3 Months on CPAP today.

Wow, how time flies!

Today is my third month anniversary - I started CPAP on May 4th of this year.

This last month marked a struggle to get enough deep sleep - and work out the last of the kinks with my machine - and learn that it will actually be an ongoing process to work out the kinks as no day is exactly like the day before.

We've had a very humid very hot summer - so it's been quite the challenge with my nasal pillow mask (Opus 360) to keep water from collecting in my mask or keep my throat from drying out completely and closing down - seems I can't have both at the moment. It's either one or the other, and boy, is the latter an experience I never ever want to experience again.

I had been very comfortable on both fronts with the humidifier at 4. It is now at 2 - still getting water in my mask. My mask and hose are both covered. Our house is an antebellum house - so we have a window air conditioner - at night the air conditioner is set at high - but around 2 am for some odd reason the humidity, the dew point and the temp changes in the room, and I get flooded. I so want a sensor that senses this and adjusts the humidifier in my machine automatically!! My machine does this somewhat - but not enough to really help. (Wishful thinking would have my humidifier set at 4 until 2am, then drop it to 1 for two hours, then set it back up at 4 for the remainder of the night.)

Wishful thinking.

My other challenge came with learning more about my sleep. I purchased the ZEO - oh.my.goodness. how I love this thing!! I purchased it because despite low AHI, I was still feeling very fatigued during the day and my weight loss stalled completely. I wanted to know why. I found that I was getting precious little deep sleep. Through a series of trials, I found the problem - again the current heat wave we are experiencing . . .in a house completely made of brick inside an out (living in a brick oven at the moment) - my body core temp was always too warm to allow for deep sleep. Now a cold shower or time in front of the fan for a good cool off period before I jump into the sack has nearly tripled my deep sleep time. (!!!!!)

I am slowly weaning myself off of my morning coffee and am exchanging it for peppermint tea. I should be off the caffeine completely by next Monday **crosses fingers**.

Last week I had another head/chest cold. I used my full face mask during this time, and while my AHI reached an all time high of 9.7 on the second night of the cold - I slept better than I did without a mask, at all. I also recovered MUCH quicker from my cold - without it becoming a worse bronchial infection or pneumonia.

I am entering the stage where I'm beginning to realize that this hose thing is a 'rest of my life' thing. I have some mixed emotions about it, from ambivalence, to fear. The thought of being so dependent on electricity is a little scary - but then, look how dependent I am on so many other things in life - on electricity, gasoline, natural gas If society ended in any form or matter - war or otherwise, I'd be pretty dependent on the goodness of others - or would learn fairly quickly new survival skills. It is pretty much a done deal that I wouldn't be an over night 'live off the land' sensation. Survival would be a hit and miss thing at best - and just like the rest of everyone else who is so dependent on a societal way of life - some of us may not survive. Fact of existence, not just in dealing with a CPAP machine that has to be plugged into a wall. Reality bites sometimes.

And then there are the things that I do every single day and once a week - for the rest of my life. . .that have changed. Wipe this down, clean that, stow this, move that. . . and then to put it in perspective. . .I take a shower or bath pretty much every day, I brush my teeth, I brush my hair, I dress, I clean and maintain the laundry, house and food. Every day there are responsibilities to myself and to my household. Every day these responsibilities - while they don't HAVE to be met, meeting them certainly makes life a much healthier thing to deal with. Meeting my new found responsibilities with my CPAP machine is no different. I'm not taking care of a machine and equipment - I'm reiterating that **I** am worth the care and maintenance of MY health. I am worth protection against stroke and heart disease. I am worth each and every single day I have the energy to enjoy my life. I am worth good healthy sleep. I am worth this. I am worth the effort. And anything and everything worth anything is certainly worth the effort that goes into it.

Today I will be contacted by my supplier - and I'll get a new nasal pillow and other supplies. I'm looking forward to it.

I still have to experience a good winter in this house and find out what kinks I need to work out with that. I'm up for the challenge. (Wondering if the water that keeps finding it's way into my mask will end up as ice chunks?! . . . slushy up the nose. . .gah!! )

I'm continuing to do better -

Just in time for perimenopause to hit. . . of course.

Rain out now? Oh boy just wait till winter.

I also seem to need higher settings on the humidifier and it does create a problem especially in the nasal mask where it condenses from the moisture in my breath.

The PR S1 has 2 modes for humidity control. Which are you using? The older mode called the classic will use more water and potentially make rain out more likely to happen. You have the hose covered. Do you have the nasal pillow itself covered? Padacheeks has a barrel cozy for my mask which made a huge difference for me with the rain out in the nasal pillow itself.

Pugsy wrote:Rain out now? Oh boy just wait till winter.

I also seem to need higher settings on the humidifier and it does create a problem especially in the nasal mask where it condenses from the moisture in my breath.

The PR S1 has 2 modes for humidity control. Which are you using? The older mode called the classic will use more water and potentially make rain out more likely to happen. You have the hose covered. Do you have the nasal pillow itself covered? Padacheeks has a barrel cozy for my mask which made a huge difference for me with the rain out in the nasal pillow itself.

Hi, Pugsy!

