I say I'm blowing up like a balloon and it's escaping my mouth, waking me up and drying my throat. Dr. says it's"oral venting" and the air must not escape.
Posted Jan 17, 2023, 9:32 PM UTC
1035
Had a hospital sleep study on Sunday night. Lights off at 9 pm. Took nearly an hour to get to sleep. Then the tech comes in. “You are leaking air through your mouth. Just checking to see if your nasal mask is on right.”
Later “You are still leaking air. Let’s put this chin strap on you.”
Later “You are still leaking air, let’s try this heaven duty chin strap on.
Later “That didn’t work either.” Me: “I can feel the air bubbling through my lips, even with a chin strap.”
Later “Let’s try the full face mask.”
Later “We can’t get a good seal because of your beard. (Me: duh?) We’ll go back to the heavy duty chin strap and can it a night.
Later Wakes me up at 5 am and asks how I slept.
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Man oh man. So sorry to hear all that! When I was woken up at 6am, she not only asked how I slept but talked my ear off about everything under the sun. Like yo I know you’re winding down after your overnight shift but good lord I just woke up and feel like death as usual. Chill.
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I felt no problem telling the tech too leave the room in the morning because I needed a shower. I’m blunt when I’m grumpy. 🙂
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I only slept like 45 minutes in my last in lab study. I was also grumpy. But he let me leave early like 4:30, since I was just sitting there awake.
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Why are you all being forced to do an in lab study
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The data is so much better. The technician was tweaking the settings via remote control to see how I reacted.
Home resting is good but there are also a lot of confounding variables that can degrade data quality.
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Sounds frustrating. Thankfully I was able to do a take home test.
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One thing that has helped me is on the resmed nasal mask there is a vent on the front. You can feel air escaping through this vent. It helps to ground me and remind me that I can breathe out.
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Mouth tape, fixodent (LankyLefty has a video on this), double sided mouth guard, neck brace, are things i have heard about to combat this issue beyond a chin strap…I am currently trying somnifix, will let you know if it works. Goodluck
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Adjust your pressure, ramp and turn pressure relief on. I use a nasal mask and if I do wake up in the night I forget it’s even there. In the early days I used to worry that it wasn’t working as I felt nothing whatsoever. A quick release of the seal proves its still pushing constant pressure and nothing to worry about.
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It is called aerophagia. You're having trouble exhaling against the incoming pressure. You don't want to exhale thru your mouth. You need a pressure high enough to keep your AHI under 5 but low enough to be comfortable exhaling. That spot is different for each person. Possible solutions: chinstrap to keep your mouth shut and/or mouth tape for the same reason; have your MD look at reducing your top end pressure; switch on your EPR setting (that's the Airsense machines name for it).
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The first thing I thought of with blowing up like a balloon is changing your EPAP setting- the pressure you exhale against. It could be too high- that is if you have this setting and can adjust yourself. Also is your jaw dropping or jutting forward at all? Sometimes I do this and it causes the air to burst out of my mouth and wakes me up.
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I've changed the exhale pressure, and it helped a lot.
This issue has gone away, and I don't know why. I changed my pressure down a little, then back up to what was ordered by Dr. and the issue had stopped.
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That’s great news! Who knows the why but now you know how to hopefully stop it if it happens again.
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He insists I have to have a chin strap or something to keep my mouth closed so that I continue pumping full of air all night long, even though I've said I can't even exhale. Is that really how it's supposed to be?
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Yes. You’re not supposed to exhale through your mouth with a nasal mask. It takes some getting used to to exhale against the pressure. But once you get used to it you might not even noticed the pressure at all.
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I don't try to exhale out my mouth. It comes bursting out in the middle of night.
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I have to tape my mouth at night. When I’m falling asleep I can feel that back of my throat start to relax and the pressurized air pushes past my throat and into my mouth. If it’s taped then the pressure reroutes to where it’s supposed to go. I used to get chipmunk mouth but now it’s rare. When it happens just pull the mask off your nose briefly and the air will escape your mouth.
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The nasal mask is meant for you to inhale/exhale 100% through your nose. If you don’t have good air passage through your nose (like if you have a deviated septum or allergies, etc…) then the nasal one might not be for you.
Given the fact that I have a deviated septum and allergies, I’m a “mouth-breather” so I’m honestly surprised they started me with a nasal mask. So far so good but it definitely was a learning curve to train myself to breathe through my nose lol. I’ve made some adjustments to my routine to accommodate the nasal mask. (I used to use my nasal spray for allergies in the mornings but have switched to using it just before bed to kinda rinse out my nasal passage before cpap. I have also found that a higher humidity level allows me to exhale easier through my nose.)
Not sure if any of that helps, but just things that have worked for me. :)
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Thanks, reminded me I need to try higher humidity
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Yes, you need to keep your mouth sealed when using a nasal mask. If not, the pressure is lost and you don’t get any therapeutic benefit.
Get a chin strap or use 3M medipore tape.
Otherwise, get a full mouth and nose mask to cover both.
Stick with it. Don’t give up.
Ugh. Thanks, I think I get it now, but it feels like too much pressure, like I'm not able to exhale at all.
Can you turn your ramp setting on? Also the pressure doesn’t seem as forceful after you get used to it. Good luck!
So, this is in the middle of the night that I am woken up by my mouth being forced open by air pressure build up. I don't have a problem in general with sleeping with mouth open before I got cpap, or when I'm falling asleep with CPAP
Tbh I used to breathe through my mouth until I started using my CPAP so idk how to help you 😬 I know what you’re talking about re: the not being able to exhale thing though. When that happens in the middle of the night (usually bc of a leak in my mask), i adjust my mask and I turn my machine off and then back on to restart the ramp and I can fall asleep comfortably again. Do you use a full face?
You need to train yourself to not be a mouth breather. You're fighting against years of habit.
There might be a setting on your machine called something like epr or pressure relief. Try turning that on if it's not already on.
I don't sleep with tape or a chin strap, but I do seem to naturally sleep with my tongue blocking the route between my nose and mouth. Since I just do it naturally, it's probably not helpful to suggest to people who don't.
Yes, I already have the epr on highest setting