The underlying causes of sleep apnea

My father already was snoring, when he was young and thin as a rake. He developed sleep apnea after he become older and put on weight.

If your father was "already snoring" when he was young and thin perhaps he had apnea FIRST and the long term hormonal effects CAUSED his weight gain.

Janknitz wrote:If your father was "already snoring" when he was young and thin perhaps he had apnea FIRST and the long term hormonal effects CAUSED his weight gain.

That's a typical progression. But people will hold on tight to an incorrect paradigm.

Janknitz wrote:

My father already was snoring, when he was young and thin as a rake. He developed sleep apnea after he become older and put on weight.

If your father was "already snoring" when he was young and thin perhaps he had apnea FIRST and the long term hormonal effects CAUSED his weight gain.

I don't think so. He was at the top of his class and an avid soccer player and also studied in one of the most demanding fields. Chemical engineering. He got sleep apnea when he started working night shifts and gained weight as a result. Its all very individual how people develop the disease and their set of circumstances. I got sleep apnea the same way. Stayed up until I got to a place where my weight affected my health.

tiredandscared wrote:I don't think so. He was at the top of his class and an avid soccer player and also studied in one of the most demanding fields. Chemical engineering. He got sleep apnea when he started working night shifts and gained weight as a result.

What? You don't think people with untreated sleep apnea can be achievers?

Your father's description is close to surprisingly close to mine. I have a degree in chemical engineering and an MBA. I have worked long hours and traveled heavily all my life. First, I was very successful working for a multinational chemical company for years and later started my own consulting company which I continue to run.

I was always slim but I gained some weight in my late forties/early fifties. Sleep apnea nearly killed me until I finally got to a doctor and started using CPAP in my mid fifties. Looking back and now knowing what sleep apnea is, I am sure I already had it in my teens. Of course it became more severe with age and I am 100% certain it was the cause of my midlife weight gain.

So I am skeptical about your claim that your father "got" sleep apnea as a result of working night shifts or gaining weight.

As far as the work that doctor is doing, she may be on to something. But while she is working on this good research, she needs to also realize that most cases of obstructive sleep apnea are caused by underdeveloped jaws and the resulting small airways.

Thanks for posting the information.

tiredandscared wrote:

Janknitz wrote:

My father already was snoring, when he was young and thin as a rake. He developed sleep apnea after he become older and put on weight.

If your father was "already snoring" when he was young and thin perhaps he had apnea FIRST and the long term hormonal effects CAUSED his weight gain.

I don't think so. He was at the top of his class and an avid soccer player and also studied in one of the most demanding fields. Chemical engineering. He got sleep apnea when he started working night shifts and gained weight as a result. Its all very individual how people develop the disease and their set of circumstances. I got sleep apnea the same way. Stayed up until I got to a place where my weight affected my health.

That doesn't mean he didn't already have sleep apnea. The brain fog and other issues are cumulative. I earned a doctorate degree at the top of my class while clearly suffering from untreated and severe apnea.

I think there's a big tendency to blame obesity and lifestyle for apnea (a lot of shaming, too) but it may very well be that apnea comes first. However, most people are not diagnosed until the long term effects of apnea have already been manifest in obesity. The hormonal disruption from apnea interferes with the very hormones implicated in obesity--insulin, leptin, grehlin...

For my part, with micrognathia and other structural airway abnormalities, the apnea was clearly there long before I gained weight. But never recognized until doctors started to blame my obesity for it. I get very tired of being told I caused my apnea by "letting" myself get fat, or that weight loss will cure it (it hasn't).

I was dx'd 17 years ago. Wasn't obese but I did snore. Kids said when I napped on the sofa I would stop breathing. As a child I had constant ear infections and tonsillitis so often that they never could get me in to have them removed. A few years ago my ENT told me I had a deviated septum.

the Swedish lecture is from 2011

Janknitz wrote:

tiredandscared wrote:

Janknitz wrote:

My father already was snoring, when he was young and thin as a rake. He developed sleep apnea after he become older and put on weight.

If your father was "already snoring" when he was young and thin perhaps he had apnea FIRST and the long term hormonal effects CAUSED his weight gain.

