Not Breathing....

Hello all,

Hope everyone is well.

I'm a new forum user but not so new to CPAP. I was diagnosed with moderate OSA back in 2011. My pressure is 10. Oxygen level was in 70's during sleep test and 96-100 when awake.

I had been off my cpap machine for over a year because I got sick with anemia and chronic infections (not due to cpap). Somehow, during that time I had developed a paranoia towards my cpap and stopped using it.

Well, now I am battling an arrhythmia, pvc's and presyncope. I decided to get back to cpap because all my tell-tale signs are manifesting again; fatigue, sleep paralysis, disturbing dreams, sweating and short term memory loss. I suspect the heart rhythm problem is due to my non-compliance as well.

Last week I replaced all my parts (except the machine) and have started it back up with the same pressure. I don't have a card or reader for the machine and I don't know how to set that up, so I can't see my apneas per night. Sorry for the long background but now I am worried that my pressure may be too high/low because last night I woke up through the night feeling like my heart had stopped and I wasn't breathing. I know I WAS breathing but this was different from the snorting apneas I had before diagnosis. I know the cpap is doing something because my heart rate is much lower upon waking and I remember my dreams in vivid detail (even if I don't want too).

I have a doctors appointment coming up in September. I'm thinking about asking for another sleep test for pressure evaluation. I just want to know if this is normal for some to wake up feeling like you are no longer breathing (while on cpap)? Is this just something that happens in the beginning? Any advice is appreciated.

Post what kind of machine you are using, model and such. If you are using the pressure you were originally prescribed, then that is the minimum you should be using without any other data available. If you did not have this sort of reaction before, I should think it would be wise to contact that doctor's office and tell them that you started reusing your equipment and are having these specific reactions. They may get you in faster or at least get you on a cancellation list. May not get you a sleep study faster though.

SewTired wrote:Post what kind of machine you are using, model and such. If you are using the pressure you were originally prescribed, then that is the minimum you should be using without any other data available. If you did not have this sort of reaction before, I should think it would be wise to contact that doctor's office and tell them that you started reusing your equipment and are having these specific reactions. They may get you in faster or at least get you on a cancellation list. May not get you a sleep study faster though.

Thanks for the reply. I am using my original machine which is a Resmed Escape 2 with EPR. Mask is nasal and I do not use the ramp feature. My pressure is 10.

I think you are on the right track. I am on a window machine (win7) and I plugged in the reader ($8) windows did it thing and said drivers installed. I write protected the memory card and plugged it into the only slot in the reader that it would fit. started sleephead (which I installed with one click and zero problems) if found the card and I clicked read it. done all the data and graphs were there to see.
Installing stuff like this has gotten very easy, finally.

My guess is that the pressure is on the low side for what you need, but what do I know without liking at the plots
It would help if you edited your profile and put the equipment info in there so we know how old and what model you have

I WAS going to suggest you download SleepyHead free from here to see your results, but the Escape doesn't give any data (beyond what you see on the screen), so since you're now in a different place physically from when you had the orig. study, it's probably a good idea to be restested, something you normally could do at home if you had a useful machine, but though it's an auto, no data, no help. Does your insce. cover a new study now?

PoolQ wrote:I think you are on the right track. I am on a window machine (win7) and I plugged in the reader ($8) windows did it thing and said drivers installed. I write protected the memory card and plugged it into the only slot in the reader that it would fit. started sleephead (which I installed with one click and zero problems) if found the card and I clicked read it. done all the data and graphs were there to see.
Installing stuff like this has gotten very easy, finally.

My guess is that the pressure is on the low side for what you need, but what do I know without liking at the plots
It would help if you edited your profile and put the equipment info in there so we know how old and what model you have

It took me awhile but I updated my profile. Thanks for the tip. I was thinking the pressure may be too low which is actually discouraging considering I weigh 50 pounds lighter than first diagnosed. I am thinking setting up the reader would serve me too.

as Julie posted, your machine is not data capable , most insurance will cover a new machine every 3-5 years, check out what is covered. Basically Julie gives great advice! Without a new sleep study or a data capable machine you are throwing darts in the dark when you change pressure settings.

Julie wrote:the Escape doesn't give any data (beyond what you see on the screen),

It's amazing how fast the machines depreciate. I didn't want to spend more money though on a machine if this one works fine. I do remember in the beginning my doctor saying it could be monitored but by her... Now I wonder how true that was.

Julie wrote:so since you're now in a different place physically from when you had the orig. study, it's probably a good idea to be restested, something you normally could do at home if you had a useful machine, but though it's an auto, no data, no help. Does your insce. cover a new study now?

I will have to call my insurance but I don't see why they wouldn't cover the test, especially after diagnosis. They covered the two tests I had in 2011.

So do you know if this heart stop feeling is related to apnea or a different form of it? I remember my old apneas which still happen once in a while and they are the snorting-awake kind. I'm worried about this new one. Could it be central apnea? Can OSA change to something else? I don't want to get off the machine because I know I need it and I sick of medical staff chewing me out when they found out I was non-compliant.

