SleepyHead Software Newbie and My First Step

The remaining "numbers" that are available are likely unremarkable. Most of the other stuff have a wide range of normals and won't really tell us much. If they were way out of range you would likely have some sort of lung issue and would already know about it.

If you aren't feeling the good numbers then you get the standard speech that I usually give out to people.

Not everything is tied to AHI and/or leaks...so good numbers don't guarantee feeling so great and we wish it were that easy because good numbers are fairly easy to get.

When we don't feel the good numbers we need to look at other areas that could potentially affect how we feel.
Hours of sleep? Are we getting enough hours of sleep...if not we are going to feel like crap.
Are those hours of sleep fragmented by a lot of wake ups? Fragmented sleep means we don't get a chance to have the normal progression of the normal sleep cycles and we need that normal progression for restorative sleep to happen. If you are waking often...why?
Is the mask comfortable? If we aren't comfortable we don't sleep so great.
Is the bed comfortable...bed pillow?
Meds...are you taking any meds that have side effects that can either affect sleep or how we feel during the day?
General health issues??? Do you have any other health issues that might also impact how you fee.

DeeCPAP wrote:because I think I keep struggling to be aware of pullng it off or excessively
dry mouth when I sleep.

It sounds like you are still having comfort issues and if we aren't comfortable we don't get good quality restorative sleep.
Dry mouth usually means mouth breathing but it could also mean a side effect from meds and/or mouth breathing making things worse. It takes very little mouth breathing to dry out the mouth.
If you are removing the mask during the night and sleeping right on and not remembering removing the mask then you are waking up after having a period of sleep that is untreated because the mask is gone.
It's a funny thing but the body tends to remember the most recent sleep...meaning if you sleep for 7 hours with the mask and then remove it and sleep another hour without it...the body will most likely remember the effects of that 1 hour without cpap more than it remembers the other 7 hours and you will still feel like crap.

If you are waking often during the night....any idea why?

You seem to have covered all the bases. Thanks!

One concern is figuring out if I'm opening my mouth. I was always a mouth breather and I'm also on medications that dry the mouth. I got a huge dental bill and I was told dry mouth was a contributing factor along with meds). Now I have to play detective and figure out how to solve the problem so that the extensive dental problems don't continue.

I don't have broken up sleep to my knowledge and sleep straight through the night -- about 7 hrs. a night, and lately more, but I'd like to be sure so can I figure out how long I sleep using the SleepyHead Software?

Almost forgot -- twice in the last few months I went through a week or so of feeling so sleepy that I slept maybe 10-14 hours today which I've never done before. My primary doc said my blood tests are fine.

Pugsy wrote:The remaining "numbers" that are available are likely unremarkable. Most of the other stuff have a wide range of normals and won't really tell us much. If they were way out of range you would likely have some sort of lung issue and would already know about it.

If you aren't feeling the good numbers then you get the standard speech that I usually give out to people.

Not everything is tied to AHI and/or leaks...so good numbers don't guarantee feeling so great and we wish it were that easy because good numbers are fairly easy to get.

When we don't feel the good numbers we need to look at other areas that could potentially affect how we feel.
Hours of sleep? Are we getting enough hours of sleep...if not we are going to feel like crap.
Are those hours of sleep fragmented by a lot of wake ups? Fragmented sleep means we don't get a chance to have the normal progression of the normal sleep cycles and we need that normal progression for restorative sleep to happen. If you are waking often...why?
Is the mask comfortable? If we aren't comfortable we don't sleep so great.
Is the bed comfortable...bed pillow?
Meds...are you taking any meds that have side effects that can either affect sleep or how we feel during the day?
General health issues??? Do you have any other health issues that might also impact how you fee.

DeeCPAP wrote:because I think I keep struggling to be aware of pullng it off or excessively
dry mouth when I sleep.

It sounds like you are still having comfort issues and if we aren't comfortable we don't get good quality restorative sleep.
Dry mouth usually means mouth breathing but it could also mean a side effect from meds and/or mouth breathing making things worse. It takes very little mouth breathing to dry out the mouth.
If you are removing the mask during the night and sleeping right on and not remembering removing the mask then you are waking up after having a period of sleep that is untreated because the mask is gone.
It's a funny thing but the body tends to remember the most recent sleep...meaning if you sleep for 7 hours with the mask and then remove it and sleep another hour without it...the body will most likely remember the effects of that 1 hour without cpap more than it remembers the other 7 hours and you will still feel like crap.

If you are waking often during the night....any idea why?

