Cannot use CPAP-Insomnia. CPAP Alternative?

[alanhj13]

I previously had insomnia/anxiety caused by tinnitus. I have tried using my CPAP machine but cannot fall asleep with the mask on. After several days without sleep I stopped using the CPAP and still could not fall because insomnia caused by trying to use the CPAP. I have explained the insomnia to my Dr. and he has prescribe me sleeping pills. I tried the pills and did fall asleep for 2-3 hours but I end up taking my mask off. I have also tried 2 different full face masks. I really believe it is not the mask design that is causing the problem but rather the fact I am wearing a mask. Instead of the CPAP helping me it is bring back my insomnia. I really have little hope I will ever be able to use a CPAP.
Has anyone been successful with CPAP alternatives (if there really are any)? I have seen mouth guards advertised on the internet. Has anyone has success with this?
Thank you,
Alan

[ozij]

Allan,
If you you're looking for lots of non-cpap related information, you'll be better off browsing the varous forums of http://www.talkaboutsleep.com. You'll find far more people there who have had success with dental sleep medicine than you will here.

I'm sure many of us would like very much to help you get used to cpap, give you tips about learning to sleep with it, and how to use it comfortably, but you sound so convinced that insomnia is your major problem, that I won't even try.

O.

[kteague]

It may depend on if your sleep apnea is mild enough and if your issue is such that moving the jaw forward resolves it. Too many variables to know for sure. If you do go that route, please insist on being tested to be sure it is doing what it is supposed to do.

For what it's worth, insomnia is not uncommon with those of us with sleep disorders. For me I think I had learned to avoid sleep because it was going to be so miserable. Then it became a pattern. Can't say I've yet fully overcome it but have improved. Taking the mask off during sleep it also common. We feel something foreign and we remove it. That took a few months for me to quit, but I cost myself a lot of time by only sleeping a couple hours a night. Only way for it to not feel foreign is to wear it enough that it feels familiar. Ever had a crown on a tooth? For a while we're very aware of it, then one day you realize you aren't even noticing it any more.

You didn't say how long you've been trying or how many hours you've logged. It takes quite some time for some to adjust, especially when insomnia comes into play. When you are awake at night with insomnia, do you catch naps during the day? The only way for me to be able to sleep at a reasonable hour is to get up early and not nap. Few days of that and I WILL sleep.

Unfortunately, you are in a cycle that can take time and diligence to break out of. Untreated apnea with its repetitive surges of stress hormones contributes to the anxiety and insomnia. I want to encourage you to relentlessly pursue resolving your apnea in whatever way you find that works for you.

[DreamStalker]

Has anyone been successful with CPAP alternatives (if there really are any)? I have seen mouth guards advertised on the internet. Has anyone has success with this?
Thank you,
Alan

The only long-term successful alternative is premature heart failure.

You see .... the issue with OSA is that it causes you to stop breathing while you sleep (kind'a like being water boarded all night long every night). It makes your heart race causing it to enlarge over a period of time. It causes havoc on your hormones stressing out the body and inducing total-body inflamation which leads to cardiovascular disease and eventual heart failure or stroke. CPAP when used correctly, maintains an open airway and keeps you breathing while you sleep by using positive pressure to stent the throat open. Mouth guards don't do that.

CPAP is more about breathing than about eliminating snoring or allowing you to sleep. Sleep is just a fringe benefit of CPAP use, life is the main reason for using CPAP.

[Elbysmom2004]

I have had my CPAP for 2 weeks now. I was very frustrated at first. The first night I couldn't get used to the nasal pillows so I used the full face mask that the hospital gave me. The air felt too cold and turned the heat up on the humidifier. My nose started running. Then during the night I took a part of my mask off but not the whole thing and lost it. Got a new mask and the noise was bothering me so much that I called dr and he gave me sleeping pills. Well, I would wake up after a few hours. Rip the mask off and go back to sleep due to it leaking under the chin, wake in the morning to the machine running and the mask on the floor. Then while I was cleaning the mask the silicon ripped on me. Finally got it rigged up and tried to use it again. If I got it to stop leaking under the chin then it would leak around the eyes. FINALLY got the right mask and even though I don't like having to make sure there is water in the humidifier and all the other things that you have to do to care for it (it adds about 30 min at my bedtime routine and about the same in the morning) espcially since I have a dog that likes to chew EVERYTHING! I kept ripping the mask off in the first two weeks. I have put in a total of 31.5 hours of therapy and 52 hours of blower hours in the past two weeks with only 3 sessions recorded.

My dr asked me to promise him that I would do 30 min the first two nights and then increase it to 1 hour the next two and increase it 30min each night after for a month before I gave up on it and I promised him.

