Follow up to "Peaceful Sleep?"

As a follow up to my Sleep Apnea post I talked with my father about how he has coped with being diagnosed with sleep apnea and his treatment with the CPAP machine. My father was diagnosed with sleep apnea about four years ago. My mother forced him to go to the doctor because at night he would snore so loudly it would wake everyone up. Sometimes he would snore so loudly that he would wake himself up. Although I found it funny the first time I saw him do it, I knew it was not good for his sleep routine.

 He would wake up in the morning tired as though he had not even slept during the night. He technically was not sleeping during the night, when he was snoring during the night he was trying to breathe. With sleep apnea you stop breathing during the night and the snoring is your body trying to restart itself. When I learned about sleep apnea I became fearful for my father because some people with sleep apnea don’t wake up or restart their breathing when they are asleep and die. At first with the CPAP machine my father was a little uncomfortable because of the face mask but he was waking up well rested in the morning.

The way my father coped with his diagnosis from what I seen was by remaining calm. I believe that do to the fact that his diagnosis was controllable. There was a solution to his sleeping problem and it was not invasive. When he first got the machine he did immediately use it, he didn’t just look at the box and set it aside. There was slight difficulty with figuring out how to use the machine but eventually he got it together. After a few days that is when we saw a change in him.

 He was actually waking up in good moods now, he wasn’t as tired as he was before. My father reminded me of Darth Vader from Star Wars because he had the whole face mask and when he would talk with the mask on he sounded just like him. The sound of the machine doesn’t disturb my mother because it is almost a soothing sound to her, kind of like the machines that make the rain forest and ocean noises. The machine doesn’t make any crazy noises like a VCR use to; it is easy to tone out. My father said sleeping with his mask now is easy because he is not a wild sleeper. He lays on either his side or back and doesn’t do much moving. The way the mask is positioned on his face if he turns around in bed the tube doesn’t coil around his neck.

I’m happy to say both my father and mother adjusted fairly well to his diagnosis of sleep apnea and the usage of the CPAP machine. They are both happy especially my mom. Her sleep is no longer disturbed by his snoring and he can now sleep peacefully through the night. I am happy my father actually uses his machine because the fact some people don’t wake up scares me.