Reply to freedancer
Hello Freedancer.
This reply to your post is as bit late but your post has only just been brought to my attention, so I have only just noticed it.
The concept of trying to help people ‘not to hate’ (anything) is quite an intriguing one and I might have been inclined to avoid tackling it. However, having spent most of my working life helping people to control their emotions, I do have a whole ‘programme’ of pointers which might help in this regard. These pointers are listed in a book entitled ‘Handbook of self-help Hints’ 2003 (reprinted 2004). Unfortunately, the concepts and their explanations are far too lengthy to attach to a post such as this and they are usually part of a personalised programme that extends over a period of at least a year.
On the other hand, there are some very practical things that I tried with my own CPAP mask which eventually worked sufficiently well for me to get a good night’s sleep without cursing the mask too much. This might be a more practical approach to your problem.
To begin with, the full face mask took off the skin above and around my nose which was painful and impractical. I therefore made a nose inhaler out of copper tubing which I showed to the consultant as an example of what can work and not make things worse. He then prescribed what are described as ‘nose-pads’ which are a much softer and more manageable ‘mask’ to wear. However, I then needed to have some way of keeping my mouth shut because otherwise the air simply circulated up my nose and out of my mouth. This I did at first with a chinstrap supplied by the hospital which was pretty useless, so I made my own from towelling material with a layer of the same material they make wetsuits from, this is secured with Velcro and has done the job reasonably well for a number of years.
I still think that there ‘should be’ a device which we could wear in our mouths a bit like the gum-shields that rugby players wear, but which would allow the air flow through both the nose and the mouth in the same way that the full face masks do. However, I have not managed to get such a device made so far, so I’m still stuck with the nosepad input and the chinstrap.
I have found that starting off the night with olbas oil in the tubing helps to clear the nasal passage and sinuses, which makes for a quicker and more comfortable sleep .
I hope these comments might help in some practical way, but it’s a bit like having a stoma in that I’m still not over-keen on having to use it, but the alternative is worse, so I simply grin and bear it!
Best wishes
Bill
PS: It might be worth mentioning that my wife seems to hate the CPAP machine more than I do as the noise seems to keep her awake at nights!!