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Sleep apnea is strange. Good news! We have a diagnosis, sleep apnea. You're bad at sleeping now, the thing everybody has to do all night long every day since b
by agrue 3y ago
Sleep apnea is strange.
Good news! We have a diagnosis, sleep apnea. You're bad at sleeping now, the thing everybody has to do all night long every day since birth. The solution is to wear a modern iron lung whenever you want or need to sleep forever. Many times it's because people are overweight but you aren't.
Is that really all there is for treatment? No throat exercises or therapeutic sleeping positions? No diets? No botox injections for your uvula or a daily pill to obviate breathing while sleeping?
- lmohseni 3y agoI read a book called Breath by James Nestor, it’s all about the benefits of nose breathing. Anecdotally this has completely fixed my sleep apnea/ snoring/ energy levels/ etc. Highly recommended!
- olejorgenb 3y agoAssoc https://hubermanlab.com/how-to-breathe-correctly-for-optimal-health-mood-learning-and-performance/ https://hubermanlab.com/how-to-breathe-correctly-for-optimal...
- EvanKnowles 3y agoWait, people aren't breathing through noses?
- senectus1 3y agoI found that I have to consciously close my mouth and "tell myself" to breath only through my nose. When I do this i sleep better.
- ghusbands 3y agoYou sleep better by consciously breathing through your nose at night? Or during the day?
- LoganDark 3y agoProbably by falling asleep with their mouth closed so that they breathe through their nose for the night.
- senectus1 3y agoyes this
- LoganDark 3y agoI know someone who has to make a "vacuum seal" with their mouth, that is, make some slight suction on the inside so that they won't drool in the night. Is it anything like that?
- senectus1 3y agoum... not consciously no. I think its more just being mindful. Something i feel we could all benefit from doing more of.
- LoganDark 3y ago> I think its more just being mindful. Something i feel we could all benefit from doing more of. Absolutely, I'm always surprised by the lack of this in some people. Like are they not self-aware or concerned at all? Just floating through the world existing? Ignorance is bliss but I sure wouldn't want to live like that myself.
- amanj41 3y agoI'm not sure if it started this way, but I mostly breathe through my mouth at night due to significant congestion in my nasal passage. If I use a nasal rinse or flonase it helps but if I'm not diligent it regresses immediately.
- khazhoux 3y agoGive this a shot for a week or two. Just jam these up there. It will be uncomfortable at first but you get used to it. Really opens you up and takes away a ton of resistance in nasal breathing. https://a.co/d/18eLtdw https://a.co/d/18eLtdw
- tsgagnon 3y agoI had to have my deviated septum surgically corrected back in my late teens before I was capable of breathing consistently through my nose. Even simple things like chewing with my mouth closed were difficult because I couldn't breath well enough with my nose only.
- stuffuru 3y agolots of people with chronic allergic or non-allergic rhinitis aren't able to breathe through their nose.
- dtech 3y agoNope, usually feel like I don't get enough air.
- dizhn 3y agoI thought I'd get a freebie there (like when you lose weight just by cutting soda - which I already don't drink. Another freebie lost), but when I paid attention I am breathing exclusively through my nose and to make matters worse my tongue is in the mewing position. So this is already the best case scenario for my weight, sleep and jawline. Bummer.
- vaylian 3y agoWhat are the best strategies for increasing nose breathing?
- stuffuru 3y agoLook into the EASE procedure by Dr. Kasey Li
- uptownfunk 3y agoHave you tried this? does this work?
- stuffuru 3y agoIt helped me. I no longer wake up feeling congested. The impact on sleep was more subtle. I had some prior complications so I wasn’t able to expand as much as the avg patient.
- sanman811 3y agoI would also suggest looking into the Oxygen Advantage system. Just finished reading the Breathing Cure by Patrick McKeown, makes some interesting claims but mostly found helpful exercises to retrain nasal breathing
- eth0up 3y agoHis book "Deep" remains one of my very favorite books of all books, and I've turned a fair stack of pages. It's a different kind of medicine though; for me, it revived my soul, if there is such a thing.
