As a child, napping was the bane of your existence. But now as an adult, the thought of getting to lie down for an hour, even 30 minutes, sounds like a luxury. This is especially true if you’re dealing with sleep apnea that’s making you exhausted. Unfortunately, napping during the day is shown to make sleep apnea symptoms and the associated sleep deprivation worse, and here’s why.
How Napping Can Make Sleep Apnea Worse
Firstly, even for people who don’t have sleep apnea, napping can interfere with their ability to fall and stay asleep during the night. While this might be a mild annoyance for the average person, for those with sleep apnea, every minute of rest counts.
Also, studies have shown that sleep apnea patients tend to not use their treatment when they nap. While they’re drifting off on the couch, it’s just too much of an ask to go grab and turn on their CPAP machine. As a result, they experience an uptick in apnea episodes (pauses in breathing) that defeat the purpose of the nap in the first place.
What to Do Instead
So napping isn’t a good idea, but you need to do something about how tired you are during the day. The key is to get the best sleep possible during the night. Fortunately, there are several ways to do this that you can start almost immediately:
- Make sure your bedroom is cool, quiet, and completely dark.
- Give yourself time to fall asleep, as in actually get in bed about 30 minutes to an hour before you’d like to be out.
- Have a bedtime ritual that doesn’t involve looking at a screen (like reading, journaling, or listening to a podcast).
- Light to moderate exercise during the day can make it easier to go to sleep at night (just don’t exercise too close to bed as this can make you feel too awake).
- Limit caffeine during the day so there is less in your system in the evening (a good rule of thumb is to finish your last cup of coffee by noon).
- Use your sleep apnea treatment every single night.
What if I Don’t Have Sleep Apnea Treatment?
The vast majority of people with sleep apnea are untreated because they haven’t been diagnosed. Estimates usually put this at about 80% out of everyone with the condition. If you’re exhausted all the time, can never get enough sleep, snore loudly, and sometimes wake up in the middle of the night out of breath, then it’s time to see a professional.
Dedicated treatment is the only way to get the consistent rest you need, whether it comes in the form of CPAP therapy or oral appliance treatment. While both are proven effective, an oral appliance actually makes napping more viable because a person can just keep it in their pocket and pop it in when they want to catch some Z’s.
Napping might seem like a sleep apnea hack at a glance, but the truth is that the only thing that truly works is treatment from a professional. Getting it is relatively simple these days, and with it, you likely won’t have the urge to doze during the day anyway!
About the Author
Dr. Jeff Rodgers is a Diplomate of both the American Board of Dental Sleep Medicine and the American Sleep and Breathing Academy. He is a board-certified sleep expert and 1995 graduate of the University of Alabama School of Dentistry. Dr. Rodgers and our team can provide you with a custom oral appliance to improve your rest if you suffer from sleep apnea. Give our Dunwoody office a call at (770) 394-4310 or click here to take our short sleep assessment.