I don't think so. He was at the top of his class and an avid soccer player and also studied in one of the most demanding fields. Chemical engineering. He got sleep apnea when he started working night shifts and gained weight as a result. Its all very individual how people develop the disease and their set of circumstances. I got sleep apnea the same way. Stayed up until I got to a place where my weight affected my health.

That doesn't mean he didn't already have sleep apnea. The brain fog and other issues are cumulative. I earned a doctorate degree at the top of my class while clearly suffering from untreated and severe apnea.

I think there's a big tendency to blame obesity and lifestyle for apnea (a lot of shaming, too) but it may very well be that apnea comes first. However, most people are not diagnosed until the long term effects of apnea have already been manifest in obesity. The hormonal disruption from apnea interferes with the very hormones implicated in obesity--insulin, leptin, grehlin...

For my part, with micrognathia and other structural airway abnormalities, the apnea was clearly there long before I gained weight. But never recognized until doctors started to blame my obesity for it. I get very tired of being told I caused my apnea by "letting" myself get fat, or that weight loss will cure it (it hasn't).

Take it easy. You have to look at it from a detached perspective. People have different circumstances. I don't get why people take this thing so personally. I didn't start this thread to make scrutinize remarks or to criticize anyone. I created it so that people get a more fundamental idea of the functional issue with sleep apnea. Perhaps also to encourage people to be more vigilant with their acquitances and social circles. And to give hope to people that there will be more permanent procedures/treatment in the future.

I don't get why people take this as some personal blow or a judgement. I asked my father, and he said he never had sleep troubles until he was 36-38, which is when he got diagnosed with sleep apnea. If he did have sleep apnea prior to this, it must have been mild enough to not affect his functioning. But it's more likely he got it as he got older. I'm sure that in some cases, people have had it for years, before they begin noticing a difference in functioning. I personally had no issues with sleep, until january this year. And I have mild positional sleep apnea. In my case I got as a result of screwing with my sleep.

Enchanter wrote:

Goofproof wrote:Maybe if we all died young, we would have been less likely to have Sleep Apnea. Jim

Maybe a better solution would be getting your treatment to work, instead of guessing what ifs. Jim

Matter, Anti-Matter and Don't Matter, builds the World.....

Sure getting treatment to work is what we need. But we should also work on the underlying cause to. The great Al Thomas once said, ''If you're needy, you're weak.''

And perhaps that means strengthening our throat and tongue muscles.

Maybe the answer is to go back in time and chose different parents, with better genes. Jim

tiredandscared, have you purchased your CPAP?

Janknitz wrote:

My father already was snoring, when he was young and thin as a rake. He developed sleep apnea after he become older and put on weight.

If your father was "already snoring" when he was young and thin perhaps he had apnea FIRST and the long term hormonal effects CAUSED his weight gain.

Or your Mom's cooking got better. As we age, we get more sedimedtary, work smarter not more, and can afford more food, not better food. Lifestyle causes more weight gain than sleep apnea. We must not blame ourselves, it's never our fault. Jim

tiredandscared wrote:

Janknitz wrote:

My father already was snoring, when he was young and thin as a rake. He developed sleep apnea after he become older and put on weight.

If your father was "already snoring" when he was young and thin perhaps he had apnea FIRST and the long term hormonal effects CAUSED his weight gain.

I don't think so. He was at the top of his class and an avid soccer player and also studied in one of the most demanding fields. Chemical engineering. He got sleep apnea when he started working night shifts and gained weight as a result. Its all very individual how people develop the disease and their set of circumstances. I got sleep apnea the same way. Stayed up until I got to a place where my weight affected my health.

You may be on to something. I had been at 175 lbs for 10 years, changed jobs, had to go on nights, that's when weight gain started.

Working thirds, causes weight gain, and then it brings on Sleep Apnea. We finally have the true cause. Jim

tiredandscared wrote:Take it easy. You have to look at it from a detached perspective. People have different circumstances. I don't get why people take this thing so personally.

You need to understand that you made a post which infers that,

so that people get a more fundamental idea of the functional issue with sleep apnea

nerve damage and muscular abnormalities

is the cause of obstructive sleep apnea.

I don't believe that is the case - the majority of cases are poorly developed jaws which result in small airway.

