Hubby going for to sleep clinic for apnea!!
 

Tonight my dh is going to have the sleep apnea study done. He is definatly going to need the machine to sleep. He stops breathing for anywhere from 23 seconds to 30 seconds at a time.

Does anyone else have experience with the machine to sleep?

I do not have personal experience with this but I have a uncle who uses one. It was strange for him at first but he actually feels rested when he gets up now :) Good luck with this.:)

My Mom needed it for a few years before her death. She was in great shape, not overweight and active, but it still hit her. Without, you run the risk of ....Dying. Not something your partner wants to wake up to. Many people hate the machime, my Mom being one of them . Also have a friend who was on it, and he lost a bunch of weight, and no longer needs it. It sure beats the alternative.

I agree. I mean he stops breathing, stirs, then stops breathing again. He is looking forward to getting a good nights sleep. He could stand to loose a bit of weight also, but he has been doing this forever. He has been sleeping in the living room on a recliner for a while now because he hates the bed.. As soon as his head falls back in the chair he stops breathing!

I don't even think he will get through the test. They might just put him on the machine after a little bit. That's how bad he is. I actually videoed him so he could see for himself.

I am nervous but I don't know why!!:confused:

I hope it all works out, for the both of you. Maybe with the machine, he will be encouraged to lose a few pounds. Sometimes that is all it takes, but is not universal. WOrst case, he will sleep well, and his health will improve. You may need seperate rooms though after a while. I remember the machine, while not what I would call loud, is annoying. Maybe they are better now. Good luck.

Thanks :)

2 friends of DH have machines and they love them, they say best sleep they ever had. I think my DH is next~

My SIL's dad uses one and I think it really helps him.
My Mom did the clinic and they wanted her to get the machine and she took it home to test it and she didn't think she could adjust to it!
Good luck!

My husband has been diagnosed with sleep apnea for 10-12 years but he's only been able to use the machine, CPAP, for the past 5 months. He was never able to tolerate the mask because he is a mouth breather, he can't breathe through his nose, his passages are too small even after two nasal surgeries.

So, if you can't breathe through your nose, the only option used to be a full face mask that covers your nose and mouth. My husband has heart failure and pretty significant asthma, so the full face mask just made him feel like he was smothering. He said it felt like he had a bag over his head. He wore nasal oxygen at night while sleeping to keep his oxygen levels from dropping dangerously low due to the apnea episodes - but oxygen does nothing for the apnea.

A few months ago the nurse practitioner at his pulmonary doc's office told him about a mouth piece that goes into your mouth, like a scuba or snorkeling mouthpiece. There's nothing over your face or nose, just inside your mouth. Guess what! It worked for him. Now, he still HATES the machine, but he can tolerate it and sleep with it. Even though he denies it, he wakes more refreshed and requires less sleep. He is quiet in the bed - yep, I know what it is like to have the person you sleep with "wiggle" all the time due to apnea episodes - it's not pretty!

Also, for those of you who have sleep apnea or know someone who does and does not use the machine - there is a strong connection between sleep apnea and heart failure. Some research suggests sleep apnea causes heart failure - of course they can't be sure. But sure enough, my husband developed heart failure of unknown origin (it is usually caused by a heart attack - but he did not have a heart attack). So, my husband's heart failure might have been caused by his sleep apnea. Of course, we can't be sure - but since he has been able to use the machine, his heart function has improved and he is feeling much better. We also changed some of his heart meds, so maybe that is part or all of it, we just don't know.

The point is that treating sleep apnea is very very very important!!!

My DH has to sleep with a c pap. It doesn't bother me at all compared to his snoring etc. that he used to do before the c pap machine. His is very bad also, so much that his heart was enlarged and only working 20%:(So he had to see a heart doctor who had to put him on heart meds. Hope everything works out well for him.

I'm very sorry to hear this! I hope his heart is working better now that he is using cpap! It usually helps a lot!

Also, I meant to say the machines are very very quiet now - but if you can hear it, use a fan or a white noise machine. My hubby's oxygen machine is VERY noisy so we sleep with a ceiling fan and another fan.

No experience with the machine myself. I have sleep apnea too, but only minor--5 second spurts. (When I'm awake too.) My sister also has it, she went for sleep studies, but they never recommended a breathing regulator for her.

Just curious, does your hubby have chronic sinus and allergy issues? Both my sister and myself do and we were told that they could attribute to it and probably were the cause in our cases.

I started on a machine in Jan. I couldn't fall asleep and was up every hour. It has changed my sleep pattern. I can sleep 5-6 hours at a time without waking and sometimes I fall asleep within 15 minutes. It was hard to adjust but after I got over the panic and accepted that I needed it, it became asier. I do not sleep with it on all night but I try to sleep several hours with it. It will change his life. I have encouraged other to get a study done. I am hoping that with weight change Ican shed the machine. I am small framed and do not look really fat just its to much weight for my frame which contributed to it. I've lost about 10lbs so 20 more to go and I can get another study. Good luck and be positive. It doesn't work overnight. He will see the difference over a few weeks

GOOD LUCK with the test - my (late) husband had it horribly and it was very scary.....It totally inhibits sleep and also to me is dangeous to have it - I hope you find the answers he needs....

