![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
I still do not have sleep apnea.
I have no signs of sleep apnea.
Even if I went in for the sleep study you think would prove I have sleep apnea, any reputable doctor would listen to my symptoms and talk me out of it because it would not be medically indicated at this time, because sleep studies are for problems that occur while one is asleep and I do not have such a problem.
My problem is that I can't go to sleep. So even if I went in for a sleep study, it would just involve me lying there awake for four or five hours while the doctors and technicians exchange awkward glances and check their watches, and then suggesting that maybe my problem is insomnia. Even on my best day I couldn't get to sleep under the circumstances of a sleep study, because I am an insomniac and insomnia is difficulty getting to sleep.
In the comfort of my own home, with my carefully controlled environment, suitable surface, pile of blankets, total darkness and quiet and freedom to arrange my limbs I have a really good chance of eventually falling asleep. In a strange place, surrounded by strangers and with 22 wire attachments? No. Not going to happen. I would have to pass out from exhaustion before I could fall asleep in the conventional fashion, and even then the study would show that once I'm asleep I sleep pretty much normally, because that's what happens.
Maybe you're thrown off by the fact that sometimes I blog about nights of very poor quality sleep caused by the abuse of caffeine I fall into sometimes to make up for nights of missed sleep. You think you recognize something of your own trials and travails there.
But see, your poor quality sleep was a mystery to you and the miraculous life-changing sleep study gave you an answer you were lacking. There is no mystery here: when I chug three liters of Dr. Pepper in order to function, my brain's ability to regulate the sleep cycle is impaired and I have shallow, easily interrupted sleep or even things like partial sleep paralysis with attendant hallucinations.
When I don't, then once I'm asleep I will sleep for 7 to 9 hours of deep, good sleep... the problem is getting to sleep in the first place.
You know, insomnia... a problem I am very familiar with, as I've had it for my entire life, and a problem that I now have largely under control through knowledge of my sensory issues and disabilities that intersect with it.
I've gone over this with you before. Yet every time I mention a bad night on my blog or every time you learn about some new treatment option, we go through this again.
Will it make a difference to you if I tell you that every time you do this... and I know it isn't that frequent but the fact that it happens more than once, that I have had to tell you that I do not have the symptoms of sleep apnea more than once, that I have had to ask you to stop rendering opinions about my medical diagnosis more than once is just really beyond the pale... but since you won't stop just because I asked, will it make a difference if I tell you that every time you do this, it ruins my day?
I mean, what you are doing to me is exactly the sort of thing that the patterns in my brain that tend to keep me up at night feed on. I'm sitting here thinking why? Why won't she stop? Why won't she take me at my word? Why won't she mind her own business? Why can she not understand that her experience and my experience aren't the same thing? Why can she not understand that however big a part of her life her diagnosis was, it doesn't universally translate to other people's lives?
Why can't she leave me alone?
Can we please just stop? I mean, for the past hour, this has been all that's been going around in my head. I'm supposed to be writing now. I want to be writing. I'm going to have to do relaxation exercises first, and I'm already behind because I woke up at 1 this afternoon after being awake until 5 in the morning due in part to insomnia.
But notice how 1 PM is eight hours after 5 AM, and I woke up feeling like I had a good solid eight hours of sleep? That's because I don't have sleep apnea.
I don't even snore. I know the two don't always go hand in hand, but... I breathe normally when I'm asleep. I sleep normally when I'm asleep. It's getting there that is tricky, and I have over the years of living with this problem acquired a repertoire of methods for dealing with that problem, which are not helped by your well-meaning(?) concern.
So, yes. Let's not do this again, please. Maybe the day will come when I'm able to just chuckle at your stubborn insistence, but for now, I just get more and more stressed and if you actually care about my well being, if you actually care about my mental and physical health, you will please stop.
The irony is that my insomnia is largely controlled, but my efforts at further controlling it are impaired because you have succeeded in turning me into a nervous wreck when it comes to publicly mentioning anything about how I'm doing on the sleep front.
Never do this again.
