Author: Sheila Quirke

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Sleep Apnea, a Bedtime Story

It’s after 9PM and I am awake.  A few months ago, this would have been highly unlikely.  A few months ago, I was living with untreated sleep apnea and, for lack of a better term, was not unlike a zombie.  Settle in for a sleepy bedtime story, my friends.

Once upon a time, my husband politely pointed out that I was snoring.  Loudly.  We laughed about it, mostly.  I shrugged it off, always. After a while, those polite mentions of my snoring turned into more concerned expressions of worry.  “Sweetie, I think you might have sleep apnea.  There are times in the night when you are gasping for air and you stop breathing.  It’s scary.  You should go see a doctor.” I always shrugged it off.  Nevertheless, he persisted.  “Sweetie, it was really bad last night.  I think you need to call a doctor.”

Lather, rinse, repeat.

After almost two years of this scenario, and me having a harder time justifying the giggle and distract response I preferred, I reluctantly made an appointment with a neurologist/sleep specialist to surprise my husband on our 15th anniversary.  Aaahhhh, marriage!  Apparently, 15 years marks the CPAP anniversary.

A friend had recently posted about his own experience in a sleep study and his hopes for a more rested future.  I summoned up all the courage I could muster and reached out to him.  Tell me your secrets, oh wise and sleepy one.  Gratefully, he did.

The truth is that life had become fairly intolerable.  I had trouble waking in the morning, as restful sleep was a thing of the past.  I trudged through my days, napping whenever I could.  My husband would often take care of the kids before he left for work, waking me when he and my older son left for work and school.  In the evening, after dinner, I would say goodnight, then retreat to bed, often by 7 or 7:30.  Within minutes I would collapse and fall asleep, often waking at midnight or soon after, ready to disco.

These were the quiet hours of my day, my middle of the night party for one.  I would often stream TV shows on my iPad, sometimes get a snack.  I convinced myself that those hours were “me time” and, while I wasn’t sleeping, I was still resting, technically, reclining in bed, ear buds on, catching up on the best Netflix had to offer.

My quality of life had gone to hell.  The fatigue was oppressive.  I was sharp and cranky with my kids.  I dreaded any event that kept me out of the house at night. Basic tasks like dinner and laundry were overwhelming.  I honestly don’t know how my husband or sons put up with me.

It turns out I didn’t just have sleep apnea, but a severe case of sleep apnea.  The two sleep studies I had showed that I was experiencing 70-80 “events” an hour — basically, I was waking up 70-80 times an hour, all night, every night.  This was hard core sleep disturbance that involved both my brain and my lungs not functioning properly and not cooperating with one another.  People die from this.

It was clear from the get go that a CPAP machine (Continuous Positive Airway Pressure, yo) would be necessary.  Dammit.  CPAP machines were for old men, not me.  The idea of needing to rely on air being forced into my nose via a machine because of lazy throat muscles freaked me the freak out.

My Dad relied on a CPAP machine the last twenty years of his life.  It was big and loud and made him look like an elephant at night. Was this my fate?  Yep, turns out, it was.

cpap

Five months into sleeping with the aid of a CPAP machine, I’m over my bad self, for the most part.  Full disclosure, I had an extremely easy transition to wearing the mask and being connected to a machine to enable sleep.  Gratefully, while I have severe apnea, I am treated effectively with a minimal amount of air flow.  The machine, while annoying, is quiet and tolerable.

The truth is that my vanity is what prevented me from seeking treatment sooner.  That vanity contributed to me and my husband and my children suffering from the effects of my sleep apnea for so much longer than was necessary.  My health suffered, too.  Sleep apnea contributes to high blood pressure, diabetes, strokes, depression, irritability, insomnia, and a host of other unpleasant possibilities.  It is nothing to joke about, or ignore.

While I hoped for a complete turnaround, an Oprah style transformation, I can’t claim that, but I do note significant improvements, as do the three humans who live with me.  I have more energy these days.  I no longer dread leaving the house.  I am once again able to exercise.  My irritability has diminished and my concentration improved.  Dinners and laundry have resumed being a tolerable level of drudgery.  Naps are a luxury again, instead of a necessity.

If you think you or someone you love might have sleep apnea, I highly recommend attending to that ish.  Today.  Well, maybe not today, as it’s 10PM now.  That right there is a miracle to me — writing and typing and thinking and producing at 10 o’clock in the damn night is not something I would have been able to do pre-diagnosis.  CPAP FTW.

Nighty night, y’all.  Lights out, mask on.

______________________________

If you want more information about sleep apnea, read HERE or HERE or listen HERE.

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When Your Toddler Is All Up In Your Business

My toddler loves me.  He loves me and his Dad so much that many of the hours he is awake are spent all up in our grill, yo.

Our little guy is the third and final toddler we will raise.  I am reminded of the sometimes overwhelming nature of raising kids this age.  Toddlers love you.  Like, really, really, really love you.   And, having buried a four year old daughter, I am a bit ashamed to say this, but, sometimes, that love can feel a wee bit, a tiny bit, perhaps just a smidge oppressive.

It’s just as horrible to type that sentence as it is to think that sentence.  What kind of a monster feels oppressed by their kid’s love?  Me, it turns out.