PoolQ wrote:as Julie posted, your machine is not data capable , most insurance will cover a new machine every 3-5 years, check out what is covered. Basically Julie gives great advice! Without a new sleep study or a data capable machine you are throwing darts in the dark when you change pressure settings.

True about the darts in the wind. I was on the fence about the new sleep study but now I think I will ask for one. What happened last night really scared me and it wasn't just once. I didn't honestly realize the depths that untreated OSA can bring a person too. That's my fault because the education on it is there.

I didn't think about the insurance covering or partially covering a new machine. I'll check out their website for options. Thanks so much for the info.

Your symptoms could be anything or nothing and could be related to Cpap or anxiety, or the machine not working properly now, or your health having changed... speculation won't get you anywhere much and I suggest you be retested - if all you ever had was 'obstructive' apnea vs e.g. complex, central or related leg movement issues you might be able to do a home test and your insce. might cover one - ask them.

until you get through the study and hopefully a new machine, try propping yourself up to sleep. Before my machine I was trying to sleep vertically, yep a full 90 degrees so I could get 1-2 hours of sleep a night. I never want to go back to that ever again.

Julie wrote:Your symptoms could be anything or nothing and could be related to Cpap or anxiety, or the machine not working properly now, or your health having changed... speculation won't get you anywhere much and I suggest you be retested - if all you ever had was 'obstructive' apnea vs e.g. complex, central or related leg movement issues you might be able to do a home test and your insce. might cover one - ask them.

Thanks for the answer. I appreciate all the replies.

PoolQ wrote:until you get through the study and hopefully a new machine, try propping yourself up to sleep. Before my machine I was trying to sleep vertically, yep a full 90 degrees so I could get 1-2 hours of sleep a night. I never want to go back to that ever again.

Good idea. I'll try that tonight. Thanks.

As for this heart stopping thing, This is what I can tell you, then you decide:
1. I like what someone said "CPAP is an alien sitting on your face and blowing air up your nose while you are sleeping" what this means to me is that my brain has noting to compare these new feelings with and it makes the best guess as to what's going on. For me I have always been wrong ie thought I was congested when I was really feeling the pressure when I exhaled
2. I had reduced blood flow to my heart in December 2014 and I had no doubt that I had never felt anything like that before, but did not think it was a heart attack. Double bypass and two stents later.....
3. my wife had some interesting thing with her heart where by the time we got to the ER she was over 200bpm, they gave her something IV to stop her heart so it would reset. It looked like she had seen a real alien, stopping your heart gets a big reaction, right then.
4. Having a large enough apnea event to wake you up can cause your heart to race, which is exactly what it would do if it had stopped and restarted.

Could your heart have actually stopped, well yes. Would I bet money on it, no. I would bet it's your brain trying to make sense out of something new that is happening.
The good news is that CPAP should treat the apnea's and then your heat should stop feeling like that. By the way, from what I hear the new machines are so much better than the old ones and I love my Airsense 10 auto, but it is the only one I have used.

Have I diagnosed anything, NO, I am not a doctor. Your heat is very important and if you are concerned disregard everything I have said and talk with your doctor

PoolQ wrote:As for this heart stopping thing, This is what I can tell you, then you decide:
1. I like what someone said "CPAP is an alien sitting on your face and blowing air up your nose while you are sleeping" what this means to me is that my brain has noting to compare these new feelings with and it makes the best guess as to what's going on. For me I have always been wrong ie thought I was congested when I was really feeling the pressure when I exhaled
2. I had reduced blood flow to my heart in December 2014 and I had no doubt that I had never felt anything like that before, but did not think it was a heart attack. Double bypass and two stents later.....
3. my wife had some interesting thing with her heart where by the time we got to the ER she was over 200bpm, they gave her something IV to stop her heart so it would reset. It looked like she had seen a real alien, stopping your heart gets a big reaction, right then.
4. Having a large enough apnea event to wake you up can cause your heart to race, which is exactly what it would do if it had stopped and restarted.

Could your heart have actually stopped, well yes. Would I bet money on it, no. I would bet it's your brain trying to make sense out of something new that is happening.
The good news is that CPAP should treat the apnea's and then your heat should stop feeling like that. By the way, from what I hear the new machines are so much better than the old ones and I love my Airsense 10 auto, but it is the only one I have used.

Have I diagnosed anything, NO, I am not a doctor. Your heat is very important and if you are concerned disregard everything I have said and talk with your doctor

I appreciate all the info and I'm sorry to hear of you and your wife's medical issues. I think you bring up a good point, that if my heart had stopped (for a good length of time) my reaction would have been severe. I am under a cardiologists care (thank God) because both sides of my family have heart disease. I am still going to use my cpap and take your advice and the others to get a new study and discuss problems with my doctor. I've only been back on it a week so I probably need to give it more time as your advice stated. Thanks for all your help.