Posted by BC on July 05, 2011 at 08:50:32:In Reply to: One person’s journey - cpap FAIL (s posted by sun dog on June 27, 2011 at 10:25:25:
It is hard when a treatment that is supposed to work turns out not to work for you. That must be very frustrating.
It is artificial to try to sleep with a hose and mask (or nasal pillows) attached to your face. I don't think any of us would claim it is an ideal way to sleep, and it makes sense that for some people the gains from CPAP would be more than balanced by the losses. For many of us, there really is little choice: I had so much daytime sleepiness that going without CPAP was not a viable option. But you don't seem to have been suffering (at least in terms of sleepiness) without CPAP, so it makes sense you may not get the same benefits.
Possibly there are ways that you could reduce the inconveniences of CPAP so it would interfere less with your sleep. For example, I find it much easier to have the tube attached to the mask at the top of my head rather than leaving it free, though that had no appeal to me at the beginning. Maybe that or other adjustments might help you to sleep better with CPAP.
On the other hand, I don't know that you need to try to adjust to CPAP. Is your doctor concerned about the health risks of not using CPAP?