Occupation and has cpap helped or hurt your career?

Ted_S · Post by **Ted_S** » Sun Sep 18, 2005 5:11 pm

I'm a forensic psychologist doing court ordered evaluations... mostly various competency evals or sanity at the time of the alleged offense. It requires a great deal of record review and report writing which were harder pre-cpap. Also, bad idea to be drowsy when interviewing some of the potentially violent and mentally ill individuals I am evaluating. Life is already better and this isn't quite a month on the pap. It is an annoying addition to my life which I wouldn't choose to do without. Strange...

Ted

Oh 2 breathe · Post by **Oh 2 breathe** » Sun Sep 18, 2005 5:39 pm

I work as a counsellor in a community mental health clinic. My work involves long periods of sitting face to face with people who are dealing with mental health issues. Before I was diagnosed I thought I was having major burnout symptoms, which can happen in my field. I used to be a very high energy person but I thought, well, this is what it's like to be over 40 and 14 years into my career, and I just have to get used to being tired all the time. My worst fear was to fall asleep on a client in the middle of a counselling session. That definitely would not be good for someone with low self-esteem! Luckily this never happened, but I came close a few times and used to fidget my feet in sessions to stay awake. I learned to never schedule three depressed people in a row right after lunch! It took a long time to get the sleep apnea diagnosis because I had another medical problem at the same time. Luckily both issues are highly treatable. After more than a year of fuzzy-headedness and chronic fatigue I have been using CPAP therapy for a month now and I swear I have regained about 20 points on my IQ. Although I am still trying out a number of masks to get the right fit (I have a very small face which makes it difficult to find something to fit me) I am starting to feel normal again. I feel so lucky to have figured the sleep apnea problems before losing my career, my health, maybe even my life. One side benefit for my clients is that I am now very aware and informed about sleep disorders. I actually diagnosed the problem myself after doing research on the internet, and then told my doctor who sent me to the sleep lab for official confirmation. I think many doctors are not well informed about sleep apnea, and that it can easily be misdiagnosed as burn-out, stress, other illnesses or depression, then handled with the wrong treatment. I now routinely ask my clients about their sleep patterns and encourage them to get checked by a sleep lab if they are having problems. So hopefully others will benefit from this life experience.

Im2tired · Post by **Im2tired** » Sun Sep 18, 2005 6:49 pm

DSM - my Dad started working at IBM the year I was born - 1957. He worked more with selling (procurement) than the computers themself but I thought it was ironic that I also ended up with a technology job. He worked there for 37 years and then took the early retirement. They did pay the medical expenses for my Mom's pregnancy with me even though I was a pre-existing condition!

Sleepless on LI · Post by **Sleepless on LI** » Sun Sep 18, 2005 6:53 pm

im2Tired,

We were born the same year, '57. Also, I remember when everybody worked for IBM and they made typewriters and not computers. Are we old or what? Nah, just getting there...but feeling better every day .

dsm · Post by **dsm** » Sun Sep 18, 2005 7:23 pm

Im2tired wrote:DSM - my Dad started working at IBM the year I was born - 1957. He worked more with selling (procurement) than the computers themself but I thought it was ironic that I also ended up with a technology job. He worked there for 37 years and then took the early retirement. They did pay the medical expenses for my Mom's pregnancy with me even though I was a pre-existing condition!

A funny story re IBM. A few years back while still with I was introduced to a woman I was to work with whose name was very familiar to me as someone I knew in the engineering side of the company. It was a quite unique name.

I said to her I am sure I used to work with your dad at IBM. She said, "no can't be he never worked for them". Then after a short pause she said, my granddad did (ouch!)

DSM

unclebob · Post by **unclebob** » Sun Sep 18, 2005 7:25 pm

Hi Oh 2 breathe,

Really enjoyed your post. Kind of surprised this was your first one. Please let us know how you make out with the mask. There was another poster here who had a similar problem with a small face and Restedgal gave some somewhat unorthodox advice by suggesting a large Active nasal but using it as a full face mask.

All kinds of advice on this forum which may be of help so stay on board and you will for sure help others.

Bob F

dsm · Post by **dsm** » Sun Sep 18, 2005 8:21 pm

Oh 2 breathe wrote:

<snip>
I now routinely ask my clients about their sleep patterns and encourage them to get checked by a sleep lab if they are having problems. So hopefully others will benefit from this life experience.
<snip>

Must confess I am finding myself look at particular people in work situations & wondering if they, have or will sometime 'acquire' SA or OSA.

