How Did I Revert to a Mouth-Breather?

I have been on CPAP therapy for three months and 2.5 months of it I have had the pleasure to be able to get good therapy with a nasal mask pillow (switched successfully from a horrid full face mask). Until last night I never had any problem with keeping my mouth shut (insert jokes here). Last night, I woke myself up numerous times because my mouth had dropped open and I had broken the therapy seal. I know there are many of you out there who knows what a horribly uncomfortable feeling that is.

I am wondering--why now? I don't have a cold or allergies, I could breathe just fine through my nostrils and my Sleepyhead graph didn't show anything unusual. I had one hyponea and one CA during 8.5 hours of sleep. Only 3 RERAs and two VS.

I pray this is an isolated incident or sleep gremlins messing with me. Has anyone had a similar experience?

Yes, it's horrible not being able to keep one's mouth shut at certain times...

Sometimes we don't get answers to "why"...that's when I like to blame the aliens. It's as good a reason as any and injects a bit of humor in this whole cpap stuff which doesn't have a lot of humor anyway.

I don't mouth breath often but I do on occasion have more of it than usual and I have found that when I do I am almost always on my back.
Gravity seems to let the jaw drop open just a little and that's all it takes for the mouth breathing to start.
Why sometimes and not other times? Don't know....probably won't ever know "why" when there isn't obvious reasons for needing to mouth breathing (like congestion).

Long ago I came to realize that this therapy just sometimes doesn't always end up as "perfect" as we might hope for any number of reasons.
Perfect numbers don't guarantee feeling perfect either...but I think they should as difficult as this therapy is.
But it doesn't so we accept it and move on.

Don't sweat occasional bumps in the road. We all have them...even myself after over 8 years of cpap therapy ...yes, I will have some nights where all hell breaks loose and I end up scratching my head as to what those darn aliens did to me.

Back when I was 3 months into therapy...heck I was having bumps in the road quite often. Things will continue to improve for you with time and experience but don't think for one minute that the aliens won't come visiting you every now and then and screw with you just because they can.
Heck, they came to see me Sunday night...and they gave me a big dose of insomnia and I only got barely 4 hours of sleep night before last.
I haven't had time to look at the data but I don't expect it to show much except a short night.
You know the old saying....cleaned up a bit....crap happens.

Sleeping Ugly wrote:I have been on CPAP therapy for three months and 2.5 months of it I have had the pleasure to be able to get good therapy with a nasal mask pillow (switched successfully from a horrid full face mask). Until last night I never had any problem with keeping my mouth shut (insert jokes here). Last night, I woke myself up numerous times because my mouth had dropped open and I had broken the therapy seal. I know there are many of you out there who knows what a horribly uncomfortable feeling that is.

I am wondering--why now? I don't have a cold or allergies, I could breathe just fine through my nostrils and my Sleepyhead graph didn't show anything unusual. I had one hyponea and one CA during 8.5 hours of sleep. Only 3 RERAs and two VS.

I pray this is an isolated incident or sleep gremlins messing with me. Has anyone had a similar experience?

Hi Sleeping Ugly. I've been having the same problem over the last couple of weeks. Everything's fine until early morning, around 4 am, then I wake myself up with leaks and discover my jaw has dropped open. I'll be following this thread to see what others have to offer.

Edit: Just saw Pugsy's reassuring answer. I had been thinking of trying the soft cervical collar route, but resisting because it sounds hot and uncomfortable.

Sleeping Ugly wrote:I have been on CPAP therapy for three months and 2.5 months of it I have had the pleasure to be able to get good therapy with a nasal mask pillow (switched successfully from a horrid full face mask).

As a stomach sleeper, I never even tried an FFM because I couldn't imagine how that much mask would work without sleeping on my back. I started out with a nasal pillow, and now that I've found one that I really like, I can't imagine going to anything else. I did occasionally have issues with mouth leaks, though, and based on info from this forum, I started taping my mouth shut at night. Not everyone finds this to be comfortable, but for me, it works like a charm. I've been doing it for close to 10 years, now.

Standard disclaimer: Your mileage may vary.

Bertha deBlues wrote:I had been thinking of trying the soft cervical collar route, but resisting because it sounds hot and uncomfortable.

The cervical collar is an option but every option comes with potential drawbacks and hot and uncomfortable are potential drawbacks for some people.
You won't know unless you try though so you have to decide if the problem is bad enough to be worth trying something to fix the problem.
Then weigh the pros and cons in your situation with your own personal preferences and needs and wants.

Since I personally have a "less on my face and head" preference and that would include my neck...cervical collar would be at the bottom of my list of things to try IF (big IF) I thought the problem was bad enough to need fixing in the first place.
If it were me and I found that sleeping on my back was the primary culprit in the mouth dropping open...and it was causing a substantial leak or sleep quality problem...I would try something to keep me off my back first because that would be more in line with my own personal preferences and needs.
And it sure wouldn't be the tennis ball trick...just what I want to do is use something to cause pain to wake me up so I can move and get rid of the pain. My sleep is already fragile enough without adding more pain and I get enough pain as it is anyway.