Now if you want to make the case that,

nerve damage and muscular abnormalities

are complicating factors or perhaps the sole factors in a minority of cases, you have a different case from what was presented.

tiredandscared wrote:he said he never had sleep troubles until he was 36-38, which is when he got diagnosed with sleep apnea. If he did have sleep apnea prior to this, it must have been mild enough to not affect his functioning. But it's more likely he got it as he got older. I'm sure that in some cases, people have had it for years, before they begin noticing a difference in functioning. I personally had no issues with sleep, until january this year. And I have mild positional sleep apnea. In my case I got as a result of screwing with my sleep.

Sorry, I don't buy that many cases of sleep apnea come on suddenly (less than one year). They worsen over many years until, if you are lucky, you get diagnosed and commence treatment.

You say in January you were diagnosed with mild positional sleep apnea. Be glad you caught it early because it is a progressive condition due to weakening of the muscles in the airway as we age.

Now don't take this personal!

I do take this personally because I think that the implication that "you caused your sleep apnea because you allowed yourself get fat" is a BARRIER to diagnosis and treatment, and too many doctors engage in subtle and not so subtle forms of fat shaming when they are presented with a patient with OSA symptoms. This short-sighted thinking makes my blood boil!

Often they are told "if you would just lose weight . . . " all things will be "cured".

I know too many people who are ashamed to get clinically diagnosed or accept treatment--they buy in to the myth that "all they have to do" is lose weight and the problem will go away (and this also feeds denial that there's a problem that needs treatment). Of course, it's much harder to lose weight with OSA because of the hormonal disruption, and they never quite achieve it, but then they don't want to face the blame others put on them (all the while blaming themselves) by going through the diagnosis and treatment process.

Is obesity a factor in OSA? Certainly. But we still don't really know which came first, the chicken or the egg, in part because nobody goes around testing thin people who don't complain of symptoms (that doesn't mean they don't have symptoms, they just may not be severe enough--YET--to warrant complaint).

Meanwhile, that belief that treating the cause rather than the symptom may be aiming at the wrong target. I posit that it is just as likely that apnea is a causal factor obesity, as it is that obesity causes apnea.

Janknitz wrote:I do take this personally because I think that the implication that "you caused your sleep apnea because you allowed yourself get fat" is a BARRIER to diagnosis and treatment, and too many doctors engage in subtle and not so subtle forms of fat shaming when they are presented with a patient with OSA symptoms. This short-sighted thinking makes my blood boil!

Often they are told "if you would just lose weight . . . " all things will be "cured".

I know too many people who are ashamed to get clinically diagnosed or accept treatment--they buy in to the myth that "all they have to do" is lose weight and the problem will go away (and this also feeds denial that there's a problem that needs treatment). Of course, it's much harder to lose weight with OSA because of the hormonal disruption, and they never quite achieve it, but then they don't want to face the blame others put on them (all the while blaming themselves) by going through the diagnosis and treatment process.

Is obesity a factor in OSA? Certainly. But we still don't really know which came first, the chicken or the egg, in part because nobody goes around testing thin people who don't complain of symptoms (that doesn't mean they don't have symptoms, they just may not be severe enough--YET--to warrant complaint).

Meanwhile, that belief that treating the cause rather than the symptom may be aiming at the wrong target. I posit that it is just as likely that apnea is a causal factor obesity, as it is that obesity causes apnea.

I have no idea why you brought this up. I already stated that according to the professor herself, she pointed to the fact that in a subset of sleep-apnea patients, sleep-apnea is caused mainly by obesity. What does the medical establishment's statements and held views have anything to with this thread? Did you see me propose in any post, that weight loss is a definite cure for sleep apnea in every case? However you want to take, it's an undeniable fact that there is a relationship between weight and SDB. There is an obvious correlation between sleep apnea and obesity, regardless of whether you want to admit it or not. I don't understand what irks people about that idea. It's a scientific fact, which can be observed with clinical instruments. Sleep apnea can definitely be caused by fat deposits in the throat cavities narrowing the airway, causing obstruction and collapsability of the muscles in the throat and soft palate. This is a fact. At the very least it can aggravate a pre-existing condition. Sleep apeana has complex etiologies. I don't get why people start to feel guilty or ashamed over their weight when this is stated. A fact is a fact. Denying it doesn't make it less valid.