I’m remembering an elaborate dream after my first night with the new bilevel machine. That means I’m on the right pressures, and going forward I’ll get more of the deeper sleep stages and the life-giving REM. This morning I made a list of things I need to finish, which tells me my mental fog is starting to clear. I think I got everything I asked for.
I’ll be working with my new sleep doc and his staff to maximize this therapy and put myself back on track. Back to Life.
Late this afternoon I saw my new sleep doc for a follow-up visit. I now have a date with a new bilevel machine — Monday is likely — and some of the data from my March 18 sleep study. Some of the numbers are scary, even for a sleep study veteran like me.
SaO2 nadir of 69%. Longest hypopnea was 27.5 seconds. Longest apnea was 62.5 seconds. In a Total Sleep Time of 258 minutes: 93 central — and surprising to me — 14 obstructive apneas. That shows my apnea is Mixed with Central the dominant type. All respiratory events — apneas, hypopneas, respiratory arousals — occurred at greater than double the average rate when I was sleeping on my right side.
What my doctor and I hope is that my brain will adjust over time on the machine, and I’ll get more time each night in the deeper stages of sleep, and of course REM. This will mean more energy, more oxygen in my bloodstream, and a much brighter mood. For starters.
Though I can hardly wait, I’m keeping in mind that compared to standard sleep center appointment wait times, this turnaround of 34 days is phenomenal. So I’m getting the best of care and consideration. About damned time.
I’m with Kate Bush on this: Let me be weak, let me sleep, and dream of sheep.
I’ve learned that less really is more in web design. Once you can make sites look the way you want, you need a reason — something to put your decoration around and behind. Blog software has evolved to give you faster results and a streamlined design process.
I love the fact that a dedicated crowd of PHP developers created a platform that makes site production easier. I also love being able to rapidly install, customize, and publish right away if I want. If you’re bashing away in an HTML editor when you’d rather be posting and showing your stuff, know this: You can free yourself. Right now.
I’m hosting this site with HostGator, one of thousands of hosting companies running cPanel and Fantastico. Many companies provide those tools, and even if they aren’t a WordPress favorite, I like HostGator’s tech support folks. Solid phone support is key.
There is a learning curve. I’ve spent hours in the WordPress Codex and Forum, but many things are easy enough to just dive in and figure out. The latest release, 3.1, has some very welcome improvements. It just gets easier and smarter, and makes me feel the same.
I don’t regret the two years I spent learning to code in Dreamweaver. I do wish I hadn’t waited to take advantage of WordPress. Now that I know how get a functional site up in minutes, and enough CSS and PHP to tweak it just the way I want, I’m free.
Dude. Join us.
You’re viewing my customization of the TwentyTen theme running on WordPress, which I installed in about 10 seconds on my Hostgator cPanel. Customization took three weeks.
The colors happen to be two of my favorites plus the usual shades of gray which came with the theme. Two of my favorite web fonts, Helvetica Neue and Georgia, are the defaults in TwentyTen, which ensures maximum readability even at smaller sizes.
I use Adobe Fireworks for page mockups and final graphics; Photoshop for background photo image prep; FireFox with FireBug for identifying page elements and working in my WordPress Admin; TextWrangler for PHP file changes; and CyberDuck for uploads to the server fileset. Except for the Adobe programs, all of this runs on my MacBook for free.
In the blog section, posts are titled after rock and pop songs. If your brain works like mine, the songs will be playing in your head as you read the posts. Stumped? YouTube.
I’m telling you this because I want you to know: if you take enough time to learn some coding basics, you can have a unique and attractive site on the web in a matter of days. I’m no longer in the business of site setup and marketing, but I can certainly answer questions and recommend ways to DIY. My sleepy brain loves this creative outlet.
If you think I can help you get to the same place, let me know.
I was born with a birth defect called pyleric stenosis. This pic was soon after my first surgery — mom says my stomach valve (pylorus) was re-sectioned and inverted — just before my 2nd birthday. I was extra chubby because my food was staying down. In my first visual memory I’m projectile-vomiting something orange over mom’s shoulder onto a white wall. I don’t remember the hospital stay.
When I look at this pic of my younger self, I notice the deviated septum and the dazed look. My early childhood featured vivid nightmares and some sleepwalking, but in our family those were common enough that they didn’t stand out. I’ve always had chronic daytime sleepiness that overtakes me before I can react, which means I’ve always had some degree of trouble breathing at night. Every male member of my immediate family has a CPAP machine, and I’ve had surgery on my nose and and upper airway.
These days it’s widely accepted that many people have sleep disorders, and that Apnea is the most commonly occurring one. What isn’t widely accepted is that our American culture denies sleepiness and thus denies sleepy people the chance to tell their story.
So I’m speaking to my two-year old self. I’m telling him, everything will change, and yet nothing will. People will listen or they won’t, but you will get to tell your story.
And people can listen. Or not.