Well....can't get much more boring than that report can we?
Do you take any medications besides the gabapentin? Even OTC? If so have you careful researched all the possible side effects?
Are you aware that fatigue is a common side effect along with drowsiness (that's probably how come it helps you sleep) associated with gabapentin?
It's obvious that the OSA is well treated and you mention seeing
GreenSleeper wrote:However, the only thing it really helped was daytime sleepiness. Also no more old apnea symptoms like night restroom breaks or sore throat in the morning.
so there are those symptoms that have been eliminated. Your cpap therapy is working...it just isn't working like you hoped it would work.
You know not every problem or ailment that we have is related to OSA. There are other things that cause the same sort of symptoms that OSA seems to have. If what we have going on isn't related to OSA then effective cpap therapy doesn't stand much chance of helping reduce symptoms that are unrelated to OSA because the machine's main job is sleep apnea prevention.
We like to put every thing wrong with us in the OSA basket and expect with good reports that we shouldn't have any of those symptoms we have put in the OSA basket but the cold hard truth is that not all of what ails us is related to OSA.
I think that this probably explains why so many people give up on cpap therapy....unrealistic expectations.
When cpap therapy doesn't rid us of all that bugs us "it just isn't working so why do it" mentality takes over. It must not be working because other people say they feel like a million bucks.."why can't I".."it must not be working".
Maybe the headaches aren't related to apnea events. I still have some bad headaches but they come from my cervical spine..muscle tension type of headaches most often when I sleep with my neck in a bind.
Maybe your headaches aren't related to OSA.
There's a pretty standard speech that we give to people who come here and say they just aren't feeling the "miracle" that they have read about or desire.
Here's my version of that speech.
Your OSA seems to be well controlled on paper. The reports don't scream out anything that points to something needing fixing. So you look good on paper but don't feel as good as you think the reports say you should.
Sometimes there is a lot of truth to "give it time"...for some people improvements are very gradual and not nearly as remarkable as other lucky people have.
So you have seen some improvements but not enough.
You still have to give it time...we don't have much choice about it and maybe that is all that is needed but while you are giving it time (like you have a choice, which you don't because you must use the machine) you might as well make use of that time to see if there is something else going on that is affecting how you feel that is simply unrelated to cpap therapy and the machine doesn't do such a great job of fixing stuff that is unrelated to cpap therapy. That's just a cold hard fact of life.
So what to do? Well while you are giving it time you can take that time to take a hard look at other things that might produce the same symptoms we like to blame on OSA. The list is long.
First isolate what your unwanted symptoms are.
Then if you take any medications at all...research them thoroughly multiple sources as to any possible side effects that might account for the unwanted symptoms.
Most SSRI meds for anxiety or depression have a nasty little side effects that lasts during the day that mimic OSA symptoms.
Some blood pressure meds do the same thing.
In fact if one looks closely...a lot of meds have side effects that mess with how we might feel during the day or mess with the quality of our sleep at night.
So start with meds...detective work...see if any of them could possibly be a factor...may not totally to blame but maybe a factor.
Then start with sleep quality detective work...Short hours of sleep. Fragmented sleep. Insomnia, etc
Then consider general comfort..bed comfort..mask comfort..leaks, etc.
General health issues...aches and pains.. other health problems like diabetes or thyroid? Fibromyalgia? Depression?
Talk to your doctor..had the routine physical lab test recently for the usual like thyroid? The unusual like hormones of vitamin D?
I think you get the idea here. I wish that a near perfect report like yours above guaranteed the miracle but unfortunately it simply doesn't. Now it may just take time but since we never know how much time...make use of the time and do some detective work to see if something else may be also involved that the machine can't fix.
There is just so much more to feeling better than the AHI numbers. Getting good numbers is really the easy part. The hard part is figuring out what might be going on that is unrelated to OSA itself.
I may have to RISE but I refuse to SHINE.
