Just diagnosed

[Dustin59513]

I was just diagnosed with sleep apnea. I knew I had it but I wasn't prepared for how bad. By ahi was 130 and my oxygen levels went down to 68%. With an average episode lasting 18 secs that leaves me not breathing for 39mins every hour! I am legitimately afraid to fall asleep now. I was wondering what positive changes do I gave to look forward to when I finally get my machine next week?

[chillAtGVC]

I was in denial for a long time too. Sure enough, I have sleep apnea. The changes and when the happen vary a lot from person to person. I had an overnight (or over two nights) dramatic improvement in daytime energy and mental clarity and an unexpected reduction in anxiety and depression. I also took to sleeping in a mask like a fish to water. Which to say that I was one of the lucky ones. I think a positive attitude to wearing the mask helps. Sure, it is not the most excellent thing in the world but you are asleep most of the time and feel worlds better the next day when the therapy works.

After the first few days, I got used to feeling OK rather than like something scraped out of a casket with a putty knife. The following few weeks were not so great as I got used to the therapy and started comparing OK to not so OK rather than horrific to horrific. I am still working out the ideal settings.

Get a data capable machine and take charge of your own progress. No one is more interested in it than you!

[Mudrock63]

I was just diagnosed with sleep apnea. I knew I had it but I wasn't prepared for how bad. By ahi was 130 and my oxygen levels went down to 68%. With an average episode lasting 18 secs that leaves me not breathing for 39mins every hour! I am legitimately afraid to fall asleep now. I was wondering what positive changes do I gave to look forward to when I finally get my machine next week?

You didn't say how you feel, as to whether you feel fatigued now or not. I can tell you a couple of things based on my experience alone. I'm 52, and for me sleep apnea was debilitating. I looked like an extra on Walking Dead most days of the week, and spent most of my weekends getting "caught up" on sleep. In reality, I never got caught up. Went through every test imaginable. All of my numbers were great. So why was I so exhausted? Because I had similar sleep apnea to you with pretty scary O2 desats overnight.

What I believe is that while you are young, your body can somewhat compensate for the condition. But as you get older you end up in a downward spiral. I am telling you I was miserably tired all the time, no matter how much I slept, how much caffeine I ingested, how many B vitamins, energy drinks, etc. Nothing helped me, until CPAP/APAP therapy.

I was finally diagnosed in September, did the sleep studies in October, and received the machine in late October. The initial prescribed settings were FAR from what I really needed. But I found some assistance here in this forum and finally got my AHI down consistently below 2.0, and mostly below 1.5. It has made a world of difference, and I feel 15 years younger.

But, it was a process. I did have several aha moments......after the titration study, and after tweaking my settings several times and getting better results. But those moments faded until I finally, in late February and after much tweaking, started achieving optimal results. So now the key to me feeling better is consistently good therapy, which means using the machine every time I sleep, even if it is to close my eyes for 10 minutes, at these optimal settings. The process was reading everything I possibly could about the condition here, and interacting with some experienced folks to help me understand the condition, and to get my settings at the optimal range for me. You may get lucky and have the sleep doctor hit it out of the park on his first prescribed settings. Or, you will be like most........taking control of your treatment and getting optimal results faster by interacting here. I recommend the latter.

If I had to do it over again, I wish to God I had done this at 39 instead of 52. So here's your chance. Go for it.

[Holden4th]

Holy Crap ....130!!!

No wonder you felt bad.

Regardless of what happens when you get your machine and mask (don't forget that) next week just make sure you persevere and also seek the help and encouragement of the wonderful people on this forum who have the same issue as you.

My initial experience was not great but I've stuck to it and now it's starting to work for me.

Best wishes

[Julie]

Hi, please remember this, because it often confuses newbies... the severity of your diagnosis, the high number, is not related to the pressure setting(s) of your treatment, C- or Apap. In other words, someone like yourself with a high number of apneas on testing may only need a relatively low setting on the machine to open their individual airway (which is all that Cpap does), and someone with only a diagnosis of e.g. 20 events/hr. may need a much higher one to keep their airway open... it's as much about anatomy as anything, so don't be too concerned if your MD prescribes what seems like a lowish 'low' setting (the high one isn't as important).

[Dustin59513]

The reason I even got treatment was because my lack of sleep was affecting my grades in college. Electrical engineering isnt easy to begin with, I really started falling behind. I am falling asleep in classes and am just regurally unable to focus. When it comes to testing I have a hard time remembering things that I should already know and cant pull concepts together under the time restraints.
My prescription is for the autolevel bipap at 25. They wanted to do 28 to get rid of all the snoring but I am in college and wouldn't be able to afford much less carry around a hospital grade machine.