Sleeping Wrong, After All These Years

A Story of Older Age

Do I really need them telling me I don’t even sleep right? I mean, I’ve been doing it for 75 years – longer – far longer, let me point out – than most of those who are the current sleep “experts” have even been alive – and I’ve been getting by. But now they’re telling me, remotely, no less, that I don’t know how to do it. At least not properly. It seems like that’s just a snore away from being told you don’t know how to be dead. Though I suppose there are those (mostly, I suspect, on the religious right) who’ve been strongly hinting all along that I won’t be getting that right either.

This current early morning musing – which I’d call a “rant” – but I think I’ll leave it to others to call it that, since it seems to give them so much pleasure telling me I’ve “got it wrong” – has emerged along with the most recent milestone in my milestone (or is it, pothole?) littered golden (or is it, declining?) years: My first night of not-sleeping with my brand new CPAP machine.

For those who are too young, thin and sleep proficient to know about such things, CPAP stands for “continuous positive airway pressure,” and is an acronym which really means, “you don’t even know how to sleep, you fat, grey old fart, who will soon be drooling in your porridge and for whom Depends will be the only dependable thing left in your useless, pathetic, hopelessly out-of-it, seemingly interminable entitled life (if you can call it life), now good only for thwarting the hopes and dreams of the (entitled) young.” As you can see, CPAP stands in for volumes.

I’ve found that CPAP is not alone in tackling this task of condensing tediously complex phenomena of older (oh, give it up and just say, OLD) age into a few letters. FIBER is another such concision. We’re not talking fiber ART here – though what we are talking does rhyme with it. (An aside: Has anyone else noticed the shortage of Fiber One the last few months? Good news, the shelf at H.E.B. was stocked once again last week – until I bought all six boxes. Bad news, the shelf is empty once again.)

And for those who did first think of ART when I mentioned FIBER, let me translate – or maybe not. I have, after all, already made reference to Depends, and I don’t want to risk some head-shaking youth giving me that “you-pot-obsessed-old-fart” look – again. (We’re not talking the pot you smoke here, though I’m starting to think that a few tokes, even at my age, might not be a bad idea.) So CPAP and Fiber and others I won’t mention now – some of the dirty words of old age – are sort of like (but for the old instead of the young) sex and trans and suchlike that we desperately try to keep the kids from knowing as long as we can keep fooling ourselves that they don’t already know them – lest they be equipped for making rational decisions?

But back to CPAP. I got the machine yesterday, finally approved by insurance months after my “home sleep study” determined I needed one – a test which took place, yes, at “home,” though “sleep” hardly entered in, considering the flashing lights of the monitor strapped to my chest, which lit up like motion lights whenever I moved – to let me know I’d moved – which was a lot, it turned out, verified by the “study,” even if nothing else was. That night, at least, I didn’t sleep, so the study results were accurate, for that night, at least – and so, eventually, my machine was authorized.

I even got training on how to use it: the proper air pressure, the level of humidity from the distilled water attachment, the correct procedure for strapping my head into a Marquise de Sade sort of full-head  apparatus, which had safety vents so I “wouldn’t smother” if the electricity went off and the air-flow stopped, according to the technician. Kinky. (Did I find that comforting? Depends! Oh, no, that’s a different joke.)

The perky, efficient technician showed me that there were face cushions to be washed daily (in Ivory, recommended – who knows why?), and filters to be changed weekly, and attachments to be replaced monthly, and “events” to be monitored minute by minute – “events” which, I realized after, really meant, “periods of not breathing, for which safety vents, and maybe even CPR, will be of absolutely no use.” (I’m really thinking I should invent “Gurgle Translate for Drooling Elders” to help us figure all these initialisms out.)

By the time I got home, and cleared room on the bedside table (so that’s where that lost Faulkner has been all these years!), and plugged the “power supply” into the right socket (after the wrong one – twice), I’d forgotten all my training, of course. I like to think this was not just because my memory is now shot – though I can’t remember quite why I think it might be otherwise. (OK, so Depends may be a different joke, and this may be no joke at all, but … But what? Never mind, I can’t remember.)

And now it’s the morning after. I’d hoped to wake up bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. No, not really. Even I’m not dotty enough to think that was a possibility. But I had hoped to wake up somewhat rested and ready to grasp this new day with new CPAP vigor, instead of the shaking, arthritic appendage I’ve been groping at new days with these past many months. I managed to keep the De Sade head gear on for 6.7 hours, according to the monitor. And I managed to get myself reattached to the properly pressured air flow after only two trips to the little room (instead of the recently usual six). All in all, I thought I’d done pretty well for a first night in a chamber of potential horrors. I even thought I’d slept – maybe even slept correctly.

But then I looked at the monitor. How wrong I was. “Mask needs adjusting” the screen read. Such a disappointment, when I thought I’d got it just right. Adjusted how?! Oh, no, you’re not telling me that, are you? And the pressure level was questionable, and the distilled water trough was almost empty. And I didn’t have Ivory, only Dawn. But most alarming of all, the tiny screen said: “11.7 events per hour.” That’s 78.39 brushes with death in my 6.7 hours of still-wrong sleep. Apparently I was lucky I’d made it through alive, never mind rested and refreshed.

I have to admit I’ve awakened to this new day with something less than confidence and hope. And with telltale strap marks either side of my face, like those that gave President Biden away as a fellow wrong-sleeper last summer.

At my CPAP training, the technician assured me that “this machine will change your life.” Already I can tell that she said a true thing. In retrospect, after our first night together (it was an arranged affair; I’m not sure either of us jumped into bed enthusiastically, but there we were – and we made it through), in retrospect, I think I’d feel more comfortable, more confident if the technician had added, “for the better.”

PS: And now it’s morning after number three, and the machine says “Time for a check-in to see how you’re doing.” That sounds ominous. Since this is meant to be the partnership of a lifetime (however short my remaining lifetime may be), why would we need a “check-in” as soon as morning three – unless there were serious deficiencies to be addressed: unless I was sleeping even wronger?

I’ve put off looking at the “assessment” of my sleep success for hours now. Even an extra hour, since this is the day daylight saving time ends – always a day of guaranteed successful sleep (NOT!). But I have to look sometime, I suppose, or I’ll never sleep tonight. And so, I pull my chair up to the bedside table. I poise my finger above the NEXT button on the screen. I slowly move closer until I make contact. And the verdict on my sleep success is …

But no, on second thought I don’t think I’ll tell. I should retain some shred of privacy, dignity, even when my eyes are closed. Even old, grey, sleepless farts should have our limits. (Though you’d never guess it from my Facebook feed.)

PPS: And now, sleepless morning-after five. I’ve shaved off my beard in quest of “better mask seal,” exposing the Grand Canyon creases either side of my mouth that it was meant to conceal. What more indignities lie ahead? My sleep-deprived blurry-eyed brain wonders if this “treatment” will someday join blood letting and exercise in the museum of discredited medical horrors. Will I EVER know a good night’s sleep again? Only Hypnos, Greek god of sleep, and CPAP may know that. For damn sure, I don’t. But I have my doubts.