If you have other Heath issues besides OSA

[Finnc]

Do you ever get frustrated?

First let me say since getting use to sleeping with the cpap, I can't imagine not using it. So I am not giving up BUT.

I have other Heath issues that Interfere with ever feeling rested. My thyroid was killed two years ago and the doctors have struggled to get my levels corrected. I am with a new doctor that is getting me closer but still not there. I may have narcolepsy, I will be tested for that after my thyroid is settled and I have been on cpap for 3-6 months.

The reason I am so frustrated though is I want to badly to wake up with energy and feel like cleaning my house, taking a walk, going out with friends. I have become totally reclusive and it's effecting my relationship with my husband and son.

I guess this is really more a vent. I was in perfect Heath before my thyroid and now have OSA, liver problems, kidney problems, fatigue, I'm over weight for the first time in my life. It just kinda sucks.

[Goofproof]

Most of us had other things going on medically, some are worse from Sleep Apnea, some are caused by Life and Aging!

Unless someone invents a WayBack Machine, I'm afraid we will have to live with it. We are dealt this Hand, we have two choices, Pass or Play. Jim

[Pugsy]

Sure.. I still get frustrated and sometimes worse than others.

FWIW...after 5 years of really good cpap therapy (on paper anyway), when I wake up in the mornings the first thing on my mind is NOT what sort of house cleaning am I up for today.
Well....to be honest house cleaning isn't something that is ever at the top of my "to do" list but I know what you mean.

Fixing the cpap apnea thing isn't all that easy itself ...with all the various issues we might have to sort through with masks and just adjusting to the therapy itself...but it is still easier than sorting through and fixing the other issues that we might have that also will impact how we feel each day in terms of energy levels (which is probably one of the first things we want to see hugely improved and are so disappointed when we don't wake up wanting to go run a marathon).

There's so much more to feeling good overall than just sleep itself. Not to mention sleep quality in general. The best sleep in the world with or without cpap therapy doesn't guarantee that we have what I call the "miracle"...where we wake up rearing to go run that marathon or tackle whatever chores we have been putting off.
There's just too much "other" stuff that affects us and the cpap machine can't fix it no matter how much we want it to or how good of a job it does with the sleep apnea aspect of things.

My bad sleep has been fixed with effective cpap therapy...that part was relatively easy for me to obtain. Found a mask right away that suited my needs and after a couple of weeks of a little bit of pressure tweaking the OSA was well controlled.
What wasn't fixed was my bad sleep due to numerous wake up from pain. That little problem is something I always will have to deal with. Sometimes I win and sometimes the pain wins.

In general at first instead of concentrating on what wasn't "fixed" in terms of how I felt, I decided to concentrate on what was fixed by cpap therapy and the 2 biggest things for me was the nocturia and waking up with killer morning headaches from the oxygen drops. Those went away pretty quickly. Those are both common signs of OSA but not everyone has them so it makes it harder to evaluate the success of therapy without some sort of significant marker.
The energy levels and excessive daytime sleepiness were much more difficult for me to measure. I came to realize that both energy levels and daytime sleepiness was directly related to hours of good quality solid sleep with minimal awakenings.
Anything less than 6 hours and it doesn't matter if it was fragmented or not...I don't feel nearly as good as when I get 7 to 8 hours. Heck...even 8 hours with a ton of awakenings due to pain is going to guarantee that I don't feel so great.
So this pain thing is something I know is just something that is a factor I deal with and will always have to deal with.
I deal with it better knowing that my sleep with the cpap machine is at least not letting the other possible issues cloud how I feel even more.

Let's face it...getting older and dealing with the problems that come with the body aging might be a PITA but it's still better than the alternatives which to me are...the stroke or heart attack that comes up short and we end up with significant disabilities or they don't come up short and we end up planted underground or consumed in fire if cremation is a person's thing.

I do try to look for the positives whenever I can. Negatives are always easy to find and sometimes those positives are elusive but sometimes it helps to think more on the positives while working on improving the negatives.

So this is what I think the first thing I wake up and running the marathon isn't on my to do list...at least I don't wake up feeling like I just ran that marathon and got run over by a truck at the end of it.

[Finnc]

I guess I should be thankful I do get up and get ready for for my day and I at least get a couple hours in before I feel like I am just gonna crash where before cpap I was sleeping 15 hours a day and still was exhausted. But I really do enjoy my cpap and how it seems to relax me before I go to sleep and before I get up. This morning I laid there forever with it on.

[Pugsy]

If it's any help to you....it was at least 3 months of optimal therapy before I started to see much improvement in my "energy" levels and then the improvement was very gradual. The nocturia and headaches going away was pretty much overnight and if the only improvement I ever saw was the absence of the nocturia it would be so worth it to me. I used to wake up almost every hour on the hour with a painfully full bladder. That alone was a huge disruption to my sleep quality and if the only benefit I ever had from cpap use was that went away...so totally worth it to me.

I still get some morning headaches every now and then but the killer headaches are gone. Mostly now my headaches are related to my cervical spine issues which are part of my pain issues and I just deal with them as they happen.

I am still not a morning person...never have been...even pre OSA and I know I haven't had it all my life. My OSA was a nice little gift from menopause...not only did my boobs, belly and butt start to sag...so did my airway tissues.
Zero apnea symptoms prior to menopause. It's very common for menopause to give us women that little gift of saggy airway tissues along with everything else going south too.

I hate to sound like a PollyAnna (anyone remember that movie?) but when I start to feel sorry for myself for what is going on in my life...it usually doesn't take much for me to realize that my little problems are nothing compared to what some people have to deal with. Yeah..I had a broken back but I can still walk...might be with a limp and some days worse than others but I can walk. I think that I am generally very fortunate indeed and this helps keep my "pity parties" to a minimum...we all have them but I don't stay at those parties very long if I can help it at all.

