How did you know something was wrong?

[PUFFERETTE]

My Family doctor recommended that I take a sleep test after years of trying to control my blood pressure with medications. I am 5'2" and 115 pounds. I have plenty of exercise and am actually in pretty good shape for a 61 year old. There was absolutely no explainable reason for me to have a blood pressure of 186/104. So I had the home sleep test and found out that I had mild obstructive sleep apnea. After less than two months on CPAP my blood pressure dropped to 134/78 and is still dropping. Occasionally, it will go higher, but a good night on CPAP and the blood pressure drops. So, I'm happy. It works and I am just waiting for the day when I can go off the blood pressure medication.

[nanwilson]

I am a widow so didn't have the bed partner to tell me I stopped breathing or even snored.......but...
Went camping with my daughter and granddaughter, me in my motorhome and the girls in their tent. The first night out we ended up having a downpour, it was so bad the girls tent was collasping from the water, they got up and ran into the motorhome with me. They lasted only a couple of hours as they both complained I snored so loudly that putting up with the downpour was better than listenening to me Fortunately, one of our friends that has osa was with us and when he heard the story the girls were telling, he immediately told them that I have sleep apnea. Sure enough went and got tested........and that's why I'm here with the rest of the hoseheads .

[Drowsy Dancer]

I fell asleep at a stoplight. I suppose that falls under the category of "sleepy during the day."

[dragonflybeach]

I'm a military spouse and after 8 moves in 12 years, my new doc just blurts it out at my first appointment "are you sleepy during the day and do you snore?" Uh.....ya, doesn't everybody? Been this way since I was pregnant with the first kid. He looks at my most recent labs and immediately sends me for a sleep study. He must have been the first doc to flip through my record and see the running theme....complains of being tired....adjust thyroid meds again.

[Kody]

Just felt WAY too burned out during the day. Not "sleepy", but more of an exhausted no energy feeling, dragging feeling all day everyday. My Doctor actually has Sleep Apnea so he picked up on the symptoms right away during a routine physical.

[Soreheed]

Morning headaches for years and no-one figured out what the problem was. I would wake about 3 days a week at 3 or 4am with awful headaches and there was no way I could sleep.
Having had sinus problems and migraines previously 'diagnosed' it was explained away as that by the doctor.
I refused to take the pills that two different doctors proscribed. They were Elavil, some sort of anti-depressant.
So I just eventually blundered on the possibility of this being OSA. Better late than never.

[Lizistired]

Feeling like crap and brain-dead all the time. Didn't care about anything. Everything seemed like work, not pleasure.

But the turning point was thinking wierd stuff in the morning. Trying to figure out impossible tasks that you would never try to do anyway. I explained it to my doc as trying to peel a doorknob, or trying to put a hinge on a tree limb.

I think I was dreaming but in some state of awake. I would wake up, or drift through different sleep stages, angry and everything unresolved in my life presented itself. That's how I started my day. I was angry, first thing in the morning, and felt like crap all day.

[azpilgrims]

I had not been to a Doctor for several years, was complaining to my Wife for years my muscles were tight in the neck and shoulders, fatigued, and I thought it was all stress related from work. My Doctor did a full check up with lab work and my labs came back that my blood was critically thick, hemoglobin was 22.7 and it should have been between 13 to 18 on the scale. Have had to have multiple units of blood removed to thin it out over the last 3-4 months. They diagnosed me with Secondary Polycythemia, they tested my heart, lungs, kidneys, etc. and all were fine. My Doctor ordered an oximetry test at home and they found I was very hypoxic, oxygen dipped as low as 63%. They then ordered a sleep study and found out I have sleep apnea. Been on the machine for 3 weeks now, Doctor feels with normal oxygen levels from the APAP Therapy over time will get my blood back to normal.

[Slartybartfast]

None of the above.

Six bouts of bronchitis in 9 months, each of which was knocked down by Azithromycin within 24 hours (therefore it was bacterial). Knew I was a loud snorer, but I come from a family of loud snorers. Even the dog and cat snore. Was then a newlywed and RN-wife said she thought I had sleep apnea, but I kept putting off getting tested. Then, while waking up from minor surgery, I heard anesthesiologist (who was a total knockout, and therefore had my full respect and attention) dictating her notes, said the phrase "apneic breathing." I roused myself enough to mumble something about sleep apnea and she said, "Yes, I think you should talk to your doctor about doing a sleep study."

