Sleep: The Fundamental Building Block

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In my last progress update, I promised to let you in on a couple of things that have turned my well-being around in the last couple of months.  I alluded to sleep being one of them.  This is one of the few times I’m touching on something much larger than golf, so hang in there because I think this is important.

Without a doubt, sleep is the fundamental building block of everything we do.  It’s a fundamental human requirement along with food and water.  You can eat poorly or not get adequate water and probably get by for a long while.  If you don’t sleep properly, though, life becomes a mess.

Let me give you an accounting of my last 5-10 years.

I’m a software engineer so being able to concentrate is kind of important.  Several years ago, I noticed that I was having trouble concentrating at work.  I was having trouble getting to work before 10:00 or even 11:00 in the morning.  I didn’t really feel rested in the morning when I woke up.  I slept until 10:00 or 11:00 on the weekend.  I woke up and tossed and turned all night long.

It became difficult to do anything.  Making time to go to the gym or to the driving range was difficult, because I was exhausted all the time.  Especially after work.  I could take a nap at any hour of the day, 10am, 4pm, 8pm, it didn’t matter.  I woke up with headaches.

For years, I chalked it up to stress or eating late or whatever else I could think of.

Then, I had two friends who had been diagnosed with sleep apnea around the same time and talked to them about their situations and noticed some similarities with my own life.  I figured I should get checked out, but I kind of put it off because I didn’t perceive my problem to be that bad.

Finally, I had enough and was fed up with feeling bad and spoke with my doctor.  That led to a sleep study for me that showed that, in fact, I do have obstructive sleep apnea.  For those of you who aren’t familiar with it, it’s a condition where, during sleep, the muscles around the airway relax and actually block air flow to the lungs.  This causes the brain to wake up many, many, many times during the night, depriving a person from restful sleep.

There are a few different treatments, but in my case, my doctor and I decided to go with CPAP (Constant Positive Air Pressure) machine therapy.  This entails me wearing a mask during sleep that keeps constant pressure in my airway, preventing it from closing off.

The first week wearing a mask was pretty awful.  I struggled to make it through the whole night wearing it.  I would lay there awake in bed listening to myself breathe.  I felt like my breathing was restricted, possibly a little mini-claustrophobia.

After a couple of weeks, I was making it through the whole night.  I was also waking up some days feeling really good.  I was also waking up some days feeling as bad as before.

Right now, I’m about a month in and I’m almost fully used to wearing the mask.  Most days I feel much better.  Even my “bad” days are much better than and I can recall from the time before I was using the machine.  I actually look forward to going to bed now, where before I dreaded it.

I’m still sleepy many days, but after reading many accounts of sleep apnea sufferers online on a couple of forums, it seems that it’s normal to feel that way for weeks or even months, because the body finally realizes that it can get real sleep again and wants to fill up the “sleep bank”.  It seems like in many cases, this ends after two or three months.

Just to be sure the therapy is working, I took the data from my CPAP machine (awesome technology!) back to my doctor and he reassured me that the numbers look fine and that I’m going through normal stages of recovery.

In my case, the sleep apnea is considered “minor”.  During the two sleep studies that I did (one to check me out, and one to try me on a CPAP machine), it was found that when I sleep on my side, I have about 15 apnea brain arousal episodes per hour.  When I’m on my back, it’s about 50 times per hour.  That means, that for who knows how long, I’ve been sleeping for only about 1-4 minutes at a stretch and spending a lot of that time depriving myself of oxygen.

I’m fortunate that my CPAP machine treatment doesn’t require very high pressure.  The pressure is measured as cm H2O (I have no idea why).  The minimum pressure on the machine is 4.  My setting is 6.  That’s considered very low and is due to the fact that when my muscles relax, they don’t close my airway with much force, but it’s enough to bring my brain out of deep sleep frequently.  Many people require a much, much higher pressure which takes a long time to get used to.  I’m at the point now where I barely notice it.

I’m telling you all this because sleep apnea can absolutely be deadly.  If it goes untreated, it can cause heart attacks and strokes.  It’s thought that it may have contributed to the death of Reggie White, NFL hall of famer.  Even in the non-worst case, it severely degrades a person’s lifestyle.

If you read this and any of it seems like it could be you, I implore you, speak with your doctor to see if you might be a candidate.  There are a number of risk factors, but people who are overweight (me) are at a much higher risk.

I really regret waiting so long to be checked out.  It gets to a point where you simply get used to it.  While I knew I didn’t really feel good, what was long lost to me was what “good” felt like.  I literally did not even perceive how bad it was.

I believe it has absolutely hindered my journey to become a golf pro.  I believe it has contributed to my trouble losing weight, difficulty in maintaing a regular workout regimen, difficulty in practicing as much as I want, break down in my body (sleep is when we heal!), and difficulty in playing effectively.

In this one short month, I have been working out more effectively than I have in years, my memory is starting to return, and I feel physically and mentally better, and importantly, I’m losing weight. I feel so optimistic about this year because I now know what good sleep is starting to do for me.

Again, I urge you, if you even have the slightest suspicion that you might suffer from sleep apnea, speak with your doctor without delay.  If you think you might be a sufferer and just want to know more about my siutation, feel free to leave a comment or contact me via e-mail and I’m glad to share all the details.

As I said at the top, quality sleep goes way beyond golf.  Your life is at stake.