Have been using my Resmed Airsense 10 Autoset on APAP 8.0-20.0 for about 4 months now since my diagnosis of Sleep Apnea with an ahi of 102. Towards end of first month I started to get full nights sleep with decent numbers according to the basic interface on my machine. I believe I was still having bad leak rate although it was enough for the green smiley face. Doctor set me up for a 2 month appointment after the 1st month because I was on track.
Next two months, I fell off the horse for a lack of better words. Many stressful things happened in that amount of time along with a lot of traveling and not sleeping in my own bed, I basically reverted to prior to CPAP usage. The nights I did get the mask on, I would usually only get an hour or so in before taking mask off in my sleep and finding it across the room the next morning. Got a few nights at 4 hours of sleep, but only a few. Other nights I would fall asleep waiting for mask to dry from sanitizing. The first month I was sitting with mask on during the day while watching tv or reading, I think this helped me get to the point of being able to sleep longer nights, I basically quit doing this after that first month. So of course, the doctor grilled me at the follow up for not using my machine enough, and although I had what I would consider a pretty bad couple of months in that time span, I know that I could have done a lot of things differently and could have made a much better effort to troubleshoot problems I was having, I deserved to be grilled by the doc. I left that appointment with a determination and better mindset that I was going to do everything in my power to keep up my end and use the machine and try to troubleshoot any issues I was having. Also wanted to educate myself more on CPAP therapy, so I started doing research and diving into YouTube videos from Lanky and Nick at Sleep HQ.
This brings us to the previous month up until today. Maybe a day after that visit, and I catch the flu, probably worse I have ever been sick, even worse than when I had COVID. Couldn’t breathe well with my machine, use an F30 full face hybrid, but basically normally I breathe through nose and mouth. My nose was of no use to me during this time, was either completely stopped up or having to blow it every 2 minutes. The pressure would shoot up almost immediately to the point it was too much for me to try and fall asleep with. Other nights I just had too many coughing fits and the air would tickle my throat even more. Finally get better over a week later and BAM! Catch a cold after couple of days of filling better. Same deal, throat and nose interferences kept me from getting my machine time in. Finally get better after that with less than a week til my next doctors visit. Start using the machine during the day while awake to get my self readjusted to the mask, and would get about 2 to 3 hours of sleep a night before taking mask off in my sleep unknowingly. Started transferring data to Sleep HQ so I could look at data and ask advice from a Facebook group I’m in. Noticed leak rates were high starting at around 30L, so I started working on that. I have now gotten to under 5L for two days in a row. Had Dr visit yesterday. Seemed understanding of my sickness(lots of sickness local to me for the past month or so, heard multiple people call and cancel appointment while waiting for visit). Dr just stated to keep on track with how I had been doing for the past week and really stressed getting usage up, understandably of course. Only thing that bothered me was I mentioned that after looking at data that I noticed my low end pressure never really drops below 15, but they said they would leave my pressure range where it was for now which is 8.0-20.0.
Last night I got the most sleep I’ve had with my machine in ages, almost accumulative of 7 hours over 3 separate sleeps. I describe it in better detail after my Sleep HQ link. Over this past week, I have been trying to work on all aspects of my therapy and issues with it. I have changed routine such as sanitizing mask earlier and putting on my mask before I even get in bed so that there’s no excuse for me to not fall asleep with it on. Trying taping my mask on my cheeks in hopes that it will wake me up when I pull my mask off, I have to be careful to put enough tape on my cheeks, noticed last night that I didn’t have enough tape contacting my face and it didn’t wake me when I pulled it off. Just trying to do this right and with the right attitude and mindset going forward, I know that this is crucial to my well being and am trying to take it as serious as I possibly can. Onto the data and last nights sleep. Props to you if you read all of that. I know I’m not the best at simplifying things so it’s just easier for me to type it out like I did.
https://sleephq.com/public/86503440-472 ... 283b4ffc51
Wanted to share my chart from last night to get some feedback from anyone who would like to take a look. There’s three separate spreads of data there, but all of them are actual sleep.
-The first portion, I fell asleep in my recliner for about 2 hours. Legs were out laying flat on the extension but I didn’t recline the back rest, so I was just very slightly leaning backward, but still upright/forward enough that when I woke up my head was tilted forward towards my chest. I noticed my pressure during this sleep really stays around 15 to high 17’s on the spikes upward.
-The other 2 portions of data were sleep in bed. I sleep on my back, with 2 pillows for my head and one in front of the two for a slight wedge effect, so my head and chest is slightly elevated from the rest of my body, but not by a large amount. Around 2 hours of sleep the first time, don’t know if I removed mask in sleep unknowingly or just not awake enough to notice, second time slept till wife woke me up, about 2.5 hours of sleep. Noticed somewhere around half way through both times my pressure jumps up to 20 and stays near that for rest of sleep in both cases. Could this be due to different angles I was sleeping at?
Overall I feel like I am pretty well rested. I usually wake up once a night anyways so that doesn’t bother me so much although I would love to get to the point of a continuous nights sleep. My goals as of right now is to continue to get a better understanding of my sleep data so that I can better communicate to the doctor the issues I’m having with my therapy and to try to get back to getting longer nights sleep with the mask staying on. Quality of sleep in terms of how I feel seems not to be an issue for me as of yet, even 4 hours of sleep with the mask makes me feel like a million bucks compared to without the machine. But I would love to get away from the 2 to 3 hour short bursts of sleep.
I apologize if these questions are super basic, I am new to looking at the charts and trying to get a basic understanding of what I’m looking at. I have been working at getting a good mask seal and trying to solve leak issues and I seem to be heading in the right direction there. Thank you everyone!
Using a Resmed Airsense 10 Autoset set to Autopap 8.0-20.0 using a Resmed F30 mask.
That’s hilarious! That should have came to mind when writing that 
