Love your CPAP so much that your afraid to sleep without it?

Hmmm,

For the 1st 2 years I did feel this way about my machine(s). But then after loosing lots of weight early in 2007 I decided I didn't need it any more & after about 4 days & seeming ok thought I'd better to a SpO2 monitor just to be sure - one look at the night's data had me straight back on the machine that night.

Then did this again about 4 months ago after being on a holiday & not using the machine for the last 3 days & being sure I was ok - again did an SpO2 night & immediately slapped the mask back on that night.

I'll probably do it again some time (I can be a slow learner )

DSM

kteague wrote:Sharon - I've read on here something about the effects of cpap can extend a while after stopping using it. Someone said they were instructed to go off theirs 3 nights before another sleep study or something like that. Maybe that was true for you in the beginning. Sorry to hear you had a "meltdown".
Kathy

hey kath
that makes a lot of sense! cause i swore i slept well those first three nights (video would probably tell me something different!)
well anyway, i'm back on the hose, for better or worse
thanks
sharon

So it seems that "love" for the machine maybe a bit overstretching it, but more aptly stated "appreciate" the machine for what it does for us. And yes a number of us have concerns about sleeping without it, some feel okay for maybe a night or two.

I do believe weight loss will help SA (less weight to collapse down in your throat) but I do also believe that structurally sometimes you just have a system that causes SA.

After looking at video of someone who had some larynx and uvula removal surgery, I took a look into the mirror of mouth and could see why my dentist thought I was probably a candidate of SA. The opening isn't as wide as the rest of my family looks like maybe 1.5 in diameter. Not sure how that rates with normal larynx's? Anyways I also have a wide tongue.

6PtStar wrote:Love it? No, I HATE it! Hate being tied to it. It is a lot of trouble! That being said, no I can not sleep without it. I have become very acustomed to breathing while I sleep. If I happen to fall asleep (which is not very often any more) without it I wake myself up very quickly gasping for air.

Jerry

This happens to me too. I hate having to use the machine, but I feel so bad when I sleep without it (and look so bad, I might add -- I wake up all puffy and bloodshot) that I won't sleep without it now, after almost two years.

M.

[quote="dreamchick"]I have had my machine for 4 weeks now and no way am I sleeping without it.

I used to wake up with headaches every single day and all the other symptoms.

Since Cpap not one day with a headache! Even though it takes getting used to and is a pain sometimes. I would not consider sleeping without it.

First month I had my CPAP, I did LOVE it. 8 months later, (after battling hose management, rain-out, etc, ) I feel more appreciative, as others have said, than love (I'm a conditional lover )

That said, there have been quite a few nights I didn't use it: several colds, before I had a FFM; some nights where I was so nervous and restless that I just culdn't get comfortable with it (but woke up feeling even more crappy so now if i'm like that I just take a 10 minute break, try to relax and shut up my brain, and put it back on again, and then it's ok); mask leaks that i just couldnt get under control and kept me up all night (finally ordered a new mask),...

I see my CPAP like I see my contacts: most of the time I don't even think about it, sometimes annoying as hell, but can't live life without it!

p.s. my sleep doc was one of the ones that said the effects of the cpap last for several days, and that was his reasoning for refusing to give me a FFM when I had my first cold on the CPAP. I think that's complete BS, so thanks to cpap.com I have a FFM now.

For a long time I hated my cpap, had never once been able to sleep past 2am with it, and had stopped using it altogether most nights.

For the last 2 years it's been quite the opposite--I LOVE my cpap and use it every night, all night and wouldn't even think about sleeping without it. Hardly ever take naps but when I do, the cpap naps with me.

So for all of the frustrated people, give it time. The therapy works. Be patient and keep trying.

makes you wonder about all those drugs on the market for headaches now don't it?

if you made the mistake of buying one of those large bottles of generic tylenol from like Costco, you realize you suddenly have a lifetime supply in that one bottle.

That is so true, Snoredog! The other night, for the first time in 13 months, I kept waking up feeling stuffy, claustrophobic, unable to get enough air through my nose, and with a splitting headache (not migraine intensity, but bad enough). I got up, and dreaded the idea of hosing back up, but I did. A minute later I was gasping for air again, and thought, OK, something's not right here. (genius runs in my family... ) I checked my machine, and sure enough, the small pressure sensor line on my PB420E had come loose. I had been running in the ln1 pressure mode. Who knows what my breathing had been like before I found the problem, and I still had a wicked headache in the morning.

I am so grateful that I don't get migraines anymore!

Marie wrote:I have been on cpap for about 4 years, and have only gone one night(Hurricane Rita:no electricity) without it. I have not made provisions for loss of electricity yet. Don't know what I'm waiting for.
I sorta kinda am afraid to sleep without it.

Loss of electricity was my very first fear in using a CPAP, I could picture myself laying there asleep, and I can sleep through a thunderstorm, and not knowing I was smothering from the electricity going out. Sheesh! I bought an APC battery backup to use with my CPAP, at least that way if the electricity goes out the battery backup will keep it going and the alarm on it will alert me to loss of power.

I can't say I love my CPAP machine, but I love the fact it's keeping me from stopping breathing. The only bad side is I can't sleep without it, I get panic attacks if I start to nod off without it on. Even worse the doctor had prescribed oxygen with it, but having Medicaid instead of Medicare they require that I qualify for oxygen therapy by doing an oxygen saturation test every six months. Being that I can't sleep without my mask and get virtually zero sleep while trying to do the test Medicaid requires me to do, I usually fail the test and they take away my oxygen even though my doctors says I need it. If I only had Medicare .. they require only one failure of the oxygen saturation test in your life and you're set, but not Medicaid, they want to torture you in hopes you'll fail one so they won't have to pay for it.

SnowCajun
I'm old, there's no cure!