I'm gonna shift gears here...

...and let you all know about my hubby's sleep study. :D

He went in on Friday night and got all hooked up to lots of monitors. He got to watch tv a little bit to relax, then went to sleep. While he slept, the technician, Dottie, made notes when blips showed up on the monitors she was watching.

Without a CPAP (Continuous Positive Air Pressure) mask on, he registered 25 respiratory disturbance episodes in an hour. One was a complete obstructive apnea that lasted SEVENTEEN seconds. (The longest I'd ever counted at home was ten seconds.) She also registered two others that were partial airway obstructions - one lasted 12 seconds, and the other lasted 23 seconds. During those two, his oxygen saturation dropped pretty low as well. Then, he finally entered some REM sleep for her to record. She said he was an unusual case during REM sleep - he snores his most during REM, which she said was highly unusual. His breathing also gets very irregular during REM, and his pulse rate goes up. And on top of it all, he gets PVCs as he's sleeping. No wonder the guy isn't feeling rested.

Then she roused him briefly to put the CPAP mask on and had him go back to sleep. With the mask on, he registered about 2 disturbance episodes in an hour. His breathing stayed regular, his pulse stayed regular, the PVCs were gone, he snored less, and his REM sleep was longer and more restful. He came home and said that with about 6 hours of sleep with the CPAP mask on, he felt he'd had the best sleep he'd ever had in his life and he'd dreamed more than ever.

So he has the little machine and mask at home now. :) He's used it two nights. It's incredibly quiet. He doesn't snore anymore. When he wakes up in the morning, he doesn't feel like just flopping on the couch and going back to sleep. Oh, how I wish he'd done this 10 years ago!!! ;)

I can't wait to get him started on some projects around the house now, heh heh!