Newbie with Questions! LOTS OF QUESTIONS!

[trish6hundred]

Hi sleepyandsad,
WELCOME! to the forum.!
Much success to you in getting your helpth problems straightened out and also with your CPAP therapy.

[PaytonA]

My blood pressure has been creeping up for a while. I also had a red face a lot even though I felt fine. Heart rate has kept creeping up too, and a constant feeling of my heart pounding.

Supplementing with magnesium has helped me manage the blood pressure without medication. Also have been using Cardia Salt instead of regular salt (has potassium). From what little research I've done, it sounds like sodium, magnesium, and potassium need to be in the right balance. I believe that's why reducing sodium intake helps. (because magnesium levels in food has been declining over the last few decades)

Getting the apneas in check has helped with the heart pounding, and I'm finding that my sleeping and awake heart rate is trending back down now.

Part of the reason that magnesium levels have reduced is because almost all of the magnesium has been removed from table salt in order to keep it from blocking up in the containers. The magnesium chloride that coexists with sodium chloride in most sources of table salt attracts moisture with such rapacity that it will actually steal moisture from silica gel. As a result the magnesium chloride is removed from table salt and it flows freely even when the humidity is high.

Best Regards,

PaytonA

[worn_out_in_lebanon]

I've just downloaded the sleepyhead software. I have no idea how to use it

There's a long tutorial at the top of the forum.
I skimmed it. The first part talks about the basics.

I mainly use it to see what type of events, how long are the events, and what pressures are being used. It's pretty easy to use.

I had no idea that I could actually monitor myself. Is that normal?

Around here, definitely yes.
"Out there in the wild" - not so much.

the past 3 nights I've had "Events per hour" around 3. Since my original sleep study showed just 9 events per hour, I'm assuming I'm not doing so well. My pressure goes up to anywhere between 10-14 per my sleep info on the machine

Well you're doing 3 times better than before, so that's a pretty good improvement! We'll know more when you can post the breakdown of the types of events - OA vs HA vs CA.

How you're feeling is a pretty useful factor too.

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Part of the reason that magnesium levels have reduced is because almost all of the magnesium has been removed from table salt in order to keep it from blocking up in the containers. The magnesium chloride that coexists with sodium chloride in most sources of table salt attracts moisture with such rapacity that it will actually steal moisture from silica gel. As a result the magnesium chloride is removed from table salt and it flows freely even when the humidity is high.

Interesting... I had not run across that tidbit of information before. So the salt may not be as healthy as before, but it sure does flow well. Gotta have your priorities.