I'm new and fixin' to do sleep study...

Hi everyone...
I found this site tonight while researching sleep apnea, and everyone seems so friendly and helpful that I thought I'd post my situation and get some feedback.

I just returned from a two-week vacation to Alaska with my mom, who was diagnosed and got her CPAP machine last year. I'd only seen her with it once before this trip, and the whole machine/headgear/tube thing, I must admit, kinda freaked me out.

She and I hadn't slept in the same room together in years, and here we were in close quarters in our stateroom on the cruise, dead-tired from all of the activities of the day. I read before bed while she hooked herself up, and found myself nodding off as I usually do--which is to say that I usually turn out the lights after I wake up with my face on the book! *L*

Anyway, I'm dozing off, and all of a sudden my mom is snapping at me to stop breathing that way and stop making those noises, etc... I tell her it's just snoring, but she starts to tell me how I will snore, then be silent for a long time, and then make these horrible gasping-for-air noises. I try to dismiss it, but she continues to harp on it and is now insisting that I go for a sleep study and get a CPAP machine.

In all honesty, she's probably right. I'm 40, pushing 280 (very overweight and out of shape), and have high cholesterol. I'm a teacher, and I have to be at school everyday at 7 a.m., and that early time just KILLS me! I never, ever feel rested--in fact, I usually feel exhausted by the time I wake up around 5ish, although I'm always in bed by 10:30 or 11 p.m. I have come to really HATE mornings. Also, over the past several years, I've noticed that I wake up and my tongue is literally stuck to the roof of my mouth. The past year and a half, I've also seen a marked increase in having to get up and pee during the night--at least 2-4 times, whereas before, this never happened and I always slept through the night without getting up.

During college and in past years of getting together with my girlfriends for a long weekend, we'd usually end up watching movies, and I always seemed to be the first one asleep. I would wake up part way through the movie and they would have the volume SOOOOO loud. Finally, after years, they told me that it was always so loud because they had to turn it up to hear it over my snoring.

Past sleeping partners have also commented on my snoring, and one in particular refused to sleep with me--he'd go sleep on the couch. I got really annoyed at that, not really knowing how bad it must be. In fact, I've always gotten annoyed when people woke me up to get me to stop snoring, because to me, I was just sleeping really, really good. Apparently, though, I'm not.

I'm not by any means opposed to going to do the sleep study and getting a machine that will help me to sleep better and get some actual rest. My concerns, I guess, have more to do with vanity *L*:

1) is anyone out there single? How on earth do you introduce this alien headgear to a new partner?

2) after reading through a lot of the posts here, it sounds like I'm going to need a full-face mask since I guess I breathe through my mouth a lot. Every morning of the trip, my mom had these indentations in her cheeks from the straps, and they took hours to go away. Is there any way to alleviate that, since I have to face a class of 18 year olds at 7:30 a.m. each day? I really don't want strap marks...

3) I'm convinced that my sleep problems and my weight problems go hand-in-hand--they've kind of grown in size together. Have any of you had positive results after using this therapy as far as weightloss?

That's all for now. I plan to call my doctor on Monday and see what I need to do to go do the study, so that I can hopefully have a few weeks of practice with this new way of life before school starts back in early August.

ANY comments, suggestions, humor will be most appreciated!
Thanks!

Teachergurrl...

Whilst it is always prudent to err on the side of caution. I am betting that most of us here already know the outcome of your sleep study (as I suspect you do too).

Your post here was a great start. Re masks & marks etc: etc: - worry about that closer to the time of your fit out but the questions you raise are good ones.

I am also betting that you are in for an exciting period of your life where you are about to discover that a lil ole air pump can lift you above the characteristic tiredness & lack of energy & propel you into a new you & a new way of living.

As for being single & coping with the paraphenalia, there are many singles who come to this forum & I am sure they can help answer those questions. I don't have to face that issue but lemme tell you my darling 'Alien' (the creature that sits on my face everynight - a bit like that scene in the 1st Alien movie - (and otherwise known as RemStar Auto w/flex)) and who breaths life & liberty into me via my face, comes before anyone who won't accept her

Cheers

DSM

teachergurrl wrote:....

1) is anyone out there single? How on earth do you introduce this alien headgear to a new partner?

Hi Teach, I am also single. I was divorced over 10 years ago, and have found it very difficult in that time to find someone. When I learned I had sleep apnea, and that the treatment was to wear some god awful mask attached to some whirring machine, I figured I might as well abandon any hope of ever having another intimate relationship again. So i resisted and refused to believe cpap was the only answer and that somehow someone had made a mistake.

But all that only put off the inevitable, and I lost 2 months of time when i could have been getting good therapy.

I don't really have an answer for your question, but it has been one of my biggest concerns about cpap. As hard as it has been to find the right person, I don't really need this extra hurdle. But the reality is I couldn't go on the way I was. I was becmoing a total wreck, with no energy. The fact is it was never going to happen anyway with things the way they were. I decided getting myself healthy had to be the first step in any direction I took. Get some energy, get productive, get things in life working again, get involved, get work back on track, these things have to come first. My feeling is if I can do all that, my chances of finding that right person will definitely be greater than laying on the couch attempting to sleep life away in order to find some energy.

For now, I've been compliant for 2 months and I'm beginining to feel better, little by little. I figure I'll cross that relationship hurdle when the time comes. For now, cpap has to be the first step in my journey to get my life back.


ron

Both of you make excellent points...I've gotta get healthy first--that's the key.

And ya know, a year or so I had an impending blind-date at about the same time that a cardiologist told me that I needed to wear compression socks for swelling in my ankles. I told Mr. blind-date about it ahead of time, about how I was afraid that they weren't very sexy, and his response:

"Ask the doctor if they come in thigh-highs!"

*LOL* Life goes on..... I'm sure everything will be fine, and I'm actually looking forward to this more and more...

You sound like a prime candidate. I aggree that being overweight exacerbates the apnea, in my case it certainly did. I gained tons of weight due to the apnea, as the oinly way to get energy and stay awake was to just keep eating. Don't stress out over the little things...ie strap marks, you will feel so much better you won't even care about them. I'm not single, but have gone on various trips with friends where we shared the same room. Once I explained it all to them, they were okay with it all, it was no big deal. They liked it better then my snoring any day....

Welcome, Teacher, and you're right - this is THE best CPAP place on the web. Aside from the information available, I'm happy to associate with people who are so kind, encouraging and FUN!

If you can face a room full of 18-year olds every morning CPAP will be a piece of cake! Your Mom has added years to your life, I bet. I always loved to sleep before CPAP because I was SO damn tired! Now I look forward to going to bed at night because I feel truly rested in the morning.

Sure, there's an adjustment period, and you'll develop your own preferences for equipment and sleeping position and so forth. It's not unlikely you'll meet someone who also wears CPAP!

Rigby - who is scared of teenagers