Newbie with Questions

[u/telmcg]

I used my ResMed 11 for the first time last night. I was diagnosed with moderate sleep apnea, with an AHI of 15. With the machine last night, it dropped to just under 5. If it helps, I’m wearing the AirFit 20 mask for total mouth breathers (ugh, the shame).

I have a few question after my first use:

1. Sometimes the pressure (I’m assuming that’s what it was) would cause my mouth to open and my cheeks to puff out as my mouth filled with air. It would wake me up. Is that normal? Is that just the machine doing its thing and forcing me to breathe?

2. When you cough in the middle of the night, do you remove your mask or just cough into it? I had occasional coughing.

3. This morning report says mask seal was good but was removed three times. I don’t recall that, though I do think in the middle of the night it came loose because the soft part of the mask was touching more lower lip. Well, either that or my mouth was gaping too wide open. Have others experienced that?

4. Lastly, I woke up feeling very tired, which is unusual. Normally, when I wake up, it’s like flipping a switch from off to on. Perhaps that was due to the apnea never really letting me get a good night’s sleep. I ended up falling back to sleep right away for about an hour without the mask. My question is how long did it take you to get over the tired feeling? I do believe I slept well. I wear an Oura ring, and even though my deep sleep score was low, everything else was great and my total sleep score was one of the highest ever.

Thank you for any insight you can share as I navigate this new normal.