Machine causing insomnia

General Discussion on any topic relating to CPAP and/or Sleep Apnea.
joepublic23
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Re: Machine causing insomnia

Post by joepublic23 » Wed Jul 13, 2022 6:48 am

Not being able to sleep at all is impacting my cognitive abilities far more than some snoring does.

I am way more scared of losing my job because I can't function due to exhaustion from tossing and turning all night than I am of (maybe) dying in my sleep some day. Honestly dying in one's sleep is probably the least bad way to go. Bringing back my chronic insomnia is awful.

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Re: Machine causing insomnia

Post by Dog Slobber » Wed Jul 13, 2022 7:23 am

joepublic23 wrote:
Wed Jul 13, 2022 6:48 am
Not being able to sleep at all is impacting my cognitive abilities far more than some snoring does.

I am way more scared of losing my job because I can't function due to exhaustion from tossing and turning all night than I am of (maybe) dying in my sleep some day. Honestly dying in one's sleep is probably the least bad way to go. Bringing back my chronic insomnia is awful.
I suggest you do some research about the potential long term effects of sleep apnea, it isn't dying in one's sleep.

I'm not going to bother researching for you.

Like I said, put the machine in your closet, or return it so someone else can benefit from it. You're just wasting everyone's time. You've *decided* to fail.

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Re: Machine causing insomnia

Post by joepublic23 » Wed Jul 13, 2022 9:29 am

Wow that was unhelpful. Clearly you have never dealt with chronic insomnia.

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Re: Machine causing insomnia

Post by babydinosnoreless » Wed Jul 13, 2022 10:17 am

joepublic23 wrote:
Wed Jul 13, 2022 9:29 am
Wow that was unhelpful. Clearly you have never dealt with chronic insomnia.
Chronic insomnia is caused by sleep apnea. Most of us have lived with it. Get off the pity train and figure it out.

Zonker was right adding you to foe list. Tired of the whining.

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Re: Machine causing insomnia

Post by mummmz » Wed Jul 13, 2022 10:59 am

I agree. I tried to stay positive and to help but you can't help someone who doesn't want it. To join a group just to complain to strangers isn't helpful.

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Re: Machine causing insomnia

Post by Pugsy » Wed Jul 13, 2022 11:56 am

mummmz wrote:
Wed Jul 13, 2022 10:59 am
I agree. I tried to stay positive and to help but you can't help someone who doesn't want it. To join a group just to complain to strangers isn't helpful.
Years ago we had a particularly large influx of new people who all they wanted to do was whine...and it got really annoying and finally someone started a thread "don't be a "butt"head thread. It was in response to all the "but I can't do it" replies we got.
One "butthead" was whining about difficulty of sleeping with cpap in a bedroom with no A/C (lived in Pacific NW where A/C wasn't needed all that much usually) and here's what offered
1...get a room Air Conditioner....response was " BUT I can't afford it"
2...We have a room Air Conditioner I will give you...response was "BUT I don't know how to install it"
3...We will come over and install it....response was "BUT I don't have a window"
4...We can make a window....response was "BUT I don't want my house cut into and have a hole in it"
You get the idea here.

You get the idea...just full of "BUTs"....she (it was a woman) didn't really want any help...she just wanted to complain and whine and when we got right down to the crux of the issue she just wanted someone to tell her that it was okay to not use the cpap machine since it was just to hard to fix the problem. I don't know why she even bothered coming here.

We had a lot of "BUTTHEADS" at the time. Most of us lost what little patience we ever had trying to talk someone out of giving up on cpap because it was obvious all we would get were "But I can't...for whatever reason".
They don't want real help. Won't do anything to maybe help themselves. Won't do anything that we might need to maybe stand a snowball's chance in hell of actually helping....because ultimately all they want is an excuse to bail and for us to say it's okay to bail. They come to a cpap help forum for validation that it's okay for them to be a quitter....then they bitch about lack of help when someone says "go ahead and be a quitter"....damned if you do and damned if you don't.

I am a big animal lover and I try to save all the animals that I can but one of the hardest things in my life has been to admit and realize that I can't save them all. Some just don't want to be saved or they just can't do what is needed to help themselves get in a position to be saved.
It's the same with the human animal of the species....we can't save them all no matter how much we might want to or try to....sometimes we just have to swallow that bitter pill and move on.
Some people just don't want help...all they want to do is whine and give "but I can't" excuses.
As long as they have that attitude...nothing you or I or anyone can do except wish them luck because they are going to need it.