- mkmk 3y ago>No throat exercises or therapeutic sleeping positions? No diets? No botox injections for your uvula or a daily pill to obviate breathing while sleeping? Since OP's apnea is not obstructive, sleeping position, botox, etc. won't make a difference.
- agrue 3y agoThis is what I was talking about. The patient has apnea type b. The prognosis remains Bad at Sleeping, use iron lung type b with no alternatives. Most people have type a and use iron lung type a, there are some treatments for this type but most people opt for the iron lung.
- mabbo 3y agoDiagnosed at 24 with sleep apnea. I tried a bunch of things. What worked for me was regular cardio exercise and daily doses of high absorption magnesium. The magnesium is absolutely unproven pseudoscience nonsense that can't possibly work. But if I stop taking it my sleep suffers massively.
- br3akaway 3y agoCould you share your magnesium preparation and dose? If you are deficient in magnesium, the mechanism I would guess is that neck muscles are unable to relax and constrict the action of weaker muscles used for breathing.
- mabbo 3y agohttps://drbvitamins.com/products/doctor-s-best-high-absorption-magnesium-100-chelated-with-albion-minerals-100-mg-240-tablets-16567 https://drbvitamins.com/products/doctor-s-best-high-absorpti... That's the good stuff. Constantly hard to find in Canada. Edit: also this is literally the first time anyone has ever provided me with any idea if why it might actually work. So seriously, thank you for that.
- scruple 3y agoWhen I'm deep into half-marathon+ training, I (personally, not scientifically) observe that I become zinc and magnesium deficient. I simply will not recover, I will feel extremely fatigued, etc. There's a lot of controversy over this, but I more or less have to take ZMA to sleep at night, to remain asleep at night, and to recover from the training load I am putting my body through (I also carry a 2-3x per week lifting load regardless of my running schedule).
- docandrew 3y agoI’ve read that a lot of people, especially men, are deficient in magnesium. It’s an essential mineral so I wouldn’t call your use of it pseudoscience by any stretch.
- telchior 3y agoI take magnesium for migraine and vertigo. Very much not a believer in supplements -- before this, I went through years of specialists prescribing various pharmaceuticals with various side effects. These days the problem is under control without any meds; I just take magnesium (specifically, a mix of l-threonate, glycinate and taurate), telling myself every day that it's probably unrelated to my feeling better. Like you said, it couldn't possibly be working as well as it seems to. But if I stop, my condition mysteriously gets worse. If it's a placebo.. eh, who cares?
- n8henrie 3y agoTo me, it certainly seems to suggest an environmental cause (or at least significant contributor). Certainly doesn't seem evolutionarily adaptive for such a large proportion of the population to live with profound mental and physical fatigue. Obesity is an obvious confounder, but these seemingly frequent front-page HN sleep apnea posts usually abound with anecdotes of normal / thin individuals with significant issues.
- martindbp 3y agoAlways wondered if not most of our sleep issues would go away if we spent a few days or weeks camping in the wild without electricity. Unfortunately not a long term solution.
- lazyasciiart 3y agoAn easy hypothesis to check given the millions of people who do exactly that each summer. The answer appears to be that if your sleep quality issues are lifestyle related and you are simply unable to make yourself practice sleep 'hygiene', then yes, it shift your sleep cycle to fall asleep earlier. If you do already practice proper sleep hygiene but still can't sleep normally, or if you have any kind of physical problem like sleep apnea, then no.
- agrue 3y agoThank you, this is what I'm driving at. The conversation includes very little discussion of cause or actual treatment beyond symptom mitigation.
- diob 3y agoI have sleep apnea, not overweight. I wish there was more research poured into a solution that isn't pseudoscience junk or predatory. Grateful to the inventors of the cpap though, changed my life.