Me...I don't sweat a little mouth breathing or even a little large leak as long as my sleep isn't negatively impacted because I learned a long time ago that sometimes the fixes for these problems end up creating new larger problems so I choose to just accept the lessor problem.

Besides mouth breathing doesn't always equal massive big leaks. I once did a test just to see what known mouth breathing would show up as on a leak report. I happened to wake up one morning and I was mouth breathing...very gentle mouth breathing without the tornado of air rushing out the mouth and since it was time to get up anyway I decide to just lay there for a little while and continue to mouth breathe while awake just so I could see the results. I fully expected to see some large leak but didn't expect to see this....so it made me take a whole different view on mouth breathing. I had worse leaks earlier in the night than I had during the known mouth breathing.
ResMed report...so all leak is excess.

Hi Sleeping Ugly,
I was the same, I had very little mouth breathing at the beginning, then after 3 months it started. This probably isn't comforting, but with me, it got worse.
On the other hand, I love my collar. It keeps my neck nice and warm. I will sleep without my APAP, but not my collar.

coconur wrote: As a stomach sleeper, I never even tried an FFM because I couldn't imagine how that much mask would work without sleeping on my back.

Do I hear you! And some people just go on and on about finding a FFM that works when even the Amara View is FAR too bulky for a stomach sleeper

I use the cloth mask (Sleepweaver Anew) and I sleep on my side. I don't understand sleeping on one's stomach as it seems like breathing would become impossible. I got one of those memory foam pillows and sleep on the very edge of it. However, I do use a "snuggle" pillow that actually helps stop some leaks. The memory foam pillows are nice with the mask because they "end" whereas a normal pillow just tapers off.

As for why your mouth suddenly drops open. That's pretty easy. I don't breathe through my mouth, but the amount of pressure going into my nose makes my nasal circuit push out the path of least resistance (my mouth). Note that I did have the UVP surgery, so I have no uvula, so even less resistance than most people. I simply can't use a nasal-only mask because it just shoves right out my mouth, negating the purpose of the cpap.

ractar28 wrote:I use the cloth mask (Sleepweaver Anew) and I sleep on my side. I don't understand sleeping on one's stomach as it seems like breathing would become impossible. I got one of those memory foam pillows and sleep on the very edge of it. However, I do use a "snuggle" pillow that actually helps stop some leaks. The memory foam pillows are nice with the mask because they "end" whereas a normal pillow just tapers off.

Sleeping face mostly down is VERY comfortable for me. I can't use a padded brick (CPAP pillow) because I like support on my face. I generally have my nose completely free (off the pillow) but that's nowhere near good enough for a FFM.

I hope that my sudden night of mouth-breathing is the dreaded sleep aliens. I would love to have ti be a "crap" happens kind of incident, lol.

Thanks for all of the responses! I appreciate y'all taking the time to post!

ractar28 wrote:I use the cloth mask (Sleepweaver Anew)

Interesting. I hadn't heard of a cloth mask before. Makes sense that it would be more comfortable than a hard plastic one. Still, this is the Anew:
https://imgur.com/tHA0wb9
They do make a nasal mask version, but it's not as small as my Bella:
https://imgur.com/0C7Wcgj
(I hope the images work! )

Edit: Oh yeah, I sleep at the edge of a very squishy down pillow. It's enough height that I can angle my face slightly down toward the mattress, even with my mask, but not so much height that it hurts my neck.

I used the Sleepweaver Elan for about a year or so--it was so comfortable.
If I could keep the air out of my eyes, I would go right back to it.
It was only a tiny bit of air, but eventually, my eyes got too dry, and I had to switch.
The vent holes are so small that they are hard to find, and almost completely silent.
Even quieter than my P10!

coconur wrote:

ractar28 wrote:I use the cloth mask (Sleepweaver Anew)

Interesting. I hadn't heard of a cloth mask before. Makes sense that it would be more comfortable than a hard plastic one. Still, this is the Anew:
https://imgur.com/tHA0wb9
They do make a nasal mask version, but it's not as small as my Bella:
https://imgur.com/0C7Wcgj
(I hope the images work! )

Edit: Oh yeah, I sleep at the edge of a very squishy down pillow. It's enough height that I can angle my face slightly down toward the mattress, even with my mask, but not so much height that it hurts my neck.

pics came through loud and clear, if i can mix metaphors. your nasal mask looks interesting. i really like my p10 but when in comes time to get a new mask, i may go with yours. i'm intrigued by the behind the ear straps.

coconur wrote: They do make a nasal mask version, but it's not as small as my Bella:
https://imgur.com/0C7Wcgj

I've never seen this before and really like the look of it ... going on my wish list. Thanks!