to control this so I can have energy & live life again.

[hades161]

Could this all just be my body getting use to this like the first week or two taking a new anti-depressant?

Yes, sorta like that, from what I have been reading you never really adapted well to the cpap and most likely never got good treatment from the Cpap (just a guess without data). So most likely your "just starting" even though you you already put in 2 months of fighting. Your starting to get enough data to see whats going on and with more time I hope you'll settle in. The first step is to get you under 5.0 AHI every night after that you still need to give your body even more time to heal and adapt from being strangled for air every night for who knows how long, to getting air fed to you.

Some people adjust right away and others take a lot longer. You had a bad start but it's no big thing you'll get past it =P

I use to have run to the bathroom about once every hour of the night before treatment, once I got it dialed in it took a week for it to stop, but it took me a month to get it dialed in. Everyone is different though.

That's when I knew it was working.

[happysleeper]

Hi SleepyMatt,

You're doing exactly the right thing by asking lots of questions on this site, lots of great knowledge here!
\

Then within two hours I wake up, up to five times throughout the night. I feel as if I'm constantly dreaming when I am sleeping.

It took me about 2 months to get some full nights of sleep when I first started CPAP. The sleep therapist told me that my brain had to adjust to finally getting enough oxygen at night, and change my sleep architecture. That meant doing lots of dreaming to catch up on REM, and continuing to wake up fairly often. Gradually I was able to sleep longer and longer, but at first my body was wide awake after 3-4 hours of sleep. Pretty normal adjustment.

If you can't sleep, better to get up and read, listen to some radio/music, do something calm, and then go back to bed/sleep with the CPAP on. That way your brain and body get the benefit of good oxygenation whenver you sleep.

Good luck! Happy Sleeper

[Samba]

Took me 3 months to get decent sleep but at least I didn't get out of bed 4-5 timed a night. Hang in there.

[Guest]

what are AHI's ( am new to cpap etc) i too wake up durin the nite , and often that last hour in a mornin take the mask off n then fall asleep again.
I just got my autoset machine am still workin out how to work it etc. its been a night mare to get to this stage and very expensive. docs dont know about wats out there re diagnosis etc. i could have claimed some on medicare but found out to late. ( typical).

[SleepyMatt]

Thanks everyone for the reassurance. I think I need to get a mouth only mask for when my nose is stuffed up.

Last night I made it the entire night with the mask. I think I finally got a little quality sleep.