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Re: Machine causing insomnia

Post by zonker » Wed Jul 13, 2022 12:01 pm

all i can say is what they said when/where i was growing up-reading is fundamental.
people say i'm self absorbed.
but that's enough about them.
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Re: Machine causing insomnia

Post by Janknitz » Wed Jul 13, 2022 1:03 pm

You've gotten a lot of suggestions and a lot of opportunity to be a "yes butter" and whine. Here's my suggestion, take it or leave it.

Plan on starting on a Friday night, and perhaps take a Monday, Tuesday off work, too. Do NOT drive during this time, don't ingest alcohol, and don't plan any task that takes clear thinking. Do all the usual sleep hygiene things, but the goal here is not to TRY to sleep, just let your body sleep when it's ready. Wear the CPAP all night in bed but do not try to sleep. Read a book. Watch boring tv (note, the light interferes with melatonin, so you might consider some blue blocking glasses to counteract that), listen to music or podcasts or relaxation audio. Don't try to sleep. You may not sleep at all. You may feel like dirt. But that's part of the plan.

Stay home, stay low key, and if you have an overwhelming urge to nap (not a good idea but . . .) wear your CPAP. But don't try to sleep. Don't fight sleep, just don't try to sleep. Stop thinking you MUST sleep. (Of course you must, but the more you put pressure on yourself to sleep the harder it becomes).

The first accomplishment is that you are going to get used to wearing the mask and bump up those compliance numbers.

The second thing is eventually you WILL sleep with the mask--your body will see to that. It may take a night or two or even three. But you WILL sleep. Just let it happen. And you will sleep with the mask. And you and your body will see that sleeping with the mask is OK.

Maybe it will just be an hour at first--but don't take the mask off until normal waking time. Baby steps. Stop thinking that if you fall asleep for a short while and then wake, it's OK to take off the mask. It's not, but don't pressure yourself thinking you have to sleep all night--no pressure to sleep. Let every minute you manage to sleep with it be an accomplishment. Count the glass half full, not half empty. Hopefully it will double the next night. You may sleep a few hours, wake and have difficulty getting back to sleep but eventually you do. That's OK. Go with the flow. keep working it, one morning you will wake and realize you got a good 6 -8 hours sleep and you will feel something you haven't felt in a long time--RESTED. You are going to have good nights and bad nights. The next goal is to start having more good nights than bad nights. It takes a while. Just observe, and notice when you are starting to have mostly good nights.

I had a terrible time with CPAP at first and this is how I had to approach it--literally one minute at a time, then 10 minutes, then an hour, and so on. It felt like rock climbing, one tortuous step after another. An hour here, a few hours awake, another hour then up and about for the day. UGH. But I kept chipping away at those rocks, now sleeping 2 hours at a time, then 4. The morning I woke after a solid 7 hours of sleep was AMAZING. I felt peaceful and calm and like I had the best sleeping drug ever. I didn't start sleeping this way every night. 1 good night, 3 bad, then 2 good nights, 1 bad, then 3 good nights, 2 bad, etc. It took a solid 3 months to have consistently good nights 90% of the time. But very worth it. So yes, there WILL be sleepless nights. You already have insomnia, so no big change there.

You said at one point you thought lowering the pressure might help you sleep better with the mask. It's counter-intuitive, but less pressure can make it HARDER because you may feel like you are not getting enough air. We "attenuate" to the airflow and stop feeling it after a while (I often have to put my hand up to the vent to make sure I'm really getting any air) but at a low flow I always feel like I'm struggling to breathe--that can make me feel panicky. I feel comforted by the cool air flowing now. It's like a security blanket.

Try this or not, it's up to you. But please don't bother telling my why this won't work for you. I'm just throwing the suggestion out there. The rest is up to you, or not. Good luck.
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joepublic23
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Re: Machine causing insomnia

Post by joepublic23 » Wed Jul 13, 2022 2:11 pm

Those are good suggestions.

When I first got the machine I specifically waited till the weekend to attempt to use it, since I normally have a much easier time falling asleep on the weekend.

That night I took benadryl to try to help force my body to relax enough to sleep.

I had thought wearing a mask would be the problem- but exhaling through the nose mask was hard. I can do it, but I have to focus and push hard to do it. Needless to say, that prevents the relaxation necessary to sleep.

My wife wound up begging me to take the mask off since it was louder than my snoring. I informed her that if I did, she was NEVER to complain about the snoring again.

