My data looks great, why am I STILL so exhausted?

I know that this seems to be a common topic on this board, and I read through many responses before posting the same question again, but I've read all the responses and most of them say to analyze the data from your machine.

My data is GREAT. I have a Airsense machine and use the MyAir app with it. My scores are high 90s to 100 every single night. My episodes went from 91 an hour to typically less than 1. My seal gets a perfect score, everything gets a perfect or near perfect score.

I've been wearing it for over a month. I noticed that in the morning I had more energy after the first week or so. But then I had extensive travel (NY, home for 6 hours, then Denmark, home for 4 days then VA home for 3 days then DC) but during that entire time, my numbers still looked great.

So WHY am I still so dang tired :( All of my labs look great, I wear b12 patches to try and get more energy... Last night I was alseep my 8pm. I wake up at 5am every day... 5am this morning, I was exhausted. 10am at work and I could literally go home and go to bed without an issue. I am SO frustrated. I remember a time that I had energy (ample amounts of it). Now I'd just be happy to get through a work day and not feel like I have to crawl into bed the second I get home.

Getting tired is a personal and subjective issue. Prior to therapy, I wasn't tired during the day and routinely slept 4.5-5.5 hours and woke in the morning feeling fine. Trouble was I just nodded off at VERY inopportune times; not just during the Sunday sermon but riding a motorcycle and operating power tools. I thought perhaps my blood sugar was a bit low and took to eating a bit of sugar which seemed to help just a tad. When going on a trip, I lived on those 5 hour energy drinks. I was never exhausted or sleepy much... just nodded off. After therapy, I feel about the same BUT I don't nod off. What am I getting to?

Part of the problem was low blood oxygen and with that cured so did the nodding off BUT I also found I NEVER slept in the deep state of sleep required for full rest. My nights prior to therapy were full of potty runs and vivid dreams where I seemed to be on the edge of half-awake. After therapy, the potty runs totally stopped and I no longer have the vivid half-awake dreams. I don't remember dreaming at all for the most part. OK, question is, do you get up during the night to use the facility or have a lot of vivid dreams? If so, I would guess you are not entering the deep sleep state. I still sleep the same 4.5-5.5 hours a night FYI. If you are not deep sleeping, the PAP therapy is working fine but there is some underlying issue causing you to not hit the deep sleep state OR you may have a physical issue not related to OSA. First step would be a full physical (if you haven't already done so) and then a talk with a doc who understand sleep states if your physical didn't uncover some reason for the tiredness.

During my sleep study, without CPAP I acheived zero minutes of stage 3 (what they classify as deep sleep) and zero minutes of REM sleep. With CPAP, out of 190 minutes of sleep with a mask, I achieved 33 minutes of stage 3 sleep, still zero REM.

I guess it might be worthwhile to have the study run again to see if I achieve any REM sleep now that I have a mask consistently?

Oh, and no vivid dreams and 1 trip to the rest room each night.

Having an open, stable airway is one small aspect of good sleep and good health. Most significant disease states, emotional states, mental states, and lifestyle choices have some effect on how well we sleep and how much energy we have, and that can be highly individual.

When someone says "I'm still sleepy," I usually mention the importance of the principles of good sleep hygiene, if the PAP data is good. On the other hand, when someone says "I'm still tired," sleep-breathing and sleep itself are not necessarily the first things that come to my mind.

CPAP is a powerful hammer, but not every tiredness issue is a nail. So don't assume that PAP treatment gives you added strength, vigor, or stamina on its own. CPAP only solves one aspect of sleep troubles so that you now have the ability to make OTHER positive changes to fix other health issues that may be affecting energy levels.

I gave up. I feel better without that goddamn machine, but I'm still listless. Four years after this all started I'm broke, out of work no insurance (not that it matters; when I had insurance my fatigue and apnea problems remained), and as I see it, little or no hope. It's tough to look for a job when you'd rather lay down.