Just had my first follow-up, please help

[digitalepiphany]

I'm on the large pillows on the Swift FX now. Nowhere else to go from there. It shouldn't be a problem getting another mask (I just have to call the guy), but I'd prefer to hear some others chime in before I make that decision. They're not open til Monday, so I have time. But, yeah, I've heard a lot of people talk about the Aloha. When I got the Swift FX, the Aloha was the other option I had in mind at the time.

I saw that chin strap just a little bit ago. Not gonna happen though. I have no access to a sewing machine, and don't know anyone else who does. And, I'm 6 hours away from the nearest family members, none of which sew either. The ultimate chin strap is also out of the question, because I don't have $60 to get it.

If the chin strap they gave me doesn't work, I'll see what tape is out there. I may be able to make a template of my lips, and cut a piece of tape each night to fit just on my lips.

[Pugsy]

Yeah...a little bit slotted but not as big as the guy I was telling you about. His were huge.
If you have a mind to try a different nasal pillow...I would suggest the Pilairo Q. I think it might fit your nares just a little better as they are a little bit slotted when compared to the Swift FX pillow cone openings. Get the Pilairo Q though, if you decide to try it, because it has a more adjustable headgear. The original Pilairo had a one size fits all headgear and guys with big heads were SOL. It was almost too snug on me.

Do you have any Lansinoh lanolin ointment? A little dab of it might help maintain the seal but base on your experiment about which showed pretty much a straight line 0.0 leak except for short spikes...I am betting that you are opening your mouth when you are asleep.
I don't think that you have any holes in your hose or anything like that now that I see that a nice flat line can be obtained...so we know it can be done.

Here's some more information about taping. Lots of reading material. It isn't for everyone but if you don't want to use a full face mask for whatever reason and a chin strap doesn't prevent it very well...you don't have much choice.
viewtopic.php?t=8011
I did the tape thing for about 2 months when I first started therapy. I didn't have any trouble breathing through my nose but had developed a habit of mouth breathing likely from gasping for air pre cpap from the apnea events. When I first read about it I thought "what the hell?" "no way, Jose" but when faced with huge leaks and my own desire to avoid full face masks (I have my own reasons and in my mind...any reason a person has is a legit reason) I tried a couple of store bought chin straps and various homemade ones ...but they either wouldn't stay in place or were so annoying that the chin strap itself bugged me so much I couldn't sleep....so I decided to try it.
What I did was get a strip of blue painter's tape and put it on while awake and make various attempts to see how easily it would come "unstuck" and I found that while it did a good job..it wasn't like cement and a big yawn would loosen it enough to breathe through my mouth should an emergency arise. The very first night I taped we had a big thunderstorm and lost power. I woke up and the tape was still in place and I was breathing comfortably through the vent holes of the mask. The silence was what woke me up...not any distress.

After about 2 months I started "forgetting" to tape my mouth until lights were out and mask was on so I would let it slide. Wasn't long before I saw that my huge massive leaks were greatly reduced to a handful of short lived leaks which were probably mouth breathing leaks but I wasn't going to worry about 10 minutes of leaks here and there and often didn't go to large leak territory anyway. So I just stopped taping my mouth and worrying about it. I still see an occasional leak which is likely mouth breathing especially with the Tap Pap nasal pillows because those suckers don't ever move...but I don't worry about it. I don't mind if the leak line is less than perfect as long as I sleep well and feel decent and time spent in large leak territory isn't prolonged.

If the chin strap works...hey I am all for it..even if it is less than perfect but if you still have more than 25% of the night in massive leaks...then you are going to have to at least try something to keep the mouth shut if you want to avoid a full face mask.

Eventually if a person can get their tongue properly trained to keep the door shut from the airway to the mouth...it doesn't matter if the mouth opens a little because if the tongue will stay in place air can't get into the mouth. I can yawn and even talk with my mask and machine on and not have any air go rushing into my mouth from my airway.

Let's see how tonight goes with the chin strap. Maybe it will be enough and all this talk about taping will have been a waste of time. It is enough for some people.

[digitalepiphany]

I don't have any Lansinoh, but I did buy some mask seal (for scuba diving) that someone else suggested in another post. The few nights that I've used it, I had no awakenings due to leaks from the pillows.

I'll update on the chin strap tomorrow.

[digitalepiphany]

After looking through a bunch of post on mouth leaks, I think I'm gonna try some polident tomorrow. I'll test the chin strap tonight, the polident tomorrow night, and both the next night. Hopefully one of these will work.

[evanb]

If you do go with the Aloha, you can use the bottom half of the Breathewear Halo chinstrap in the spare slots on the Aloha frame. This way there is no additional head gear.

[kaiasgram]

If you do go with the Aloha, you can use the bottom half of the Breathewear Halo chinstrap in the spare slots on the Aloha frame. This way there is no additional head gear.

Whoa, cool idea -- does the BH chinstrap just go through the spare slots and attach to itself on each side (velcro?)?

[digitalepiphany]

Unfortunately, this is the chinstrap they gave me: https://www.cpap.com/productpage/premiu ... hleak.html.

It actually fits really tightly. My head's kind of on the large side. I'll give it a go, but if neither it nor the polident helps, I'll see if I can get the one you suggested.
This thing is a PITA to put on my big noggin.

[digitalepiphany]

I tried the polygrip last night, instead of the chin strap. It seemed to work pretty well, or at least better than usual. It definitely kept my lips together all night. What do you think?