The equipment company mailed me a full face mask the next week. It is easier to exhale, but still takes too much work to relax. I can wear it for a bit, but as I start to relax the seal goes to crap and air flows out the sides making lots of noise and irritating me. This makes me wonder if continued attempts are counterproductive till I go in for a different mask, since all I do is lie there thinking about the mask seal and wondering when it will become hard to exhale. Then I feel my body begin to tense up and know that I can't sleep at this point so I take it off. This was causing my average hours of sleep on weeknights to drop from 6 to 5. This week, I have been stressing about it, so that even after I take the mask off it takes me awhile to fall asleep dropping my average hours to about 3. Hence making me think that giving up is the least bad idea.


Then Last night I considered trying to see if I could fall asleep wearing the mask, but with the machine off, then having my wife turn it on if/when I start snoring. She refused to do that and said that's not how CPAP works. I informed her that failure to cooperate on her part WILL result in my pulling the plug and that she looses any right to complain about snoring or waking me up it happens since I am only trying this for her. So yes- I am very close to quitting,

Is it a bad idea to try to fall asleep with the mask on but no machine, then have someone turn it on? My insomnia normally makes falling asleep initially very difficult, but if I get woken up part way through I usually can usually go back to sleep.

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joepublic23
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Re: Machine causing insomnia

Post by joepublic23 » Wed Jul 13, 2022 2:16 pm

Chronic insomnia is caused by sleep apnea. Most of us have lived with it. Get off the pity train and figure it out.


Maybe for some people. For me difficulty falling asleep is more based on my stress/emotional state. Unfortunately it makes it hard to fall asleep when I am experiencing any kind of discomfort like a mask or air being rammed down my throat. I am trying to figure it out, but finding most people are way too dismissive of the idea that certain things make it physically impossible for me to fall asleep.

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Re: Machine causing insomnia

Post by joepublic23 » Wed Jul 13, 2022 2:22 pm

They don't want real help. Won't do anything to maybe help themselves. Won't do anything that we might need to maybe stand a snowball's chance in hell of actually helping....because ultimately all they want is an excuse to bail and for us to say it's okay to bail. They come to a cpap help forum for validation that it's okay for them to be a quitter....then they bitch about lack of help when someone says "go ahead and be a quitter"....damned if you do and damned if you don't.


I am trying to decide if the cure is worse than the disease. My insomnia had been under pretty good control for the last couple of years, but I can feel it roaring back due to this. I didn't make any attempt to get a CPAP machine for years since I assumed it would be futile. I only decided to try after I learned about Inspire, so I wonder if failing is the best option. Of course I didn't think I could fall asleep wearing the stuff for the sleep study, but I did TWICE (one of the things fell off while I was asleep, so I did it again the next night). That was the only time I thought I night actually be able to use a CPAP.

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Re: Machine causing insomnia

Post by Dog Slobber » Wed Jul 13, 2022 2:51 pm

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joepublic23
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Re: Machine causing insomnia

Post by joepublic23 » Wed Jul 13, 2022 3:12 pm

I am not saying its a scam. I know some people swear by them.

For me it is 100% effective at stopping snoring. Unfortunately it does that by stopping 100% of sleeping.

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Re: Machine causing insomnia

Post by sleepye » Wed Jul 13, 2022 5:59 pm

I understand exhaling against pressure is a big concern for you. Please tell us your settings. One of them, EPR, can be used specifically to address exhaling against pressure. If the experts here knew what your current setting is, they might be able to suggest a change that would help you in this area. There are other settings that may be tweaked to address specific problems you might have. That's why people kept asking for your settings. They weren't just nosey. Tweaking settings can help, but nobody can suggest setting changes without knowing what your current settings are. No setting is going to suddenly make everything better. But make enough little things better and maybe it will be just a little bit easier.

joepublic23
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Re: Machine causing insomnia

Post by joepublic23 » Wed Jul 13, 2022 6:30 pm

I understand exhaling against pressure is a big concern for you. Please tell us your settings. One of them, EPR, can be used specifically to address exhaling against pressure. If the experts here knew what your current setting is, they might be able to suggest a change that would help you in this area. There are other settings that may be tweaked to address specific problems you might have. That's why people kept asking for your settings. They weren't just nosey. Tweaking settings can help, but nobody can suggest setting changes without knowing what your current settings are. No setting is going to suddenly make everything better. But make enough little things better and maybe it will be just a little bit easier.

My Pressure setting is between 5-15. Is that the information you are looking for?

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