A week later I went to see a pulmonologist, had the study that night, got a call the next day at noon to come by and see him. He said it was life-threatening. Walked out of his office with a loaner. Slept like the dead, woke feeling indescribably better. Haven't been sick in 18 months. And realized the repetitive dreams I had been having about suffocating/drowning/ being buried alive were my body telling me something was wrong.

The wife is still sore that it took a surgery under the care of a gorgeous anesthesiologist to convince me to have a sleep study.

[Mary Z]

I could not stay awake. At first it started with 4-5 hour afternoon naps where I was dead to the world. Nothing would wake me. Then I started falling asleep on my feet right after I got up and would have to go back to bed (after already sleeping 12-13 hours). I couldn't drive, fell asleep in my therapists office, did drive when I shouldn't have (Red Bull with 5 Hour Energy at the same time would give me 30 minutes). It's God's blessing for me that I never killed anyone or even had an accident. My Internal Medicine Doc sent me for a sleep study which only showed an AHI of 5, barely qualifying for CPAP. The sleep doc gave me two options- try CPAP, or do nothing. The sleepiness was so bad I was totally miserable and non functional. I jumped on the chance for a CPAP machine. I have my life back.
That's how I knew something was very wrong. As an aside my OSA has gotten much worse with a months average AHI of 30. I'm on some heavy meds that can't be changed. Going to give ASV a try. It worked in the lab. With all of this after numerous tests I never had an O2 sat under 95%.

[MJKelleher]

Last summer I told my primary doctor that I was always tired - so much that by the end of the week I was exhausted, would spend the weekend sleeping 12 hour nights plus a nap or two, just to be functional by Monday. Apathetic, depressed, blah. He asked a few questions (nope, I've never been able to drive long distances without getting sleepy; yeah, sometimes I doze off at my desk or in front of the tv), and suggested a sleep study. With no insurance I couldn't do it then, but after six months it had gotten worse, and I bit the bullet to get it done, with some help from the bank of Mom. Came up with 81 incidents/hour, blood ox around 76%. Yeah, got apnea.

Started the CPAP just 10 days ago. Still getting used to the nasal pillows and the whole system. I haven't seen a lot of change, but reading about the common issues has been good, I can have patience for good improvement.

[Lizistired]

Slarty, you're funny!

I just wish I could pinpoint when it started. How long ago. I worked 8, 12, ?? shifts for years so of course I was tired. I remember sleeping while driving on I5, waking up and wondering if I had passed my exit. Kept functioning though. Driven. As dangerous as that is, the difference is when you don't function anymore.

[Kiralynx]

I was tired all the time because I woke up at least twice a night with severe hip pain, and had to take anti-inflammatories.

I'd get up, go hit the necessary, take the pills, crawl back into bed, and wait for the pain to go away enough for me to go back to sleep.

After my cancer surgery, not only was my hip pain worse, the gut pain from the incision hadn't gone away after four months. They sent me to a pain management specialist. Now, it turned out that the gut pain was gut spasms caused by the lactose in the pain medicine prescribed after the surgery.

But the hip pain which I mentioned... that got me a sleep study.

Turned out my O2 was going down significantly... just about the time the hip pain woke me up. Doc said significant numbers of her patients with chronic pain had the pain go away when their apnea was successfully treated...

[Lizistired]

Now, it turned out that the gut pain was gut spasms caused by the lactose in the pain medicine prescribed after the surgery.
Wow, really, it was in the drug? I've been reading about Prozac and other drugs that are mostly Fluoride and the side effects. Unbelievable.

Turned out my O2 was going down significantly... just about the time the hip pain woke me up. Doc said significant numbers of her patients with chronic pain had the pain go away when their apnea was successfully treated...

So did the pain subside after xpap?

[Slartybartfast]

Slarty, you're funny!

I just wish I could pinpoint when it started. How long ago. I worked 8, 12, ?? shifts for years so of course I was tired. I remember sleeping while driving on I5, waking up and wondering if I had passed my exit. Kept functioning though. Driven. As dangerous as that is, the difference is when you don't function anymore.

That's the odd thing. I think the apnea affects different people differently. I wasn't drowsy during the day, though my untreated AHI was 73 and change. Just weeks before I went in for my surgery and learned I had severe OSA, I drove my old 'Yota pickup with half a ton of tools in it from southern California to Seattle in 19 hours stopping only for gas, McDonald's iced tea, and to relieve myself of the effects of the latter. Perhaps I was kept awake trying my best to keep the swaying truck between the dotted lines. Had no problem staying awake that long and thoroughly romanced the wife when I got there. She's still talking about that night.