Thank you everyone for your input. My dh had been doing this for 22 years. He just had knee surgery in Jan and they said he has the heart of an ox. Thank goodness. He is actually looking forward to getting a decent nights sleep. I think I can deal with the noise of the machine.

He is at the sleep clinic now. He spent the night there and has had to take "naps" all through the day today. He hates the wires of course and is sooooo bored. He is so used to sleeping on the recliner that he is very uncomfortable on the flat bed. We will see what happens after all is said and done. He really need this to be fixed. He is just so tired all the time. You could be talking to him one minute then the next minute he is out like a light snoring :eek: Hopefully this also will push him to lose some weight !!! I hope!!!
I will let you guys know how he does when we find out.

Thanks

Thank you for keeping us updated. I did not realize they keept him for the day also.

My husband just got his machine and he is only 45 and I hate it. That machine is loud enough for me to hear even with our ceiling fan on that we are doing separate rooms now and I'm sick about it. We've only been married 7 years and this sucks. He is probably 30 pounds overweight and I keep begging him to lose the weight so we don't need the machine but oh well he would rather take a pill or machine to help him out. Whereas me I would do anything to not take medications or machines.:(:(:( Maybe he'll miss me and start to lose weight to get back into the bedroom..lol.:eek::D:rolleyes:

Jmdt - I have horrible insomnia and they finally decided to do a sleep study on me (ugh, I despise sleep studies :() - bc btwn Jan 09 and Oct 09, I was sleeping about 2-4 hours a night. I was, and still am, underweight (due to all the stress) - so they all thought "no way on the apnea, but let's just do the study" bc nothing they tried could get me to sleep. On that note, btw, it does turn out that 50% of people who *have* apnea are of normal weight - so this means there are a lot of people who have apnea, but are undiagnosed bc the misconception is that it is mostly seen in higher weight people.

So anyway, turns out, I do have it. Luckily, it's mild/moderate. Depending upon the severity and the cause (specifically) of the apnea, another option for apnea is dental appliances - and this is what I use, bc there was no way I'd be able to sleep w/ a CPAP. So, I have the Somnomed MAS Flex. I started using it mid-December. So convenient!

I had my follow-up sleep study to test efficacy, and I had 0 apnea events during the study :). So, don't know if your husband's diagnosis would have an option for this, but thought I'd mention it. I'm so glad he is getting this figured out, bc apnea can really be dangerous. Please keep us posted :).

My husband and I both have it and it has changed our life. It is wonderful. Tell him to relax and accept his new sleep buddy. It will help his health, your sleep and improve life.

First, :( Cyndi....oh man, I'm so sorry! That has to be really difficult for you. :( Hugs!

John has a type of sleep apnea that requires a special servo or VPap machine. I don't really understand all of it, but it's even more complicated than the regular Cpap machine. He's still getting used to it, and even that was put on hold recently because of problems with his gallbladder/ pancreas. Anyway...the machine is better than his snoring and when I would wake up to make sure he was still breathing. The machine is annoying, but I've found that earplugs help. :thumbup:

It is a little like sleeping with Darth Vader though. :eek::p

Oh and one warning. The pups had a harder time getting used to it than I did. They would bark at him at first when he had his mask on.

The nurse also told us to watch out and keep them from messing with the hoses. They are easy to damage

Hi Judy! Gary actually has a different kind of sleep apnea too and he uses a BiPAP machine - who knew there were so many different types.

Gary says he has to put on his elephant trunk to go to bed! LOL!!!

Wow this sounds like it's going to be fun!!! :rolleyes:

Hey to you too!! :) It's also amazing how many people deal with these issues. It sort of does look like an elephant trunk doesn't it? lol!

Don't let us scare you off. You'll find ways to make it work. :thumbup:

Thanks for the support. I'm sure everything will be fine. This study was way, way overdue!!! I hope it helps him get some rest. We have things do do ya know!!!:p

There are always so many things to do, places to go, things to see:) I hope you and DH have a blast when this is done and he can get a lot of real nites sleep.

I am curious about this because I think I suffer from sleep apnea. I am always tired and sometimes I could very easily fall asleep at my desk at work. I was thinking that I could have have narcolepsy? (self-diagnosing). I just get soooo sleepy during the day even if I go to bed at 11 pmish and sleep til 6 a.m.

My mil had a cpat machine, I don't think I could do that though. Curious, is it expensive to get testing done and how does one go about it?

My husband has a c-pap machine. Sometimes when his allergies are really acting up and he's all stuffy, he can't stand to have the mask on. But when he uses it, he feels great. His test results were really high.... can't remember exactly how many times he stopped breathing but it was so many that they stopped the testing early and gave him the machine for the rest of the night. There have been some really serious times when he stopped breathing for longer than usual and he would wake up and fly out of bed thinking that he was being suffocated. Scares the crap out of everybody when that happens. It does take some getting adjusted to but the feeling of being refreshed after a real nights sleep is well worth it.