This weekend the husband of a co-worker of mine died in his sleep from Sleep Apnea. They had 3 kids. She is devestated and trying to keep it together for the sake of the kids. He was only 52 years old.
It is sad. The fact that I personally know two people who suffer from this, and now one that died, it seems to be a common problem. My mom recently was diagnosed with it. She was lucky. She lives alone, so no one is there to notice irregular sleep breathing. Loretta's brother also suffers from it. His wife noticed it.
They treat it with a ventilator that helps regulate the breathing during sleep. Sounds very uncomfotable. Untreated, the apnea causes stress on the heart during sleep.
Well. I makes you rethink the cases where someone dies "in their sleep" of seemingly natural causes. My ex-wife's grandmother died that way, alone, in her sleep, of a heart attack or failure in the middle of the night. She was found late then next day by one of her daughters when she failed to show up for a lunch appointment. I can't help think that this is what actually did her in.
2 comments:
A veterinarian that I know had sleep apnea and had his "punching bag" (the thing that hangs at the back of your throat) surgicaly removed. He says it cured his problem of "forgeting to breath while asleep" which was really that thing blocking his airway. And he no longer snores!
My sister had a test overnight at a hospital for this and they determined that her oxygen levels never dropped to a harmfully low level even though her breathing stopped causing her to wake up multiple times an hour (though not to full consciousness), so she didn't need treatment.
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