- ratg13 3y agoIf it’s obstructive, you can learn to play the digeredoo After about 3-4 months you should notice your condition improve
- redundantly 3y ago> The solution is to wear a modern iron lung whenever you want or need to sleep forever Calling it an iron lung is extremely disingenuous. The Iron Lung uses negative pressure and had to be used 24x7 to keep the patient alive because their lungs weren't able work on their own. They had no mobility and were confined to a bed for the rest of their lives. CPAP / APAP machines use positive pressure and only assist with breathing while asleep, when apnea events occur. It does not replace lung functionality, it only assists. Yeah, having to use a CPAP/APAP at night can be bothersome, some people have a very hard time adjusting to using one. However, comparing it to using an iron lung is ridiculous.
- sillysaurusx 3y agoIt's hyperbole, but the comparison isn't without some merit. My grandma stopped using it because it's troublesome, and I've heard many people voice the same. Getting into an iron lung each night would also be ... troublesome.
- redundantly 3y agoYou don't climb in and out of an iron lung. If you're using one you're in it 24x7.
- bethekind 3y agoIirc iron lungs are better than CPAP, as the positive pressure caused by CPAP, if too big can stress the lungs. Iron lungs use negative pressure so they don't suffer from this
- agrue 3y agoIron lung use was not 24x7 for all patients. Saying so might be considered by some to be extremely disingenuous or even ridiculous. https://www.npr.org/2021/10/25/1047691984/decades-after-polio-martha-is-among-the-last-to-still-rely-on-an-iron-lung-to-br https://www.npr.org/2021/10/25/1047691984/decades-after-poli...
- agrue 3y ago
- elric 3y agoNothing works anywhere near as well as PAP therapy. Certainly not diets (overweight is often an effect of apnea, not a cause). Sleeping positions can help in the case of positional apnea, but certainly not for everyone. Botox injections anywhere will have to be repeated regularly. Fucking with the uvala (like in UPPP surgery) can actually worsen sleep apnea and has all kinds of nasty infection and side effect risks. PAP therapy works. The biggest problem with it is that it has a bad reputation, which is largely caused by doctors and sleep clinics not doing their fucking jobs. Patients are often sent home with a CPAP machine, titrated to some semi-random setting which happened to be fine for the night of their sleep study in an artificial environment. And that's it. Goodbye and good luck. That's such a messed up way of treating people with a life-long ailment ...
- agrue 3y agoThanks for your detailed response, but the things I listed were entirely in jest. I don't think the uvula causes sleep apnea and don't believe a pill would be able to obviate breathing while sleeping.
- elric 3y agoHaha I totally missed that, my bad! The uvula thing is pretty scary, some people have it removed entirely in an effort to treat sleep apnea, and from what I hear it seems to help at first, but then often gets worse again (maybe because scar tissue is less strong than regular tissue?).
- ignite 3y agoThere absolutely are therapeutic sleeping positions. Sleep on your side. Google it for yourself or https://www.sleepcycle.com/sleep-apnea/optimal-sleep-positions-for-sleep-apnea/#:~:text=Sleeping%20on%20the%20left%20side,less%20severe%20sleep%20apnea%20occurrences https://www.sleepcycle.com/sleep-apnea/optimal-sleep-positio....
- acomar 3y agothis worked for me for a while but in the last year, I've started getting episodes even though I've taught myself to sleep on my side, breathe through my mouth, keep my airway open by tilting my chin away from my chest, etc.. these kinds of techniques only work so well.
- m463 3y agoMy journey was: 1) side sleep - didn't work after a while 2) cpap with giant over-the-nose mask - I couldn't stand it and I rejected it 3) a boil-and-bite mouthguard to keep my jaw in place and not sliding back - didn't work after a while 4) same cpap as #2, but with nasal pillows - has worked since then by the way, I had to really learn to breathe through my nose for #4. I guess I didn't always do that, especially with allergies. losing weight, exercise - good for me, but didn't solve it
- Jeff_Brown 3y agoI lost the ability to change positions while sleeping after having open-heart surgery and having to sleep immobile for months. I wish I knew how to get that back. My searches online yield nothing.