Why am I taking breathes and waking myself up while sleeping? I did a sleep lab and sleep apnea was ruled out?
by Sarah Aniston
Filed under Sleep Apnea Books
But I constantly wake up gasping for air.
Why?
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4 Responses to “Why am I taking breathes and waking myself up while sleeping? I did a sleep lab and sleep apnea was ruled out?”Speak Your Mind
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Maybe anxiety, if you have alot of things going thru your mind when you go to sleep you could be getting anxiety attacks while you sleep especially if you think about things that stress you out before you sleep
Maybe it is the angle you are sleeping at? Or your pillow is against your face so you need air, pull your face up, not noticing where it had been at?
It seems like the sleep lab should have observed this problem,and offered some explanation other than ruling out apnea. It makes a big difference if you are waking up because of hyperventilation or the opposite problem. How did they rule out apnea – did the sleep lab monitor the oxygen in your blood and monitor you pulse rate? You will probably need to go back to a sleep lab (maybe a different one with a different doctor) and try some different tests.
The simplest explanation in the absence of apnea would be post-nasal drip, nasal polyp, or something else that intermittently blocks off your nose. If your pulse is racing when you wake up, that would indicate an anxiety disorder.
Sometimes people have what is called sleep onset central apneas. But I would think your sleep lab would have picked up on that. What happens is you actually hold your breath upon falling to sleep and you wake up gasping. Its not the same as sleep apnea. Central apneas are not obstructive, they are caused by lack of brain signal to take a breath. If bad enough the treatments are the same as for sleep apnea. But some people only do them in the lighter stages of sleep or while they are falling to sleep causing them to arouse and take a deep breath. I would check with your sleep lab about it. Otherwise I would say it could be anxiety related. Not sure. But good luck in whatever you find out.