Advice on staying asleep.

[YawnGirl]

yawngirl,

i know how exasperating it can be. before finding out about my OSA i had the same sleep pattern - fall asleep within minutes, but then wake up at 2 or 3 am, then have trouble falling back asleep. i've been 4 months now on cpap and am just starting notice that now i sleep straight through until maybe 5 or 5:30, then fall back asleep.

what changed? i have to think the cpap is working for me. i didn't notice - how long have you been on the machine?

i also cut out coffee, at least for a time (i recently fell off the wagon). but one thing that also really helped was NOT turning on the TV, NOT checking the time, just re-training my brain. "Oh, so you woke up again? No problem, just roll over, you'll fall back asleep again." I know it sounds overly simplistic, but it helped. i've heard that it's a bad habit to check the time because all it accomplishes is making one angry that they've woken up early then worried that they won't be able fall asleep again and it becomes a self-defeating cycle. breaking the routine seemed to help.

i hope you find some relief soon.

I got my APAP I purchased from cpapauction.com yesterday and used it last night. I set my minimum for 10 and max for 15 (prescribed 14 on cpap). Here are the results from last night.

Best of all, no bloating this morning.
I slept til 5 am, Yea!
AHI was 1.0
Leakage was 34 (35 is normal for my mask)
Snore index was 4.0 (not sure what that means, but it doesn't sound serious)
Machine kept me at 10.5 all night unless I'm reading the results incorrectly.

[peppi]

Machine kept me at 10.5 all night unless I'm reading the results incorrectly.

Forgive me if I ask a stupid question, I'm a newbie. Did an APAP actually do anything if it stayed at 10.5 all night?
Just wondering if it was the setting itself and not the auto function that helped.

Best,
Phil

[rested gal]

10.5 doesn't mean the autopap stayed up there right on the pressure of 10.5 ninety percent of the time.

The 10.5 yawngirl saw in the LCD of her Respironics machine the next morning was the "90%" pressure. Means the machine used a pressure of 10.5 AND pressure(s) BELOW 10.5 for 90% of the time. Also means the machine used pressure(s) above 10.5 ten percent of the time.

All your first numbers look great, yawngirl!

Are you planning to reset the data to zero each day, to have it ready to record just the one night's data? I think that's better than trying to make sense of 7 day or 30 day averages. Wish Respironics had included an overnight recording in their data stuff, like ResMed has, but...they didn't. So, if we want to look at one night's data at a time in a Respironic machine's LCD, gotta jump through some hoops to reset the results data to zero each time.

How to reset the M series machine "weekly"/"monthly" details back to zero, in order to view just last night's results the next day:

viewtopic.php?p=239127#239127

viewtopic/t29141/Resetting-the-data-on-Respironics.html

[SleepyT]

yawngirl,

i know how exasperating it can be. before finding out about my OSA i had the same sleep pattern - fall asleep within minutes, but then wake up at 2 or 3 am, then have trouble falling back asleep. i've been 4 months now on cpap and am just starting notice that now i sleep straight through until maybe 5 or 5:30, then fall back asleep.

what changed? i have to think the cpap is working for me. i didn't notice - how long have you been on the machine?

i also cut out coffee, at least for a time (i recently fell off the wagon). but one thing that also really helped was NOT turning on the TV, NOT checking the time, just re-training my brain. "Oh, so you woke up again? No problem, just roll over, you'll fall back asleep again." I know it sounds overly simplistic, but it helped. i've heard that it's a bad habit to check the time because all it accomplishes is making one angry that they've woken up early then worried that they won't be able fall asleep again and it becomes a self-defeating cycle. breaking the routine seemed to help.

i hope you find some relief soon.

I got my APAP I purchased from cpapauction.com yesterday and used it last night. I set my minimum for 10 and max for 15 (prescribed 14 on cpap). Here are the results from last night.

Best of all, no bloating this morning.
I slept til 5 am, Yea!
AHI was 1.0
Leakage was 34 (35 is normal for my mask)
Snore index was 4.0 (not sure what that means, but it doesn't sound serious)
Machine kept me at 10.5 all night unless I'm reading the results incorrectly.

Awesome numbers! Sweet! Keep up the good work!

[YawnGirl]

10.5 doesn't mean the autopap stayed up there right on the pressure of 10.5 ninety percent of the time.