In those moments when I am standing in the kitchen, cooking or doing dishes, and, out of nowhere, my three year old tackles me with a bear hug from behind, or, nuzzles his face into my rump — a unique sign of affection we termed “Kitchen Hug!” when we experienced it with our first so many years ago, or snakes his hand into my nether regions, giggling all the while with the joy of being so close, I fight the instinct to jump and instead, breathe, reminding myself of the intense and innocent love behind those hugs.

The love of a toddler is like the chaste version of those intoxicating first days of amorous love — it is overwhelming and all consuming and so very sincere.  A toddler’s love is so pure that it can create sunshine on a stormy day, cast the city slush out of week old snow, and turn politicians into puppies.  Well, maybe not all politicians, but many of them.

Some days, I simply don’t feel worthy of being loved to that degree.

adler-fast

Ultimately, I think that is why the love of a toddler can feel so overwhelming.  Are any of us worthy of that pure, intense, innocent love?  I mean, the other day I had to sit my little guy down to have a discussion about his behavior and how he needed to reign it in at certain times.  His response?  Tears.  My clear statement that he was not meeting expectations was enough to make him cry.  Like all toddlers, he just wants to please, to be loved, to make his parents proud and happy.  And there I was telling him he wasn’t doing it right.  See?  I told you I was a monster.

My takeaway from all of this is to just try and appreciate the transitory nature of my toddler’s love.  Love evolves, you see.  Today my boy can’t get enough of me, wants to smother me with his sticky fingers and face most days, I am the epicenter of his little universe.  In a few years, after I have blinked just a few times, he will no longer want to hold my hand or so gleefully accept my hugs and kisses.

When that happens, there I will be, crying in my soda, pining for the days when my toddler was all up in my business.

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The Unimaginable: A Grieving Parent On ‘Hamilton’

Is a spoiler alert required for historical events that occurred over 200 years ago?  I’m told it isn’t, but consider this your official spoiler alert.

My husband and I were presented with the totally unexpected opportunity to go see ‘Hamilton’ last week.  After agreeing that the family will be eating three squares of oatmeal for the next month to cover the ticket prices (can someone, anyone, explain why these tickets are so damn expensive?), we went.  It did not disappoint.

I would never call myself a ‘musical person’ or a ‘Broadway person.’  I can count on a couple of fingers the number of live musicals I have seen in my life.  That ‘Cats’ was ‘Wicked,’ kind of thing, but ‘Hamilton’ transfixed me. Using hip hop and rap lenses to capture the founding of America is nothing short of genius.  These tools provide a context and relevance that breathe life into history, making the humanity behind the American Revolution and founding of our country accessible to modern audiences.

Long story short, this musical was well worth a month of oatmeal.

hamilton-marquee

Because so little time elapsed between the getting of the tickets and the seeing of the play, I didn’t have the opportunity to do even the simplest Google search on Alexander Hamilton.  All I knew about the play was the hype that I studiously avoided.  I did watch the PBS documentary about the making of it, and, I can’t lie, I found Lin-Manuel Miranda so damn charming and smart that I was intrigued.  Turns out, the hype is totally legit.

So, here is where the spoiler comes in, folks.  I didn’t know that Alexander and Eliza Hamilton buried their first born child.  Philip, their nineteen year old son, was killed in a duel defending his father’s honor.  Much of the second act of the play revolves around the impact of their son’s death on this Founding Father and his long suffering wife.  The song “It’s Quiet Uptown” tries to capture what Miranda calls, “the unimaginable.”  It will stick with me for a long, long time.  Give it a listen:

If you yourself are not grieving a child, it’s hard to explain the visceral connection you feel to other grieving parents.  There is a level of empathy and solidarity that transcends so many of the barriers that exist to knowing another person.  The depth of grief is universal, despite time, despite culture, despite geography.  It is a profound and sacred shorthand.

One of the burdens of surviving the death of a child is the intense loneliness and isolation you feel.  My daily grief and sadness is unapparent to the outside world.  I shop for groceries and take my sons to school and volunteer at event XYZ and all the while, despite it not being seen, I am grieving.  The burden is real and it is heavy, but in so many instances, it is invisible.  Some days, that invisibility is an advantage, some days not.

The effect of seeing another parent’s grief on stage, captured so tenderly and respectfully, was raw and arresting.  I was a weeping mess for most of the second act.  I purchased the soundtrack the day after seeing the performance and play this song on loop.  It is the last thing I listened to before picking up my youngest from pre-school this week, so I am grateful for the bright sun these days, allowing me to wear sunglasses and hide my wet and red eyes.

Lordy.  Even as I sit here and write these words, I am crying, knowing that in just a few minutes I need to pull it together and bundle up my toddler to pick up my older boy at school.  The other parents, gathered like I will be, waiting for our kids after school, will not see this grief, this sadness, but it is there, heavy and potent, beating inside me alongside my heart.

‘Hamilton’ is a masterpiece on many levels, for many reasons.  To capture a parent’s grief and mirror it on stage for the audience to witness is a balm, a gift, an invitation to feel less alone.  Art heals, my friends.