The past two nights were the first two nights that I woke up not in a sweaty panic, dreaming that I was drowning and actually realized I wasn't breathing and couldn't breath until I stood up. Then couldn't go back to sleep for about an hour because I would lay there praying I wouldn't die in my sleep. I would much rather have a mask on my face with air blowing in it then that any day.

Another thing that helped was the fact that my cousin is a police officer and in the past month they had a call because there was a bunch of flies on a window and they busted the door in to find a man that had been dead for several days. The next day a girl about 6 yrs old called 911 because her mommy wasn't breathing and the mommy died in her sleep. The little girl doesn't have a daddy and now she is without her mommy. Both reports came back and they died due to sudden death from sleep apnea.

That was a wake up call to me. I don't want my babies to find me dead in bed due to something that if I would have just worked a little harder at trying to get used to would be prevented.

Sorry this is long but I hope it helps in some way.

[fuzzy96]

the words anxiety and insomnia together jump out at me. the doc gave slleping pills what were they?

maybe try elvel i got it for insomnia years ago . it is an old antidepressant but helped my anxiety and made me sleepy enough to sleep. 1-1/2 hrs of sleep in a week will kill ya as fast as osa . explore other options before giving up cpap. maybe different mask arrange your bed different , different meds etc.

good luck

[Guest]

I too had insomnia. After working with my machine for several months, I learned to sleep with it quite comfortably. The issue for a lot of us is the our insomnia and anxiety around sleeping can be related to years of repeatedly almost dying every night all night. That is what sleep apnea is. We stop breathing and our bodies are charged with a huge amount of adrenaline and cortisol and other hormones with the intent to wake us up so we start breathing again. As the first person said, this might not be the place to get good info on insomnia when you have only tried your mask a few days. It might be better to get ideas on how to deal with the insomnia WITH the mask on and thus go for complete sleep health rather than choosing one or the other to attempt to treat.

[lebowski8]

Has anyone been successful with CPAP alternatives (if there really are any)? I have seen mouth guards advertised on the internet. Has anyone has success with this?
Thank you,
Alan

I'd been trying to self-treat my sleep problems for years without any success... and then with CPAP, finally, sleep!

My first consultation with my sleep doctor in early Feb 2009 was revealing. Prior to our meeting, I filled out a 10 page questionairre about my sleep, including the standard day-time sleepiness assessment. He gave me a brief physical exam of my head, lungs, and ear-nose-throat.
he said (paraphrasing): even without a sleep study, I'm pretty sure you have OSA-- you've got all the classic physical signs: your neck is 18 inches, you have very large tonsils and adenoids, and your airway seems smaller than normal. Your self-reported sleep is very disorganized. You have severe day time sleepiness. But we'll use a couple of overnight sleep studies to get a clearer picture of the severity of your OSA.

Unfortunately, it would be a few weeks before their was an available slot in the Sleep Lab.
I asked him: what could I do, in the meantime, to improve my sleep?

the doctor said: Well, you could try a number of things, but I'll warn you, i've not seen much success with them. You could try elevating the head of the bed six inches. You could try breathe-right strips. You might try an OTC dental appliance that reduces snoring

I did all of these things. The result: zero subjective improvement. My wife couldn't stand the bed elevation. Breathe right strips were super-worthless.
She said the dental appliance reduced the noise level of my snoring by half, but didn't reduce the frequency. At least she could sleep without ear plugs.

I actually found the dental appliance to be a little painful and I found the change in my bite to be annoying-- my jaw wouldn't relax until several hours after waking. It would often hurt my teeth that i'd take it out only after 4 hours of use.

Finally, I got a titration at the end of March. I got my equipment from CPAP.com a few weeks later.

[Goofproof]

A iron lung will work but it's probably got some draw backs too. I purfur my XPAP, it beats trying to die at night. Jim

[alanhj13]

Thank you all for sharing yours experiences and encouraging posts.

Kteague - I have tried using the CPAP (w/o leaks) 4 (2-3 days each) times and cannot sleep with the mask on. I had to stop using the machine due to lack of sleep and insomnia.
No, I do not take naps. I will try.

FYI my Tinnitus was caused by a bomb blast while in Desert Storm. When returning to the states I had insomnia for 1 year. After a few days without sleep anxiety comes which makes the insomnia worse. It is a cycle. Sometimes I would not sleep for 2 weeks at a time. With sleep deprivation you feel like you are going crazy...very scary. I eventually got over the insomnia and do not want it to return.

fuzzy96- the sleeping pills are STILNOCT (Zolpidem Tartrate) 5MG (2 tablets). The pills do knock me out but I wake up a few hours later. I know the pills are meant of only a temporary solution.


Bottom line - DONT GIVE UP... GOT IT

THANKS AGAIN TO ALL