Obstructive Sleep Apnea
Obstructive Sleep Apnea
For those that know me this probably isn't much of a surprise, but I was diagnosed with Obstructive Sleep Apnea. Details about it is found at the link to the top of this post.
Essentially, being a big bloke, very big in weight its no surprise I snore. I have done this acutely for all my life, weight plays a large part. This snoring is mostly down to the obstructive sleep apnea. To summarise in layman terms, obstructive sleep apnea is when my airway becomes blocked during sleep because of "over relaxment". With it being blocked it has two main outward appearances. First is I can snore very loud, the second is that I stop breathing.
In terms of snoring - its so loud my next door neighbour can hear me. In terms of breathing it means I wake up regularly during the night gasping for breathe (My wife notices this, but I don't have any recollection). There are some serious none visible signs which I will come to.
About 4 weeks ago I undertook a sleep study. This basically involved sleeping with some monitoring equipment that, in fact, made sleep difficult. I had a monitor across my chest, a monitor up my nose and a finger monitor for oxygen levels. I did sleep eventually. Today I received the results which confirmed my condition, one that my wife knew about.
The results were "interesting". During my sleep study, on average, I woke up to restart breathing 20 times per hour, however on one occasion I woke up 70 times (70) in one hour. I have no recollection of this at all. In terms of obstruction and not sleeping, my average was in the region of 20 seconds each time it occurred, but there was one monitor that observed me not breathing for nearly 83 seconds - 1 minute 23. I have tried to hold my breathe for that long tonight and its frightening because I can't. To me these are scary results.
We asked what could happen if not treated. This response was as shocking as the values monitored above. Being overweight I have always suffered from high blood pressure as we as a high craving for the nice food of life. However it looks as though the high blood pressure has been caused by the sleep apnea. Obstructive sleep apnea causes your blood pressure to go off the scale, apparently as I understand it because your body is not exhaling the carbon dioxide from your lungs, and hence your oxygen levels in the blood are dropping. This can then cause blood clots and consequently strokes, heart disease and death. Frightening.
Cutting this short, the upshot is I now have to wear a CPAP mask (Continuos Positive Airway Pressure), which prevents the blockage to my airways occurring and prevents the snoring. It is a mask and a half and is not pretty in bed, but the consultant at the N&N has said it was radically change my life in terms of energy.
The mask arrives on Saturday and I will at some point post a picture of what I look like to give you an idea.
For those that know me this probably isn't much of a surprise, but I was diagnosed with Obstructive Sleep Apnea. Details about it is found at the link to the top of this post.
Essentially, being a big bloke, very big in weight its no surprise I snore. I have done this acutely for all my life, weight plays a large part. This snoring is mostly down to the obstructive sleep apnea. To summarise in layman terms, obstructive sleep apnea is when my airway becomes blocked during sleep because of "over relaxment". With it being blocked it has two main outward appearances. First is I can snore very loud, the second is that I stop breathing.
In terms of snoring - its so loud my next door neighbour can hear me. In terms of breathing it means I wake up regularly during the night gasping for breathe (My wife notices this, but I don't have any recollection). There are some serious none visible signs which I will come to.
About 4 weeks ago I undertook a sleep study. This basically involved sleeping with some monitoring equipment that, in fact, made sleep difficult. I had a monitor across my chest, a monitor up my nose and a finger monitor for oxygen levels. I did sleep eventually. Today I received the results which confirmed my condition, one that my wife knew about.
The results were "interesting". During my sleep study, on average, I woke up to restart breathing 20 times per hour, however on one occasion I woke up 70 times (70) in one hour. I have no recollection of this at all. In terms of obstruction and not sleeping, my average was in the region of 20 seconds each time it occurred, but there was one monitor that observed me not breathing for nearly 83 seconds - 1 minute 23. I have tried to hold my breathe for that long tonight and its frightening because I can't. To me these are scary results.
We asked what could happen if not treated. This response was as shocking as the values monitored above. Being overweight I have always suffered from high blood pressure as we as a high craving for the nice food of life. However it looks as though the high blood pressure has been caused by the sleep apnea. Obstructive sleep apnea causes your blood pressure to go off the scale, apparently as I understand it because your body is not exhaling the carbon dioxide from your lungs, and hence your oxygen levels in the blood are dropping. This can then cause blood clots and consequently strokes, heart disease and death. Frightening.
Cutting this short, the upshot is I now have to wear a CPAP mask (Continuos Positive Airway Pressure), which prevents the blockage to my airways occurring and prevents the snoring. It is a mask and a half and is not pretty in bed, but the consultant at the N&N has said it was radically change my life in terms of energy.
The mask arrives on Saturday and I will at some point post a picture of what I look like to give you an idea.
posted by monty at
10:24 PM
2 Comments:
bbc news did some stuff on this the other morning, they reckon loads of people suffer from it, hope the mask does the job!
Well I'm glad you've got a diagnosis and can start treatment soon. Hopefully you'll feel the benefits instantly.
Have you considered starting Weightwatchers (or was it Slimming World?) again? I know you got good results last time. As they say, every little helps...
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