BTW, the large spike around 6:45 was from me removing my mask so I could shut up my roommate's dog. He barks when my roommate leaves for work, which usually doesn't wake me up, so I guess that's a good sign. Still feel like crap though.

[Pugsy]

I think that last night was a huge improvement compared to the previous nights.
What is noticeable absent is the large number of centrals. That's a huge plus.
BTW...I tried the polident too...you can still mouth breath with it. See the leaks that have a little plateau on your graph around 4:30 to 5:00? Those are most likely mouth breathing leaks...pretty classic plateau.

Still feel like crap though.

Did you expect the one night miracle? Sorry but those are extremely rare even with optimal therapy.

How many wake ups do you think you had last night?
Do you always go to bed so late and then sleep in? or was this unusual for you?
Still not quite 7 hours of sleep..even with optimal therapy and no wake ups at all..no guarantee that 7 hours is enough to feel the elusive "miracle".

Right now your main job is fixing the leaks..somehow some way keep big leaks at a minimum and still sleep soundly with minimal wake ups.

[digitalepiphany]

I think that last night was a huge improvement compared to the previous nights.
What is noticeable absent is the large number of centrals. That's a huge plus.
BTW...I tried the polident too...you can still mouth breath with it. See the leaks that have a little plateau on your graph around 4:30 to 5:00? Those are most likely mouth breathing leaks...pretty classic plateau.
I guess I should try some tape then.

Still feel like crap though.

Did you expect the one night miracle? Sorry but those are extremely rare even with optimal therapy.
We can always hope, right?

How many wake ups do you think you had last night? As far as I know, the only wake up was when the dog was barking.
Do you always go to bed so late and then sleep in? or was this unusual for you? Honestly, my sleep habits are pretty erratic, but last night was an office Christmas party, so I knew it was gonna be a pretty late bed time. But, it really depends on if I can get to sleep. Generally, I'm so tired all day that it's all I can do to stay up till bed time. I could go to bed at 7PM every night with no problem, but that would just cause more problems with productivity. A lot of times, by the time 10PM rolls around, I'm wide awake. It's an exhausted wide awake, but I can't get to sleep. Then, I can't get to sleep till at least 4AM, which means that I go to bed at an odd hour the following night. It's really aggravating. Regardless, I've been able to get to sleep at a decent hour the last couple nights, except for last night, but I knew that was gonna happen.
Still not quite 7 hours of sleep..even with optimal therapy and no wake ups at all..no guarantee that 7 hours is enough to feel the elusive "miracle".

Right now your main job is fixing the leaks..somehow some way keep big leaks at a minimum and still sleep soundly with minimal wake ups.
You did say that you used blue painters tape, right? How was that with clean-up in the morning? Any residue? The Polygrip was a PITA.

[Pugsy]

Blue painters tape pretty much no residue the next morning.
At least for me. Sometimes it was already fairly loose just from a little drool.
Yeah, the Polygrip was big PITA yucky mess..I used the paste as I couldn't find any strips.

[digitalepiphany]

I found the strips, but didn't want to pony up the extra money, just in case it didn't work. At this point, I'm not sure they'd make much of a difference over the cream.

I didn't use the mask seal on the pillows last night, so I'll do the polygrip again along with the mask seal. Hopefully that'll make a difference. I'll think I'll put the polygrip on in front of the mirror this time. Last night, I just did it in the dark while I was already in bed.

[evanb]

If you do go with the Aloha, you can use the bottom half of the Breathewear Halo chinstrap in the spare slots on the Aloha frame. This way there is no additional head gear.

Whoa, cool idea -- does the BH chinstrap just go through the spare slots and attach to itself on each side (velcro?)?

Exactly

[Pugsy]

If your reports don't get any worse than what you saw for last night AND you can tell me you slept decent and maybe don't feel quite as bad...I would take what we have right now and work from there. It's a very acceptable point to start with. 1000% better than those other reports with events so numerous we couldn't even see them.

The office party throws everything off. You likely would have felt like total crap even if you didn't have OSA messing things up.
Sleep hygiene is a very important part of how we feel in general and we can't have perfect sleep hygiene all the time.
When I stay up too late (for me) and even though I might "catch up" on the hours of sleep by sleeping in.... I normally feel just about as badly as if I got the shorter hours of sleep.

I actually was thrilled with your report from last night as far as the report itself.
But one night doesn't make a trend...so we need more nights. If by keeping the leaks at least somewhat controlled gives you reports that look similar to this one every night...then that means those centrals we saw on those other reports weren't real and that simplifies things a lot.
So...let's see if last night was a fluke or we can repeat it enough to see a trend.

FWIW...leaks are something that we probably never totally win that war.
We just need to find you some way to keep your mouth shut that isn't so annoying that it causes more loss of sleep quality all by itself.
I don't care if the leak line isn't perfectly 0.0 all the time. There is room for compromise as long as the compromise doesn't cause problems.

I now see light at the end of your tunnel just from this one report...I am thrilled to see it.

[digitalepiphany]

So am I. While I don't feel great, I do at least have more energy now than I've had in years. I still have a slight foggy feeling around my head. I don't know how else to describe it. But, I've been able to actually get some things done today that I've been to drained to do for months, and I wasn't so sleepy after doing it that I can't do anything else. If football weren't on right now, I'd probably get some more stuff done.

Like you said, hopefully the next several nights actually turn into a trend. I'm keeping my fingers crossed.