If you are mouth breathing the leak numbers don't reflect very much leak so I doubt the mouth breathing is occurring in any huge amounts. If the mouth breathing was going on a lot the leak numbers would in all likelihood be much higher than they are.
Now it doesn't take much mouth breathing though to dry out the mouth. I have woke up with dry mouth and I know I was mouth breathing but when I go look at my leak reports in detail (not just the numbers) I have been surprised to see that the time of mouth breathing leak is really relatively short.
Some people just will have their mouths dry out easier or faster than others for any number of reasons.
Either meds or other health issues may be going on and contributing to the dry mouth issues.

Pugsy wrote:If you are mouth breathing the leak numbers don't reflect very much leak so I doubt the mouth breathing is occurring in any huge amounts. If the mouth breathing was going on a lot the leak numbers would in all likelihood be much higher than they are.
Now it doesn't take much mouth breathing though to dry out the mouth. I have woke up with dry mouth and I know I was mouth breathing but when I go look at my leak reports in detail (not just the numbers) I have been surprised to see that the time of mouth breathing leak is really relatively short.
Some people just will have their mouths dry out easier or faster than others for any number of reasons.
Either meds or other health issues may be going on and contributing to the dry mouth issues.

Thanks again, Pugsy! You've helped me tremendously and I'm sure this thread of messages will help others.
Much, much appreciated!!

Pugsy wrote:If you are mouth breathing the leak numbers don't reflect very much leak so I doubt the mouth breathing is occurring in any huge amounts. If the mouth breathing was going on a lot the leak numbers would in all likelihood be much higher than they are.
Now it doesn't take much mouth breathing though to dry out the mouth. I have woke up with dry mouth and I know I was mouth breathing but when I go look at my leak reports in detail (not just the numbers) I have been surprised to see that the time of mouth breathing leak is really relatively short.
Some people just will have their mouths dry out easier or faster than others for any number of reasons.
Either meds or other health issues may be going on and contributing to the dry mouth issues.

One last technical question about this site. I'm not geting alerts in via email and I can't "fix" my profile. I alerted
the webmasters and am now stuck in limbo. Suggestion? Thanks.

I have no part of the technical aspects of the forum inner workings so I have no idea why you aren't getting alerts.
I also don't know why your equipment profile (which is what I assume you are referring to) isn't taking whatever choices you are making in the profile...nothing at all is showing up.
I assume that you are following the normal steps and then clicking on the "submit" button.
wiki/index.php/Registering_Equipment_in_User_Profile

Exactly what choices are you making that aren't working?
I know some links are broken but I wasn't aware that the S9 links were broken but I haven't checked lately.

When all else fails and the equipment profile isn't working and the comments section isn't working we often suggest that people add their equipment to their signature area...it's separate from the equipment section and will often work when the equipment profile section is broken.

So as to why these things aren't working for you...I don't know. I am just another forum member and I have nothing to do with the background workings of the forum.

Thanks again. This is strictly technical info related to using this website. I'm not listed as a user so maybe that's why my profile isn't listed and why I can't "correct" what I've written in my profile. I wrote the administrator but haven't heard word back yet so I'll just wait. I won't know if anyone has written a reply because I don't get notification, but Pugsy, you helped SO much with the CPAP info and Sleepyhead I can't thank you enough!

Pugsy wrote:I have no part of the technical aspects of the forum inner workings so I have no idea why you aren't getting alerts.
I also don't know why your equipment profile (which is what I assume you are referring to) isn't taking whatever choices you are making in the profile...nothing at all is showing up.
I assume that you are following the normal steps and then clicking on the "submit" button.
wiki/index.php/Registering_Equipment_in_User_Profile

Exactly what choices are you making that aren't working?
I know some links are broken but I wasn't aware that the S9 links were broken but I haven't checked lately.

When all else fails and the equipment profile isn't working and the comments section isn't working we often suggest that people add their equipment to their signature area...it's separate from the equipment section and will often work when the equipment profile section is broken.

So as to why these things aren't working for you...I don't know. I am just another forum member and I have nothing to do with the background workings of the forum.

Pugsy wrote:I have no part of the technical aspects of the forum... I am just another forum member and I have nothing to do with the background workings of the forum.

Thanks again. Your answer was right on. I was able to fill in some info about my profile. Again, Pugsy, you've been an incredible help and I'm eternally grateful !! I'm sure any newbies reading the info you posted will feel the same way.

Now I'll be sleeping more peacefully and that's saying a lot!