Last Night Was First Night

Pugsy wrote: ↑

Sun Aug 04, 2024 9:00 am

So....exactly what is it that you wish the V-Com to aid with?

I have read that it can prevent chipmunk cheeks because it evens the airflow and prevents air from rushing into the mouth. I don't know how true this is. I ordered some stronger tape that comes in today - I'm hoping it'll be the solution.

When I zoom in on last night's charts, it looks pretty clear that the mouth leaks are what's waking me. https://sleephq.com/public/4b6c3a80-426 ... 030d681afd

I'm just getting really sick of being tired all day. I keep seeing posts from people who are like years in and have seen no improvement. I don't want that to be me.

Iancdub88 wrote: ↑

Sun Aug 04, 2024 9:10 am

I ordered some stronger tape that comes in today - I'm hoping it'll be the solution.

Tape on the outside isn't going to help close the back door that is in the airway letting air enter the mouth.

You can still get chipmunk cheeks with stronger tape.....just maybe it is strong enough to not blow open and wake you.

Iancdub88 wrote: ↑

Sun Aug 04, 2024 9:10 am

I keep seeing posts from people who are like years in and have seen no improvement. I don't want that to be me.

Please don't become one of the people expecting cpap use to fix ALL your problems with sleep or how you feel.
You have other issues going on as well and the machine can only fix airway issues. It doesn't do a damn thing for anything going on that you don't like that is related to anything else going on with you outside airway issues.
Like that new medication you got put on for depression and can cause insomnia issues and has a half life of 66 hours.

Pugsy wrote: ↑

Sun Aug 04, 2024 9:39 am

You can still get chipmunk cheeks with stronger tape.....just maybe it is strong enough to not blow open and wake you.

That's what I'm hoping for.

Please don't become one of the people expecting cpap use to fix ALL your problems with sleep or how you feel.

You're right, I'm sorry. I'm speaking out of frustration. I just didn't expect to feel more tired on the CPAP. I feel like if I can get this leak thing under control, I'll at least have the cpap stuff down.

I know I've been annoying and I know cpap won't fix all my problems and even though I want to make it work, I really feel like giving up today. My sleep was bad before but I feel so much worse during the day now. I don't know what to do.

Iancdub88 wrote: ↑

Mon Aug 05, 2024 8:46 am

I know I've been annoying and I know cpap won't fix all my problems and even though I want to make it work, I really feel like giving up today. My sleep was bad before but I feel so much worse during the day now. I don't know what to do.

So what happened? How are things worse?
Did you add a sleeping pill?

Pugsy wrote: ↑

Mon Aug 05, 2024 9:46 am

So what happened? How are things worse?
Did you add a sleeping pill?

I just mean I feel worse during the day than I did before cpap therapy. I haven't taken a sleeping pill in a while but I was thinking about it tonight.

I'm frustrated because I thought the mouth leaks are what were waking me up but I got this under control last night and still woke up too much and still feel like crap today.

Iancdub88 wrote: ↑

Mon Aug 05, 2024 10:24 am

I'm frustrated because I thought the mouth leaks are what were waking me up but I got this under control last night and still woke up too much and still feel like crap today.

Sigh....I know you were hoping to blame mouth leaking for your crappy sleep quality and I was hoping you would be right (I had my doubts) but I get no pleasure in saying "I was right" this time.
IMHO your sleep quality problem is not from OSA now.....it's from something else.
Your meds....maybe.... but then the reason you take those meds can also cause sleep quality problems so you are likely caught between that proverbial rock and a hard place. Just my opinion. I will tell you this....when you don't sleep good then that can make ALL your other problems exaggerated....including (or maybe) the depression.

Take the sleeping pill tonight....please. There is no shame in taking a sleep aid. There's a time and place for all our tools and I think in your case this is the time and place. I take something or other every night to help me sleep through (sort of) the pain I have. It is what it is. There is no shame in taking something to help us sleep.

Pugsy wrote: ↑

Mon Aug 05, 2024 10:49 am

Sigh....I know you were hoping to blame mouth leaking for your crappy sleep quality and I was hoping you would be right (I had my doubts) but I get no pleasure in saying "I was right" this time.
IMHO your sleep quality problem is not from OSA now.....it's from something else.
Your meds....maybe.... but then the reason you take those meds can also cause sleep quality problems so you are likely caught between that proverbial rock and a hard place. Just my opinion. I will tell you this....when you don't sleep good then that can make ALL your other problems exaggerated....including (or maybe) the depression.

Take the sleeping pill tonight....please. There is no shame in taking a sleep aid. There's a time and place for all our tools and I think in your case this is the time and place. I take something or other every night to help me sleep through (sort of) the pain I have. It is what it is. There is no shame in taking something to help us sleep.

Thank you, Pugsy. This really does help. I have been doing a bunch of research on my new med and while insomnia is pretty rare with it, it usually goes away after a month when people have that as a side effect. Tomorrow will be three weeks for me. On top of that, most people don't see it start to treat the actual depression until 4-6 weeks so I could be seeing insomnia AND depression messing with my sleep right now. Although, I find I don't have too much trouble falling asleep, my problem is waking up.