Yes, I have the nasal pillow itself covered - I use the Padacheek barrel cozy - and it worked great until this weird change that occurs every night around 2am in my bedroom. I'm not sure about the humidity control. I know it is probably on the new setting, not the classic setting. It doesn't use much water - at all. I'm pretty sure this is my own breath condensation that's causing the issue. This old house has presented several challenges that are unique to the house. It's been quite the experience trying to work around it.

I have no idea of how to change the humidity to classic or back to what the setting is now. . . the only access I've had is the 1-4 adjustment. I'm very reluctant to turn the humidity down to 1 - as the last time I did that - while I was fine between 2 and 3:30 AM - it was incredibly dry all the rest of the night. My room when I go to bed is generally right at 50% humidity.

The clinician manual shows how to change to the different humidifier modes. You probably are in the new mode if it uses less water. Changing to classic mode will use more water (I have tried both modes) and likely will increase the rain out.

The only other thing I can think of is how the mask is routed. Opus..do you route the short hose up over your head?
If so any condensation in the nasal pillow will go right back into your nose because water can't flow uphill.
I found that when I routed my hose over the head that I was snorting water all the time. Letting it hang down allowed the condensation in the nasal pillows to flow down the hose and not up my nose.

I do have it routed over my head - and have found that my AHI stays much lower that way for some reason. I've also tried having it free - and under the covers - less to 0 rain out, but my AHI goes up considerably (from an average of 0.6 to 3.5 or higher) . . .not sure what that's about. Ha!! It seems it's always one thing or the other. . .not both. Maybe the choice is to work on the AHI with it under the covers . . . instead of the water up the nose. . .lol.



Ah, challenges, what would the world be without 'em. **laughing**

quietmorning wrote: Maybe the choice is to work on the AHI with it under the covers . . . instead of the water up the nose

Well....waking often during the night snorting water defeats the purpose of getting restful sleep no matter how good the AHI. Always something.................

Make sure the machine is lower than the bed and see if that helps. Get a box, a milk crate or stack some books for one night and see if that helps on the rain-out.

Sheriff

Sheriff Buford wrote:Make sure the machine is lower than the bed and see if that helps. Get a box, a milk crate or stack some books for one night and see if that helps on the rain-out.

Sheriff

Hi, Sheriff

The machine is lower than my bed, but perhaps not low enough. I just took it out of the top drawer of it's little storage bin and moved it to the second drawer - we'll see how that goes. I don't want to put it in the bottom drawer as we have three fur-kids and the rug can get very . . . furry every once in a while.

I'm going to sleep without the hose attached to my mask for a while and try some things to stabilize it in the bed so that it doesn't pull on my mask while I sleep. . .and see how that might go.

Pugsy wrote:

quietmorning wrote: Maybe the choice is to work on the AHI with it under the covers . . . instead of the water up the nose

Well....waking often during the night snorting water defeats the purpose of getting restful sleep no matter how good the AHI. Always something.................

tooooooo true.

Ok. . .this is what how this last week went, and the solution I finally found:

I put the cpap machine in a lower drawer, turned the humidifier down to 1 and released the short tube from the top of my mask and the long tube from the top of the headboard. The long tube and most of the short tube were under the covers.

Still got water up my nose - though only once. My AHI went from .6 to 1.6 (not bad). The average leak went up from 16.0 to 20.0. The next day I had a sore scratchy throat - though my mouth was taped (just to make sure that my mouth wasn't flying open to cause the sore throat.)

Ok, that worked a little better as far as the mask rain out was concerned, but not good enough. I'm convinced that the water is from my own breath instead of the machine.

I took a "right before we close up the room to sleep with the air conditioner on" temp and humidity reading and then another one when I first wake up in the morning to see what the difference is. This is an old old house. . .so it poses some problems that aren't the norm for the modern home with central heat and air.

The room before I closed it off was 75 degrees with a 55% humidity. When I woke up in the morning, it was 65 degrees (F) and 46% humidity.

The temp is dropping ten degrees through out the night. The humidity is also dropping, which would account for why my throat gets so dry and sore when I turn the humidity down. I really need that 4 setting.

I already had a good thick hose cover on the long hose and short hose, and a Padacheek Swift LT Barrel Cozy on my nasal pillow. And before a few weeks ago, this all worked perfectly. But, things change - 'cause the weather changes. So in thinking about this, I decided to attach the mask back to the top of my head, since that is where it is the most stable. I hung the long hose back over the headboard, since if I attach the short hose to the top of my head, this is the best way to keep the long hose from hitting me in the nose all night long. I had another Padacheek Swift LT Barrel Cozy in my 'back up' bin, so I put it on top of the Padacheek Swift LT Barrel Cozy I already had on it. I cut the toe out of a sock and put that on top of the short hose cover I already had on the short hose, and took a fleece throw I had on my rocking chair and wrapped the long hose on it.

THEN, I jacked up the humidity back UP to FOUR. (and of course, crossed my fingers and was very thankful that last night was Friday, and if it didn't work, I didn't have to work today. . .yay.)

It worked.

I don't have a sore throat. There was NO water in my mask. . . AND my mask is stable, my AHI was back to the normal low less than 1 an hour, and no leaks other than the air vent blowing like crazy out the front.

So there I have it. . .if I'm going to live in a house where the temperature is basically uncontrollable in a workable way, I'm going to have to put my cpap tubing in a coat over it's basic wardrobe every once in a while. **chuckles** I just put in another order to padacheek.