Juggsy75 wrote: ↑Fri Oct 30, 2020 5:24 am
So I’m still having issues with my ahi, sometimes it’s great, sometimes not, I have a deviated septum and really struggle with nose congestion at night,
So I noticed the other night that I was having small leaks from under the mouth from mask, I attributed this to my mouth being open and jaw dropping back, so thought that’s why maybe my ahi is elevated.
So last night I fashioned my own chin strap, in hindsight it may have been a bit tight as I couldn’t open my mouth, anyway I woke at 4:30 this morning and checked my machine and it was 14.8
....... so removed the chinstrap and woke at 9 and it was 10 so I won’t be trying the chinstrap again, wife said I was making a choking snoring sound which I never do since cpap, I think maybe my nose blocked causing me to try to breathe through mouth which was limited due to not being able to open mouth
A long time ago when I first started, I went through a couple of dozen masks before I figured out what worked for me. I few things I learned along the way were:
I quickly realized that full face masks simply did not work for me. First of all, I have very sensitive sinuses and when placing pressure on my face around my nose, my sinuses would get inflamed and congested as the return flow of blood from my facial capilary vessels would back up with blood and swell up the sinus tissue. Second, as you seem to have noticed, full face masks (or those that cover the mouth) by design also place a force on your lower jaw pushing it back towards the throat (causing greater obstruction of my throat -- not good). Now that force varies from insignificant to quite significant depending to your head strap tension and if you toss and turn alot while sleeping that force/strap tension changes as you move your head from side to side or adjust your sleeping position causing chronic leaks. I am such a sleeper who tosses and turns and repositions my body while sleeping. Third I wear a beard and leaks were impossible to control.
For the same reason as the full face mask issue with my sinus congestion, nasal cushion masks don't work for me either
My only choice left was the nasal pillow masks. The issue then arose of burping puffs of air out of my mouth all night which was also a problem with mouth leaks plus sometimes they would wake me up depending upon what sleep stage I was in. My full mustache and beard made taping a nonviable solution unless I wanted to drastically change my appearance (but it was an option nonetheless). What I finally got to work for me was training my tongue stick to the roof of my mouth 100% of the time while awake and after a few weeks I would go to sleep with my tongue planted the roof of my mouth and the leaks stopped (IDK, muscle memory perhaps?). Many on the forum will poo poo idea saying all of your muscles relax when asleep ... so I don't know exactly why it works for me but it does. The only time I've noticed that it doesn't work is if I drink alcohol in the evening before bed ... but I very rarely drink alcohol now.
Finally, I also used to have sinus congestion such that one nostril or the other would always be clogged up. I grew up with that problem all of my life. Then about 10 years ago I started experimenting with my diet and while on a very low-carb diet I noticed that my clogged up sinuses mysteriously cleared up. And when I added carbs back into the diet, they would clog up again. I did some research and discovered that when going on a very low-carb diet or fasting for 24 hours or more, the body uses up all excess glucose and one of the things that high glucose creates is inflammation. Inflammation requires glycoproteins (mucous) which in turn requires available glucose. If glucose is limited, the inflammation is also reduced. So if you get a cold or flu, you can also reduce the inflammation by fasting.
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