Sleeping Disorder

[BemjamenFrankline]

This doesn't happen often to me, maybe 4 times a week. When I go to bed I feel fine etc. but the moment I cross over from being awake to unconscious sleep, I stop breathing and instantly wake up, gasping for air. It feels like all my air is exhaled but my brain forgets to do the important inhaling part because I have to do it "manually" once this starts to happen. I get a rush of adrenaline and my heart beats fast when I jolt awake - its quite terrifying actually. But it makes it hard to fall asleep.

When this does happen, it happens every time I finally drift into sleep all night, possibly 100 times (I never bother counting because I just want to go to sleep). I'm not really sure how I fall sleep eventually, but it takes hours sometimes. At one point I must just be so tired that I fall into deep sleep faster than it takes my body to realize that I'm not breathing inwards and wake me up. However, I'm always alive in the morning, hooray. Once I get over the bridge to sleep, obviously my brain must kick back in and breath for me.

I have no trouble actually sleeping, I am the deepest sleeper in my family and only wake up because of thunderstorms, earthquakes, or having to pee really bad. I don't snore or choke in my sleep, I'm not tired during the day except when I can't fall asleep till 3 am, and I don't have any other sleep problems. I'm 23 years old, male, and not overweight. Also, this is not something that happens throughout the night, only when I'm awake trying to fall asleep, suggesting that it's not sleep apnea. There are many other people I have found with this identical problem, and most of them (except for the ones that also have sleep apnea) have failed sleep tests for apnea. Also it happens 3-4 times a week. I'm guessing that it might be triggered by stress or anxiety, but this also causes me to freak out every 5 minutes when I start to cross into sleep so "trying to be calm" isn't really a viable option.

I want to know if anyone has been given a name for this strange condition by a doctor? Anyone have anything they have done to make it stop when it happens so I can just go to sleep? I haven't found any recent forum post about it so I was thinking maybe there have been super awesome advances in understanding this in the last year? If anyone has any information at all, please share! I want to figure this out before it starts happening more often. Thanks people!

[2stroke]

BemjamenFrankline

try looking on you tube.com.

1 to start is--stopping breathing going into sleep.

Good Luck.

[Pippins2]

Those were my exact symptoms and sleep apnea was the cause. Go and ask for a sleep study at least to rule it out. I am now on cpap and it rarely happens now

[y_not]

Hi, just a couple of points.

1. around 90% of OSA (Obstructive sleep apnoea) sufferers are overweight ... so 10% are NOT overweight.

2. I read somewhere recently about a problem with children having tonsils removed being a cause of OSA (but I can't find the link at the moment!)

3. Whilst you think you are okay when you finally go to sleep ... how do you know for sure? After all, you're asleep(ish)!

Have a sleep study or buy a pulse oximeter device (30 - 50 GBP) and wear it overnight then download the data and check for signs of oxygen levels dropping to below 90%

[Toshanicole]

Do you have any anxiety about going to sleep at all?

[BemjamenFrankline]

No I don’t, I just feel normal about going to sleep. Actually I usually sit up in bed in Oder to breath better. If I slept with my back or lying down, my oxygen level drops to like 40% literally. But.. but it’s been a year since that last happened. Don’t know how it magically went away.