There are some fairly identifiable characteristics

Cheers

DSM

tlc95066 · Post by **tlc95066** » Mon Sep 19, 2005 11:46 am

I am an HR consultant and have worked in the HR field for approximate 17 years. My husband has really noticed a difference in my work (we work together for our own consulting company). Since i started on APAP my reasoning and thinking skills have definatley improved. I no longer fall asleep in afternoon meetings either... a real problem if you are at a client site
Best,
Teri

WAFlowers · Post by **WAFlowers** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 8:15 am

Boomer wrote:I have also recently been selected to serve on the Grand Jury in the county where I live, and 1 entire day was spent listening to the county attorney reading Arizona statutes and I had no problem staying awake!

WOW! If that doesn't put you to sleep, nothing will.

Too early to say if the xPAP treatment will help my career, but it is sure helping my productivity and creativity. So given time it should help my career.

I was (past tense) VP of Research (Software) at a company that makes inspection equipment for the glass container (bottles and jars) and metal and plastic closures industries. Just before I began treatment this summer I was forced to take a demotion which really hurt (I discussed this in another thread in July or August of this year, but I can't seem to find it at the moment). My productivity had declined to pretty much zero, so I was lucky I wasn't just fired but as the 3rd largest shareholder I guess they couldn't afford to buy me out.

My biggest immediate problem is that I don't have enough time to work on all the ideas I have. Quite the pleasant change from the 2 years of so before I began treatment when my only good ideas was to take an afternoon nap! However I've lost so much credibility in my company that I can get no support or assistance on my projects. Anything I do is on my own. This is both bad and good though, as any successes (and they are starting to occur) are very obviously the result of my work an no one elses.

derek · Post by **derek** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 10:25 am

Grabraham (Shawn),
Fascinating. A little off-topic, but as an expert can you tell us how much of a risk we run by leaving the Microsoft SQL Desktop Server running with properly patched XP SP2, the firewall installed, etc, etc. Some folk are advocating turning off the SQL server while Encore Pro is not being used,

There is a particular issue that I will PM you about, as I don't want to publicize it here...

Derek

Sleepless on LI · Post by **Sleepless on LI** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 10:40 am

Derek or Grab:

That last post by Derek has me wondering now. Lately, I notice that down by my clock at the bottom right of my desktop, there is a new icon that stays showing. When I put my arrow over it, is says, "Running - \\MSSQL Server." When I first installed Encore Pro, it didn't always show (never noticed it before a week or so ago). Should that be exited from when it appears? If I do, will it automatically start up again when I click on Encore Pro? Don't want to do anything until I know that's safe to do because (knocking wood) so far, I haven't had any problems with the software or the card reader and I don't want to tempt fate.

Thanks.

derek · Post by **derek** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 11:13 am

Lori,
That icon should be there - you can tusn the SQL Server on and off through it. The default is to have the server start automatically when you turn your macihine on - my question to Grab is whether this is a good idea, I leave it running all the time - I'm terminally lazy

Sleepless on LI · Post by **Sleepless on LI** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 12:05 pm

Derek,
Thaks. I put mine on pause after reading your post to Grab. It is set to turn on when my OS goes on, but if it is a secuirty risk, I didn't want to have it running all the time. I guess I'll just keep it on pause until I use Encore Pro. Thanks.

rested gal · Post by **rested gal** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 1:39 pm

I'll be interested in Shawn's answer too. For no particular reason other than I just don't like to have things running when not needed, I don't have the MSSQL server automatically start up. I turn it on and off via the icon, using it only when I do my Encore Pro download. And I usually do that before I ever connect to the internet (good old dialup... lol )

Since I save my Encore Pro files as PDF files, I don't have to turn the MSSQL back on, if I want to go back and look at a file again.

May not be necessary to leave it off. It's just the habit I got into early on with Encore. Annoyed me that I even have to have MSSQL on at all, at any time. lol

I sure do like Silverlining and the simple download cable for the 420E.

Wulfman · Post by **Wulfman** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 2:09 pm

I've been starting these programs up with separate icons since day one and when I'm done with my download and saving my .pdf and .jpg files in the morning, I close the programs and re-boot my computer before ever getting on the Internet in the morning. I've been doing this for two reasons. One is that I don't like any unnecessary programs running when they don't have to be and two is that I'm VERY security conscious (part of my job/profession).
I knew that there had been a number of patches that Microsoft has released, so I did a search on "SQL server vulnerabilities" and came up with many results. (Go ahead, try it. Be sure to use the " " quote marks, too.)

I did find one of particular interest:
http://www.theiia.org/itaudit/index.cfm ... m&fid=5621

The title is "Top 20 Internet Security Vulnerabilities You Can Live Without"
This was published in June of this year
SQL Server is number 4 on the list.

Do whatever you like, but I don't run anti-virus softwar or firewalls on my computers and have NEVER (knock on wood) had an infection. I'm just VERY careful!!!

Best wishes,

Den

Occupation and has cpap helped or hurt your career?

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