[Goofproof]

If it's any help to you....it was at least 3 months of optimal therapy before I started to see much improvement in my "energy" levels and then the improvement was very gradual. The nocturia and headaches going away was pretty much overnight and if the only improvement I ever saw was the absence of the nocturia it would be so worth it to me. I used to wake up almost every hour on the hour with a painfully full bladder. That alone was a huge disruption to my sleep quality and if the only benefit I ever had from cpap use was that went away...so totally worth it to me.

I still get some morning headaches every now and then but the killer headaches are gone. Mostly now my headaches are related to my cervical spine issues which are part of my pain issues and I just deal with them as they happen.

I am still not a morning person...never have been...even pre OSA and I know I haven't had it all my life. My OSA was a nice little gift from menopause...not only did my boobs, belly and butt start to sag...so did my airway tissues.
Zero apnea symptoms prior to menopause. It's very common for menopause to give us women that little gift of saggy airway tissues along with everything else going south too.

I hate to sound like a PollyAnna (anyone remember that movie?) but when I start to feel sorry for myself for what is going on in my life...it usually doesn't take much for me to realize that my little problems are nothing compared to what some people have to deal with. Yeah..I had a broken back but I can still walk...might be with a limp and some days worse than others but I can walk. I think that I am generally very fortunate indeed and this helps keep my "pity parties" to a minimum...we all have them but I don't stay at those parties very long if I can help it at all.

Maybe if Pity Parties served better Food and Drinks, we'd stay longer....
The atmosphere is a little heavy too. Jim

[Finnc]

If it's any help to you....it was at least 3 months of optimal therapy before I started to see much improvement in my "energy" levels and then the improvement was very gradual. The nocturia and headaches going away was pretty much overnight and if the only improvement I ever saw was the absence of the nocturia it would be so worth it to me. I used to wake up almost every hour on the hour with a painfully full bladder. That alone was a huge disruption to my sleep quality and if the only benefit I ever had from cpap use was that went away...so totally worth it to me.

I still get some morning headaches every now and then but the killer headaches are gone. Mostly now my headaches are related to my cervical spine issues which are part of my pain issues and I just deal with them as they happen.

I am still not a morning person...never have been...even pre OSA and I know I haven't had it all my life. My OSA was a nice little gift from menopause...not only did my boobs, belly and butt start to sag...so did my airway tissues.
Zero apnea symptoms prior to menopause. It's very common for menopause to give us women that little gift of saggy airway tissues along with everything else going south too.

I hate to sound like a PollyAnna (anyone remember that movie?) but when I start to feel sorry for myself for what is going on in my life...it usually doesn't take much for me to realize that my little problems are nothing compared to what some people have to deal with. Yeah..I had a broken back but I can still walk...might be with a limp and some days worse than others but I can walk. I think that I am generally very fortunate indeed and this helps keep my "pity parties" to a minimum...we all have them but I don't stay at those parties very long if I can help it at all.

My pity party has lasted way to long honestly. I just hate being so different from who I was. And damn it I want my perky boobs back!! Lol. Hopefully things are gonna just keep getting better since I have all new doctors that are determined to get me back to maybe not my old self but at least the best new self I can be.

[Davidwnc]

The reason I am so frustrated though is I want to badly to wake up with energy and feel like cleaning my house, taking a walk, going out with friends.

Ummmmm, when you do start to wake up and feel like cleaning the house, you are welcome to come for a visit!

[Finnc]

pay my way and it's a deal!!!

[bwexler]

You mean menopause caused my throat to get floppy which caused my OSA.
I wish I had known that sooner.

[Finnc]

I went through peri pause at 32 and didn't have a floppy throat or boobs. That waited until I hit 41.

[RicaLynn]

Maybe if Pity Parties served better Food and Drinks, we'd stay longer....
The atmosphere is a little heavy too. Jim

Oh woe is me! Jim owes me a new keyboard 'cause I spewed coffee all over mine!

[Pugsy]

You mean menopause caused my throat to get floppy which caused my OSA.
I wish I had known that sooner.

You are a guy aren't you? I forget.

It's commonly known that for women when the hormone production starts to decline with menopause that things get saggy.
I have often wondered if the male counterpart happens when men's hormones start to decrease.
Of course we can't blame it all on hormones in women but OSA development is common with menopause.
When I first met my now husband in 2002 I had no OSA symptoms at all but was just beginning the menopause thing...hot flashes and all that crap. I elected to not pursue hormone replacement therapy due to breast cancer history in my family. So just toughed it out.
My symptoms of OSA didn't present until probably 2005...the snores, the fatigue, the nocturia, the killer headaches, taking a nap at 9 AM....had none of that when I first met my husband and he says he never saw me stop breathing in those early years we were together.

[ClementineHearts]

I get this. I'm 26 years old, and a lot of time I feel extremely frustrated that I have to deal with sleep apnea, poly-cystic ovarian syndrome, severe obsessive-compulsive disorder, and being overweight. I do take comfort in the fact that treating sleep apnea can help me out in some of the other areas (weight loss, decrease some stress so the OCD isn't as bad, etc.), but I did cry a lot the first night I used my CPAP and I woke up tired. I think I had pinned all my hopes on this miraculous "waking up to birds singing and feeling like dancing" moment, and of course that doesn't happen. :-/

[kaiasgram]

You mean menopause caused my throat to get floppy which caused my OSA.
I wish I had known that sooner.

You are a guy aren't you? I forget.

Couvade-type thing?