Tips for staying asleep, or should I just give it more time?

Its been almost two weeks now since I started xpap therapy. My doc rx'd Ambien to help with sleeping, and it really helped the first few nights. The first week I consistently slept at least six hours with the mask. However, during week #2 the Ambien seemed to stop working....I kept waking up in the middle of the night.....so I decided to try a couple of nights without taking it. I can fall asleep ok without it, but I can't seem to stay asleep. I go to sleep about 11:30pm and wake up from 2am to 4am. Then I sleep until 7am. This has happened the last several nights....I'm not sure what to do. It seems like I get hyper-aware of my heart rate and breathing, and can't relax again, at least for an hour (or more)..... I don't *think* the mask is bothering me- I can breathe ok through it, and I don't *think* there are any leaks. (Um....just got the M Series Pro, haven't yet gotten the card reader and software ) Is this something that will go away on it's own? Maybe just a normal occurrence when starting cpap therapy? Any suggestions? I don't drink coffee or caffeinated drinks....I exercise about 45 minutes 5 days a week.....any help is appreciated.

ask your doctor for Ambien CR. It's time released. It works much better. Ambien is more for those who have a difficulties falling asleep.

Victoria, I had the same problem. I started CPAP therapy the beginning of November. For the first two months I would wake up around 3 AM every night. I would take off the mask, get out of bed and take a break before going back to bed with the mask and sleeping the rest of the night. Then I started sleeping all the way through the night on occasion. In late January I received new headgear which I tightened a bit and now I am sleeping through the night every night. You may just need to give it some time. I don't know if the new headgear helped or if it was just a coincidence.
Good Luck

Victoria wrote:Is this something that will go away on it's own? Maybe just a normal occurrence when starting cpap therapy?

Yes, it is not uncommon - I woke up a couple hours each night for 2 weeks.

Second, Ambien after a while does become less effective, and after 7 days straight of it the other issue you'd have would be 'rebound insomnia' for a day or two once you stopped taking it. So not terribly surprising you woke up in the middle of the night after you took it for over a week since that's almost guaranteed, and the fact you got to sleep originally means (along with the no caffeine and exercise) you probably have pretty good 'sleep discipline' - unrelated to OSA.

I wouldn't mess with sleep meds in a big way yet. It sounds like you're getting used to things, albeit slower than you'd like

You're doing fine so far! Give it a good 6-8 weeks for your body to adjust to this new way of sleeping. When you wake up during the night you can get out of bed and read or walk around a bit(if that helps) or you can hit your ramp button again(if that helps). More time to become accustomed to all of this is probably all you need.

Brenda

I was having the same problem of waking up for no reason. After over a month of this I finally woke up one night looked at my machine and noticed that it was in the process of shutting down and restarting on it's own. Well that will wake you out of a sound sleep. I was given a remanufactured machine and I am having similar problems again. Check your machine when you wake up and see what it is doing.
The problems I had are not and have not shown up on the card or screen. All the manufacturer was thinking is that I got water into the blower which I didn't.

Check your mahine before you think it's you.