05.27.10
Posted in CPAP, Sleep Apnea at 9:20 pm by Nate Smith
SLEEP STUDY AFTERMATH
So the Doctor sends you to the medical supply store to get all machinery for your CPAP or biPAP machine and you get home and you have a bunch of tubes and a mask that looks like something Chuck Yeager would need at Mach two rather than you in your bed trying to stop sawing logs.
If you are lucky, the people at the medical store took some time to show you how everything goes together. If not, you are like me. Wait until you have some time to really read and put it together, don’t try to do it five minutes before bed when your spouse is already asleep. Buy, or clear off your nightstand. You may want to invest in one of those alarm clocks that shoots the time on the ceiling.
THE POINT
The whole point of CPAP or biPAP is to push air down (usually) your nose. The air going down your nose pushes some skin and muscle out of the way. The very same skin and muscle that vibrates when you breath cuasing a snoring sound. Make the snoring sound now to yourself to feel that muscle. Nice. This is the same muscle that helps you hold your breath when you go deep underwater and let bubbles out your nose a little at a time. We don’t have time to try that now. As you age, that muscle changes and becomes flabby or less responsive. Probably in the same way that you no longer get hiccups as much when you are older.
So as the air comes in through the mask, it helps push that flabby muscle and tissue flap out of the way. The mask and machine are also designed to allow you to breathe out. Should the machine stop working, you will not suffocate. Vents in the mask will still allow you to breathe should you fail to wake up or your mouth fail to open. If you are a mouth breather - aparently I was - you will have to get used to breathing through your nose. If you are subject to sinus illnesses, infections or allergies, they may present additional complications to adapting to the CPAP machine and mask. This will be discussed further.
Next we’ll get into actually learning to use the CPAP and mask.
To be continued in part 3
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05.25.10
Posted in CPAP, Sleep Apnea at 11:56 am by Nate Smith
This is going to be a big departure from what I normally write about, but I meet enough people that never seem to learn to sleep with their CPAP (Constant Positive Airway Pressure) machine that I want to share how I cope with it. None of what follows should be construed as medical advice in any way. It is simply my story and what I have found works for me and I want to share it in case somebody else can benefit. Check with your physician and use your common sense to decide what will work for you.
We will go through some background, the sleep study, and then get on to how the CPAP and mask works, and how you can cope with it.
I DON’T SNORE
Yes, you do. Get over it. Hopefully somebody who sleeps near you or even loves you told you you snore and you conceded that you might snore - at least long enough to do a sleep study. (If somebody is telling you that you snore, and even stop breathing, you should listen to them long enough to take them seriously). Worse yet, if they tell you you stop breathing a phone call to your doctor should be the very next thing you do.
THE SLEEP STUDY
Hopefully you’ve been through the sleep study. For the uninitiated, they hook you up to about every conceivable monitor. They watch your brain waves, the oxygen content of your blood, your respiration and your heart. All these crazy wires dangling off you and your scalp while you try to sleep, which they are watching and video taping. Go to the sleep study tired.
In my case they woke me up after a few short hours and said “here’s your mask”. This is how they tell you you have apnea. Using the mask they can try to determine how much pressure is needed to help you breathe.
Sleeping with that mask over my nose felt ridiculous. I was gagging on too much air and I felt like I could not breathe. A blast of air was going out all over my eyes. I didn’t really understand what was going on, or how this was supposed to help me sleep, we’ll get to that later on. But after a few more hours sleeping with that horrible thing, I awoke, unable to sleep any more, and feeling better than I had in ages. I was awake at 5:30 AM and felt ready to take on the day. I thought about this for the next two days and I could not wait to get a CPAP and mask of my own so I could feel this awake and refreshed again.
Continued in part 2
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Posted in crystal-ball, ramblings at 11:41 am by Nate Smith
I’ve been looking at e-book readers a lot lately and I like what I see. We are still a ways away from a tipping point where people switch heavily to e-book readers. It is probably safe to say we are in the second generation of readers, and it will probably be in the third generation that it really starts to take hold. Once more readers are in the used market, color becomes available, and the price comes down. The third generation of e-book readers might fracture a little too, with really inexpensive readers, and high priced-color readers that are super-thin, or have other features like multiple folding screens or can play music while you read.
For my part, I think I will know the tipping point has been reached when magazines and newspapers with high circulations - perhaps the AARP Magazine, Reader’s Digest or Wall Street Journal, begin to offer a free e-book reader with a subscription because the economics of electronic distribution will make it reasonable to do so. Inexpensive e-book readers combined with ever-present wi-fi and rising shipping or postage costs.
I’ll probably get an e-book reader soon. When will be the right time for you, how much would you pay for an e-book reader?
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