The 10.5 yawngirl saw in the LCD of her Respironics machine the next morning was the "90%" pressure. Means the machine used a pressure of 10.5 AND pressure(s) BELOW 10.5 for 90% of the time. Also means the machine used pressure(s) above 10.5 ten percent of the time.

All your first numbers look great, yawngirl!

Are you planning to reset the data to zero each day, to have it ready to record just the one night's data? I think that's better than trying to make sense of 7 day or 30 day averages. Wish Respironics had included an overnight recording in their data stuff, like ResMed has, but...they didn't. So, if we want to look at one night's data at a time in a Respironic machine's LCD, gotta jump through some hoops to reset the results data to zero each time.

How to reset the M series machine "weekly"/"monthly" details back to zero, in order to view just last night's results the next day:

viewtopic.php?p=239127#239127

viewtopic/t29141/Resetting-the-data-on-Respironics.html

The info actually came from the smartcard. I just started looking at the data, so I may be looking at something wrong, but the pressure line did not show it moving all night. I am going to research my results more throughly when I have spare time (ha, ha, spare time). The info is a bit "technical".

-Paula

[YawnGirl]

Update: I slept 5.5 hours last night straight thru! I'm very excited. I even had a dream that didn't involve being suffocated in some way. Yeah!

[Cavallo]

Neat, isn't it? I hadn't thought about dreaming in so very, very long until literally this week. I'm psyched.

[SleepyT]

Update: I slept 5.5 hours last night straight thru! I'm very excited. I even had a dream that didn't involve being suffocated in some way. Yeah!

This is how you do it! Congrats!

[fishhead]

Update: I slept 5.5 hours last night straight thru! I'm very excited. I even had a dream that didn't involve being suffocated in some way. Yeah!

that's terrific!! we're so glad you are getting some good sleep.

[Muse-Inc]

...NOT checking the time, just re-training my brain. "Oh, so you woke up again? No problem, just roll over, you'll fall back asleep again." I know it sounds overly simplistic, but it helped. i've heard that it's a bad habit to check the time...

I cover the LED display of my alarm clock, originally so I could sleep in the dark (all light sources covered). Then, I was diagnosed with severe OSA. Because I keep the clock covered, when I wokeup (does anyone new to CPAP therapy not go thru periods of wakeups?) I did what you did Fishhead, reminded myself to go back to sleep. Now if I wake up when an event terminates, I just breathe deeply to slow my heartrate, avoid thinking about what just happened, and count backwards by 3 from 300, 400, or 500 whichever one I haven't started from in awhile .

[chrislegg1]

I am so glad that I am not alone! I have only been using CPAP for about 10 days, but I still wake up once or twice per night and then a final time some time between 3-4 a.m. I went for the sleep study and then started CPAP to stop this from happening, so I was very frustrated to have it continue. This thread is great: at best I know that there may be hope at the end of the tunnel (according to some posts), and at worst at least it is not a problem unique to me.

Thanks,

Chris

[sagesteve]

I take a Melatonin and Valerian cocktail. Not just ANY Valerian...this one: http://www.wonderlabs.com/itemleft.php?itemnum=6061 I study herbology years ago and this Valerian is the strongest. Their Melatonin is really inexpensive, check out the price! $1.99 : http://www.wonderlabs.com/itemleft.php?itemnum=2561 I take 4 Valerian and one 2.5mg Melatonin. This really works.

[fishhead]

I cover the LED display of my alarm clock, originally so I could sleep in the dark (all light sources covered). Then, I was diagnosed with severe OSA. Because I keep the clock covered, when I wokeup (does anyone new to CPAP therapy not go thru periods of wakeups?) I did what you did Fishhead, reminded myself to go back to sleep. Now if I wake up when an event terminates, I just breathe deeply to slow my heartrate, avoid thinking about what just happened, and count backwards by 3 from 300, 400, or 500 whichever one I haven't started from in awhile .

at first i wanted to have a clock in line of sight so i could see how long i had been asleep, thinking it would be positive reinforcement. and i wanted to log the time so i could the next morning check the data to see if there was an event at or around the same time. but, i think it very quickly turns into a trained habit or response. in the end, it's better not to know what time it is - i'm more likely to fall asleep quicker.