I will take the sleeping pill tonight.

I think there's another underlying mental issue where my brain just needs to realize "this is just sleep, you've done this a million times."

Iancdub88 wrote: ↑

Mon Aug 05, 2024 11:47 am

Although, I find I don't have too much trouble falling asleep, my problem is waking up.

Trouble falling asleep is called sleep onset insomnia.
Trouble staying (either waking multiple times or too early) asleep is called sleep maintenance insomnia.

My primary problem has always been sleep maintenance insomnia with a little mix of sleep onset insomnia thrown in just to screw with me. So I am quite familiar with both but mainly my problem is sleep maintenance insomnia secondary to pain issues. Don't get me wrong it isn't a horribly horrible pain either. It's just a low level chronic pain situation and the discomfort is enough to either cause a lot of arousals or just plain old wake ups and sometimes I have trouble going back to sleep so sleep onset insomnia can rear its ugly head in the middle of the night. My sleep onset issues have mainly been stress related though....all the stuff going on with my mom before she died and then afterwards as well.

And yes, I agree, you probably have the sleep maintenance insomnia from both meds and your depression.
And I am hoping the new med will see it's sleep effects wane after a month but I won't be holding my breath.
Historically all those mood meds either mess with sleep and cause insomnia or mess with sleep by messing with the sleep stages. People just don't get enough of the deep sleep or REM sleep because of the meds.

Pugsy wrote: ↑

Mon Aug 05, 2024 12:02 pm

People just don't get enough of the deep sleep or REM sleep because of the meds.

So should I ask about going off of it? I'm not sure what to do.

Iancdub88 wrote: ↑

Mon Aug 05, 2024 12:29 pm

Pugsy wrote: ↑

Mon Aug 05, 2024 12:02 pm

People just don't get enough of the deep sleep or REM sleep because of the meds.

So should I ask about going off of it? I'm not sure what to do.

That's not my call.....thankfully.
That's your call and I have no way to judge your depression at all....nor do I want to.
Depending on the medication....almost all the mood meds require a tapering off period when someone wants to discontinue them.

You can of course ask about it but most docs will say "it shouldn't/won't affect your sleep" when in fact they all will affect sleep in some form or other. It takes very little research to find documentation. Some mood meds are worse than others as well.
And of course the very reason we take mood meds can also mess with our sleep so it makes for figuring out the problem and the fix really difficult.
Plus it seems like there are always outliers to any medication. Like me and my pain med that came with a "may cause drowsiness" stick that I was one of the 0.1% of people who had insomnia with it. I always said I was "special".

Not to mention the daytime unwanted side effects to meed meds. A lot of those unwanted side effects are the same side effects to OSA. What with brain fog, fatigue, excessive sleepiness, nervousness, and all that stuff.

All meds come with some sort of baggage. Even the lowly aspirin has its unwanted side effects.
We have to try to sort out if the risk (unwanted side affect) is going to make the reward much less.
Risk vs reward....a decision we have to make with any medication we choose to take.

Pugsy wrote: ↑

Mon Aug 05, 2024 12:41 pm

That's not my call.....thankfully.
That's your call and I have no way to judge your depression at all....nor do I want to.

It's probably not the best idea. My depression can be pretty severe. I'm hoping that once my depression does even out, it will help with the other stuff. I probably should have waited to switch until I was better established on cpap but you know, hindsight and all that.

Iancdub88 wrote: ↑

Mon Aug 05, 2024 1:58 pm

I probably should have waited to switch until I was better established on cpap but you know, hindsight and all that.

Yeah I know.....hindsight is always 20/20.
You switched meds and I don't have any idea what you were taking before this new med. It may have been one of those "worse sleep disruptors" for all we know.

Reminds me of something....back when I started cpap (and doing the in lab sleep studies) I was taking a mood med to help me quit smoking and my sleep quality went totally into the toilet on that medication. Horrid little drug.
I should never have tried that drug AND started CPAP at the same time. I broke my own cardinal rule which is "one variable at a time" thing. Plus I broke my other "rule" in that I didn't research that particular mood med enough back then.
Over the past 15 years I have learned that when sleep is fragile one has to pay close attention to medication side effects.
Taking a "may cause drowsiness" pain med that actually can cause insomnia taught me that fact.

Let's see how you do with a sleeping pill on board tonight.

Pugsy wrote: ↑

Mon Aug 05, 2024 2:15 pm

You switched meds and I don't have any idea what you were taking before this new med. It may have been one of those "worse sleep disruptors" for all we know.

I was on Vilazodone. I was looking up the withdrawal symptoms which include insomnia and crying spells. Two things I've been dealing with. So maybe that could be a partial explanation.

Let's see how you do with a sleeping pill on board tonight.

Sounds good. I will follow up tomorrow.

Vilazodone

that med is known as a SSRI med and if you google "SSRI meds and sleep" you will get tons of hits about how it can mess with sleep. Lots of documentation out there. SNRI meds the same thing.
Not to mention the daytime symptoms those meds come with.