Posted on December 3, 2019
Do you have sleep apnea (where your airway closes off-you wake up to breathe- fall asleep again- wake up again and cycle like this all night)?
Please see my other blogs on why your sleep is so important to you in general, but for my purposes, why it sleep so important to you around the time of surgery.
Many people don’t realize that they have sleep apnea. Here are 10 common symptoms you do.
- SNORING. Of course. This is the best known symptom. Does your partner complain? Can people hear you snoring through closed doors?
- CHOKING or GASPING WHILE SLEEPING. This can happen once a night or hundreds of times depending on how bad your apnea is.
- CAN’T FALL ASLEEP or STAY ASLEEP. If you know you have apnea, it may cause anxiety which makes it hard to fall asleep. Sometimes a patient’s own snoring wakes them out of sleep.
- DISTURBED SLEEP. High quality sleep needs alternating cycles of REM and non-REM sleep. You need to be asleep for a while before you enter REM sleep. IF you don’t enter REM, the quality of your sleep falls drastically, which lets you wake up feeling fatigued.
- FREQUENTLY WAKING UP WITH A SORE THROAT. Many sleep apnea patients sleep with their mouth open. This allows those moist mucous membranes of the mouth to dry out, leaving you with a sore throat when you wake up.
- WEIGHT GAIN. When you don’t sleep well, your body make an excess of a hormone called ghrelin, which signals our body to eat. It also makes the body make less of a hormone called leptin, which tells us to stop eating. It can make your body insulin resistant, which causes excess insulin production. See a scientific article on this HERE.
- FEELING SLEEPY ALL DAY. Many patients wake up feeling they haven’t slept. Fatigue and weakness are common. Some other health issues like atrial fibrillation and pulmonary hypertension can get worse because of a decrease in overall oxygen levels.
- FORGETFULNESS. Likely due to lack of oxygen, which causes damage to the brain cells associated with memory and concentration. *Important for kids learning in school, and may cause them to be hyperactive or angry. Sometimes they are misdiagnosed as ADD.
- MOOD SWINGS. This is due to chronic fatigue. Irritable? Impatient? Anxious? Frustrated? Lack of ability to focus?
- LACK OF INTEREST IN SEX. Testosterone increases when we sleep. If you aren’t sleeping well, the levels may decrease causing erectile dysfunction and lack of desire. (NOTE: according to this author studies have shown hormone replacement for testosterone may worsen or cause sleep apnea)