Over the last several months my fitness has greatly decreased. Lately I've been struggling with endurance and becoming easily fatigued. The consistencies of my workouts haven't been super great, but I have had other sporadic periods, but never seen such a dramatic in fitness. Lately I've been diagnosed with sleep apnea and and I am supposed to start using a cpap machine. Has anyone here been diagnosed with sleep apnea and seen negative affects on fitness because of it. I am hoping once I start the cpap machine I will see improvements, I am just curious if anyone else has been in a similar boat.
Singer who runs a smidge
Hi Lew, long time no see!! I was diagnosed with sleep apnea maybe a year or two ago, and if it's not treated, it affects absolutely everything! I was exhausted constantly, couldn't stay awake during the day, couldn't think clearly, didn't feel well, and I believe it will definitely affect your fitness, because you don't get that nightly recovery time, since you never sleep deeply. Apropos of nothing, I realized that I didn't dream because of sleep apnea. Anyway, it will also affect your blood pressure and hormone levels.
My physician warned me that some people take a while to get used to using a CPAP. Me, I was so exhausted that I stuck the thing in my nose the first night and never knew anything until my alarm went off the next morning. My CPAP has been literally life-changing, and I will love it forever. I'm not running any more, for various reasons, but I do yoga, bike, and walk regularly, none of which would be happening without the CPAP, because I just wouldn't have the energy.
Please note that it takes about 10 weeks to fully recover from chronic sleep deprivation. But like my doc said, "The first time you actually get 8 hours of sleep in a night, you'll feel like a million bucks!"
Hope you find equally wonderful results!!
When it's all said and done, no one remembers how far we have run. The only thing that matters is how we have loved.
thanks! that gives me hope that things will get better. I look at my training logs and it's sad how my workouts have decreased in quality and I have been completely zapped afterwards. It doesn't help that my kids don't allow me to regularly get good sleep. When the technician came to train me on the cpap machine I explained that I have kids that wake me up at night and he asked me if they were babies and I was like, "no they are 3, 5, 7 and 10."