Love,
me.
I have no signs of sleep apnea.
Even if I went in for the sleep study you think would prove I have sleep apnea, any reputable doctor would listen to my symptoms and talk me out of it because it would not be medically indicated at this time, because sleep studies are for problems that occur while one is asleep and I do not have such a problem.
My problem is that I can't go to sleep. So even if I went in for a sleep study, it would just involve me lying there awake for four or five hours while the doctors and technicians exchange awkward glances and check their watches, and then suggesting that maybe my problem is insomnia. Even on my best day I couldn't get to sleep under the circumstances of a sleep study, because I am an insomniac and insomnia is difficulty getting to sleep.
In the comfort of my own home, with my carefully controlled environment, suitable surface, pile of blankets, total darkness and quiet and freedom to arrange my limbs I have a really good chance of eventually falling asleep. In a strange place, surrounded by strangers and with 22 wire attachments? No. Not going to happen. I would have to pass out from exhaustion before I could fall asleep in the conventional fashion, and even then the study would show that once I'm asleep I sleep pretty much normally, because that's what happens.
Maybe you're thrown off by the fact that sometimes I blog about nights of very poor quality sleep caused by the abuse of caffeine I fall into sometimes to make up for nights of missed sleep. You think you recognize something of your own trials and travails there.
But see, your poor quality sleep was a mystery to you and the miraculous life-changing sleep study gave you an answer you were lacking. There is no mystery here: when I chug three liters of Dr. Pepper in order to function, my brain's ability to regulate the sleep cycle is impaired and I have shallow, easily interrupted sleep or even things like partial sleep paralysis with attendant hallucinations.
When I don't, then once I'm asleep I will sleep for 7 to 9 hours of deep, good sleep... the problem is getting to sleep in the first place.
You know, insomnia... a problem I am very familiar with, as I've had it for my entire life, and a problem that I now have largely under control through knowledge of my sensory issues and disabilities that intersect with it.
I've gone over this with you before. Yet every time I mention a bad night on my blog or every time you learn about some new treatment option, we go through this again.
Will it make a difference to you if I tell you that every time you do this... and I know it isn't that frequent but the fact that it happens more than once, that I have had to tell you that I do not have the symptoms of sleep apnea more than once, that I have had to ask you to stop rendering opinions about my medical diagnosis more than once is just really beyond the pale... but since you won't stop just because I asked, will it make a difference if I tell you that every time you do this, it ruins my day?
I mean, what you are doing to me is exactly the sort of thing that the patterns in my brain that tend to keep me up at night feed on. I'm sitting here thinking why? Why won't she stop? Why won't she take me at my word? Why won't she mind her own business? Why can she not understand that her experience and my experience aren't the same thing? Why can she not understand that however big a part of her life her diagnosis was, it doesn't universally translate to other people's lives?
Why can't she leave me alone?
Can we please just stop? I mean, for the past hour, this has been all that's been going around in my head. I'm supposed to be writing now. I want to be writing. I'm going to have to do relaxation exercises first, and I'm already behind because I woke up at 1 this afternoon after being awake until 5 in the morning due in part to insomnia.
But notice how 1 PM is eight hours after 5 AM, and I woke up feeling like I had a good solid eight hours of sleep? That's because I don't have sleep apnea.
I don't even snore. I know the two don't always go hand in hand, but... I breathe normally when I'm asleep. I sleep normally when I'm asleep. It's getting there that is tricky, and I have over the years of living with this problem acquired a repertoire of methods for dealing with that problem, which are not helped by your well-meaning(?) concern.
So, yes. Let's not do this again, please. Maybe the day will come when I'm able to just chuckle at your stubborn insistence, but for now, I just get more and more stressed and if you actually care about my well being, if you actually care about my mental and physical health, you will please stop.
The irony is that my insomnia is largely controlled, but my efforts at further controlling it are impaired because you have succeeded in turning me into a nervous wreck when it comes to publicly mentioning anything about how I'm doing on the sleep front.
Never do this again.
Love,
me.