Leaks and mask displacement for side-to-stomach sleepers. Tape down nasal pillows?

[Deborah K.]

Bleep stays where you put it. Changing positions does not move it a bit.

[2SleepBetta]

   
First, my bad in failing to note the stale date of the OP that started this thread. No one responded for more than 15 months. Bostonsnow apparently gave up and has not been back after September 2023. 'Hope he found a solution. Nevertheless, I will PM him about our several responses. About a half dozen members have posted constructive suggestions recently. Those who responded and Bostonsnows may soon return and inform us of any new solution discovery. Discoveries and mask suggestions may make the OP's call for prone blocking moot. Anyway, for closure on the OP's call and the prone block suggestion, I post this.
 
Next, while fashioning simple improvements to the pipe blocker of my previous post, a simple way to use it to prevent prone sleep came to mind, as is pictured in the attachment. 

The latter shows slight modifications that improved the first blocker I tried. It performed fairly well and I see no reason to go back to my less friendly box filled, knapsack-vest method. However, I hope more tweaking will eliminate a bit of block movement I want to eliminate.

When satisfied the simple device cannot be improved, I will remove the tape, tweak the black bumpers' shape and l'll have a much-improved belt that easily cinches and locks tight. The gait-belt likely slipped through its buckle, the first night I tried it. Common to cinch straps and belts, it (like new) has the serrated, hinged belt locker-blade part of the buckle. The blade needs sharpening and a bit more of a bend downward toward the belt to make it self-locking. Note: the prone-block belt must be about twice as long as the supine block. That will allow fastening belt ends together in front rather than having someone fasten them in back.

As to my wild, innertube prone-block idea, I'll table that one. But here's another. A half-gallon "plastic" bottle, like SunSweet prune juice comes in, might be used by some persons, in lieu of the sewer pipe. Those are round, quite resistant to bending and about 5 in. by 12 in. A small rope could be passed through small holes in the bottom and top cap. That rope's ends could then be affixed to wider belting that would cinch it tight. 

Regarding pictures of me wearing the prone block, I have not tried it beyond noting that it is far less prone to allow the pipe to begin to orbit my firm firmer and more rectangular chest than to orbit my rounder, softer waist, which displacement impaired my first sleep wearing it. Note that the belt must be tight. I fastened it quite tight while standing before lying down for that first night trial. But upon lying down and settling in, one of two things happened: either the belt buckle let the belt slip or it was the lessening of the limited bulge of my belly, while standing, that made the belt looser. Surprise, surprise, one's belly bulges more when standing than when lying down and relaxed. Gravity. 

This prone block, like other position blocking devices—the Rematee, the tennis ball sewn to back of a tee shirt and my boxes and vest—all rely directly and indirectly on shoulders. I relied on the pictured vest's arm holes to constrain downward displacement of the blocking pipe, just as the shoulder straps do for the Rematee. And, yes, restraint against downward movement of the prone block requires an additional item: the upper part of a modified shirt or jacket with arm holes seem appropriate.

[dsjstc]

this pipe block thing has unintentionally come to hi-jacking your thread.

To be blunt, your highjacking is so extensive that I've unsubscribed from Deborah's thread because of it.  I'm interested in her original topic (it was what brought me to sign up to the board), but your ongoing inconclusive experimental journal notes now outweigh everyone else's comments by what looks like a factor of four. 

If you're willing to hear advice on good forum citizenship, it is generally considered polite to provide a link to your own thread with a one-sentence description when what you have to offer is wordy, tangential, or liable to take the discussion in a different direction than the OP's intent.

Also, good luck with your experiment -- I hope you find a method that works for you.

[2SleepBetta]

@jststc:

Thank you for what I take as a compliment for my "ongoing inconclusive journal notes" along with your apt gentle reminder to avoid hijacking an OP's thread, your suggestion of what to do instead and your kind expressed hope I'd find a method that works for me.

Though I believe there was my OP-related filament of intent running through the long posts, those grew out of proportion. Yes, it would have been better to start my own thread on the topic, refer and link to it from Bostonsnow's thread—as you stated. I thank you for calling me on the hijack and my being refreshed on "the better way", which I believe I have used elsewhere and lapsed from here. I eventually sensed and admitted to being out of line in this thread.

     Regarding your unsubscribing from Deborah's post because of mine:

I took a look at her then most recent full-page listing of posts, 22 in all. Of those, 15 had to do with mask and leak issues. My point is that topic is one in her helper-volunteer wheelhouse. She is likely, as I saw, to post in threads about masks, not exclusively, but frequently. She does that much more succinctly than this ever wordy member.

Her mention of the bleep solution for the OP seemed apt, arguably a bit curt, given that Bostonsnow might have tried it. I long ago tried bleep, but no longer do. Hand tremor and declining finger sensitivity make mounting it difficult. Too often the expensive adhesive components were spoiled in the donning process. Otherwise, it was good, but I saw the P -10 as better for me, admitting that, strapless, the bleep has an advantage in never having stretched head straps.

     Updates for my posted suggestions above (extending the hijack, but deemed appropriate because of changes and need to "journal" closure): 

The supine block (which I have been using continuously and improving): I made it longer, from a remaining piece of pipe, adding 2 in., making it 11 in. long. (Note: the pipe length that works best out of 9, 11, 13 and 15 in. trials is the 11 in. I presently consider that length the best match for the 13 in. distance between the uppermost tips of my pelvic bone (see Wikipedia for "Pelvis" and male and the female pelvic bone pictures). The 9 in. block stayed mostly behind me but "wanted" to orbit my waist and the 15 in. block was far too long. The 11 in. is best I've tried, but a 10 in. could be better. It seems there may be a best proportion of pipe length to distance between the extreme uppermost tips of the male hip, neighborhood 11 in.to 13 in. for me.

I have tried and rejected the black items shown on the first pipe version (shown earlier, I think). Those tended to add unwanted belt-slack when lying on my side. 

Conclusions: the vest-knapsack and pipe blocks do the same thing. The vest block is a bit more comfortable, but not readily available vs.  the easy to make pipe block —which can be low cost, if one doesn't do as I did for this project, buy an 18 ft. length of pipe. Both are about the same difficulty in rolling over to the other side.

     The prone block: Wearing a sleeveless strong garment with arm holes still seems the way to go. The arm-hole "anchor" prevents foot-ward drift of the belt and looks promising for both prone and supine blocks. Why? Because one's lower back is narrow and waist is soft making orbital travel of the pipe easier there than at chest level. The wider, firmer and flatter surface of our upper backs inhibits that easier travel (as I saw when the picture above was taken). However, there will be need to find the best length of pipe for one's back width at the bottom of the arm hole.

Female PAPers who need to prevent prone sleep because of mask disturbance leakage may best use the bleep—as I think is true for most males as Deborah suggested.