Welcome to the ranks of the hosenose brigade! May you have many nights of refreshing sleep as one of us.
I have been using my CPAP for about 2 years and I have never slept so well.
I am convinced it has saved my life, my obstructive sleep apnea was so severe.
I use the full face mask as my yap tends to fall open with the nose only mask or the pillows. I tried the strap to hold my mouth shut but it is just way too damn hot for me. It’s like wearing a stocking cap too bed.
Good luck to you with your new machine. I hope it works out for you.
You’d have to fight me to take mine away.
Congrats. It is hard for me to believe I’ve been on CPAP now for 6+ months. Totally life changing and like another poster stated - you’d have to fight me to take it away. I no longer fall asleep mid-day from sheer exhaustion. I am now alert and able to focus on my work each day. I have more energy and a better attitude from not being sleep deprived. When I wake up, it is with a great feeling of being well rested and ready to go - I’m not in a deep fog for the first hour feeling like I’m half asleep still and fighting to wake up.
As for romance, I have to admit it has had some impact. Once my mask goes on, it is like putting a line in the sand that we’re not having sex now. The spontaneity is impacted more than actual frequency. We just work around it and to be honest we are both happier that I’m sleeping and not dying every night. She also sleeps better as she isn’t being woken and worried all night as I kept stopping breathing over and over. We also can’t quite cuddle anymore while sleeping and it has caused some irritation to my girlfriend since the nasal pillow mask blows air out and if I turn on my side towards her she gets a blast of air.
Good luck and glad to hear your off to a good start. Expect some setbacks and challenges and keep at it.
Congrats. It is hard for me to believe I’ve been on CPAP now for 6+ months. Totally life changing and like another poster stated - you’d have to fight me to take it away. I no longer fall asleep mid-day from sheer exhaustion. I am now alert and able to focus on my work each day. I have more energy and a better attitude from not being sleep deprived. When I wake up, it is with a great feeling of being well rested and ready to go - I’m not in a deep fog for the first hour feeling like I’m half asleep still and fighting to wake up.
As for romance, I have to admit it has had some impact. Once my mask goes on, it is like putting a line in the sand that we’re not having sex now. The spontaneity is impacted more than actual frequency. We just work around it and to be honest we are both happier that I’m sleeping and not dying every night. She also sleeps better as she isn’t being woken and worried all night as I kept stopping breathing over and over. We also can’t quite cuddle anymore while sleeping and it has caused some irritation to my girlfriend since the nasal pillow mask blows air out and if I turn on my side towards her she gets a blast of air.
Good luck and glad to hear your off to a good start. Expect some setbacks and challenges and keep at it.
Wow! Deja vu. 
BMalion, I am glad it’s working for you and adapting to the machine isn’t posing a problem.
There are some forums you might be interested in monitoring. There is some good info about new products, support, and a lot of other things related to CPAP on them.
cpap talk
Apnea Board
Apnea Support
Many of us are interested in being involved in our treatment and want to know what the results of it are.
Depending on which CPAP machine you have you can buy or download free software that will allow you to see what is going on while you sleep. If you have a Resmed or a Philips Respironics machine you can download this free program Sleepy Head
This is an example of my data HERE
This is just a small portion of the two pages but does show the apnea events and AHI variation.
Many of us have our own recording oxiometer so we can see what is happening with oxygen levels while we sleep. If you search for Contec CMS50E oxiometer you can see what it looks like. Prices vary a lot but I paid $80 for mine.
This is an example of my oxygen saturation data HERE
Right now I am using a fixed pressure but last winter I did a two week study on the auto pressure mode with min pressure of 5 inH2O and max of 15 inH2O and oxygen sat studies one night each week. Then repeated the above with a fixed pressure of 11 in H2O. This was done for my sleep doctor and the results emailed to him (We were in AZ for the winter)…
I mention this because some doctors are not not comfortable with you being involved in your treatment and some are. I prefer one that is okay with it.
My hospital sleep study titration resulted in a pressure recommendation of 13 inH20 and working with my doctor has allowed that to be dropped to a more desirable 11 inH20 with an AHI of 3.6 as opposed to 4.9 at 13 inH2O.
You might want to check into a different pillow model - some have the air going in a different direction that would be less of an issue. Obviously if you’re spooning, she’s at ground zero pretty much no matter what.
My pillows point the air downward, which means that if my arm is right in front of me as I’m side-sleeping, it gets the brunt. Making sure to have the sheet over the arm eliminates the problem.
I must say, I’m jealous of those for whom it’s been life-changing. I also have Restless Legs Syndrome, and something called Excessive Daytime Sleepiness (not quite a form of narcolepsy, but the treatment is the same).
I had sleep studies done in the 1999-2001 time frame which showed only mild apnea, not enough to treat. So I started finally dealing with the RLS with pharmaceuticals around 2005 or so. Much easier to fall asleep, but did fuck-all for my daytime energy levels.
Another study in early 2010 showed enough apnea to be worth treating, CPAP arrived, tolerated far better than I feared… did fuck-all for my daytime energy levels.
Another study in late 2010 (a 24-hour version), and despite adequate quantities of sleep I still fell asleep too fast during the daytime nap attempts. End result: daytime wakefulness-promoting meds. If I take them, AND get “enough” sleep, I can actually sort of function. Still feel like crap though, just more coherent crap :(.
My machine starts me at 4.0 then 20 minutes later moves me to 5.0.
I still take 10mg of Ambien before going to sleep. Eventually I’ll probubly stop even that.
Reported.