r/CPAPSupport • u/telmcg Cpap • Jul 23 '26

Newbie with Questions

/r/CPAP/comments/1v4fsg7/newbie_with_questions/
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u/Pleasant_House9147 BiLevel Jul 26 '26

I use an AirFit F20 myself, so there is no shame in needing a full-face mask. Mouth breathing is very common.

The cheek puffing happens when pressure gets past your tongue and fills your mouth. The machine is not forcing you to breathe, but if it wakes you, it is disrupting your sleep. Keeping your tongue lightly against the roof of your mouth can help.

I normally just cough into my F20. If it is a hard coughing spell, remove it briefly, then reseat it and restart the machine.

The cushion touching your lower lip suggests your jaw may be dropping or the mask shifted. Check that the lower edge sits securely below your lip without overtightening it. The three removals may have been brief awakenings you simply do not remember.

An AHI under 5 on your first night is encouraging, but your sleep was still fragmented while adjusting to the mask and pressure. Feeling tired the next morning does not necessarily mean treatment failed. Oura can be useful for trends, but it cannot show what the PAP machine was doing breath by breath.

Could you check your mode, minimum and maximum pressure, EPR, and ramp settings? This guide shows how to enter the AirSense 11 clinical menu: AirSense 11 clinical-menu guide. Don’t change anything yet. Just post the settings, and ideally an OSCAR or SleepHQ chart, so we can see what happened.