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This past weekend, I hit a major milestone in my powerlifting career. No, it wasn’t a PR lift or total, nor was it a significant victory. In fact, it didn’t directly involve lifting at all.

It was my first sleep study.

Like many countless strength athletes that have come before me, I can’t breathe worth a shit at night. I've snored like a chainsaw since I was a kid, and as my bodyweight goes up, the problem gets worse. While I’m small by powerlifting standards, at 5’5” and 205 pounds, I’m big enough for my weight to be an issue.

In recent months, my fiancée noticed long pauses between breaths while I’m asleep, followed by gasping for air.

Not good.

So at her urging, I arranged a sleep study, which will hopefully qualify me for a CPAP machine.

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Since this is a strength site, I have no doubt that a lot of you are dealing with similar symptoms. I also know for a fact that a lot of lifters are apprehensive about going through the steps needed to deal with it. Let’s face it, most of us don’t like doctors very much, and will avoid going unless there’s a bone poking through skin.

I decided to document the process because I thought that a lot of readers might be curious about the process. Plus, my readers really seem to enjoy it when I suffer.

Getting Scheduled

Getting the study set up was easy. I just made an appointment with a pulmonary specialist and described my symptoms to him. There was no real check-up, other than a few questions, and my weight and blood pressure was taken. He also took a quick look at my soft palate and throat to see if there was any noticeable obstruction. As I expected, there was, which means my snoring most likely cannot be cured with weight loss alone.

Doc: “You have a really big uvula”

Me: “Uhhh… Thanks?”

Next, his office contacted the sleep study center, and they called me after about a week or two to set up the date.

Preparation

There was really no prep needed, other than avoiding caffeine and alcohol the evening of the study. However, since I’m pretty sure that my marriage will depend heavily on my wife’s ability to get a good night’s sleep, I made sure to get a nice sodium bloat going, just to remove all doubt. I didn’t just want to qualify, I wanted to excel!

CPAP sleep study

The Night Of

When I got to the center at about 9:30 PM, I met the technician that would be overseeing the test. He was a nice enough dude, but with his tall, thin stature, grey hair and vague European accent, he reminded me a little too much of Claus von Bulow. He showed me into my room and I started filling out some paperwork.

The sleep center was at a nearby hospital. I don’t like hospitals, but everyone assured me that the room I was in would look just like a hotel room. I don’t want to know where these psychopaths are vacationing, but this room looked EXACTLY like a hospital room, albeit with a full-sized bed. Across from the bed, there was a camera so Claus could watch me while I slept, which seems a lot creepier now that I’m writing it out.

After the paperwork, it was time for Claus to hook me up. While I sat up in a chair, he proceeded to tape electrodes to my legs, cheeks, chin, and head. He didn’t need to shave any hair for the contacts, but he did put globs of a viscous crème on my head to improve the contacts. I felt like Cameron Diaz in “Something About Mary”… you know the scene. He also wrapped two bands around my torso to measure breathing and clipped a heart rate monitor to my finger.

Between the bloat, and the multiple wires coming out of my head, I now looked like one of Dr. Satan’s experiments from “House of 1000 Corpses.”

I usually have trouble sleeping if I’m wearing anything restrictive, but since the contacts weren’t all that uncomfortable, I figured I’d be fine. Almost as if on cue, Claus then proceeded to shove not one, but two different devices up my nose. One was a two-pronged tube to measure breathing. The other was a wire thermometer that measured the air temperature from my nose and mouth. This was a nasty little bastard that not only pinched the hell out of my septum, but also mashed my upper lip against my teeth.

Sweet, now I’m ready to relax! Time for lights out.

As you may have guessed, this was not a good night’s sleep. While none of the equipment was painful, it was definitely irritating, and it prevented me from my usual 20 minutes of tossing and turning before settling in. Mostly, I just stared up at the ceiling.

After an hour or so, Claus pops back into the room, stands over me and says “You are not sleeping.” He didn’t actually offer any advice or anything, he just seemed to be mentioning it in case I didn’t notice or something. I’m not sure if he thought standing over my bed like Dracula would help relax me, but it didn’t…it really, really didn’t.

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After a couple more hours of staring at the ceiling, I finally fell asleep long enough for Claus to put together some data. While the results go straight to the testing company for evaluation, Claus was pretty convinced when he woke me up that I do, indeed need a CPAP.

“You were really loud,” he said with an almost appreciative tone. I actually felt a small shot of pride at this comment. After all, this is a dude who sits and listens to snoring for a living. He also noted that I did stop breathing a few times, and also woke myself up on multiple occasions. He seemed to think it was as much the noise as my choking on my own face.

While the original plan was to put a CPAP on me halfway through the night, I wasn’t actually asleep long enough for them to do it. So, once the data from the first night is analyzed, I will most likely be going back for another test, this time with the CPAP.

I will keep everyone updated on the process. If it’s like everything else in my life, It will probably not go smoothly, and should make for a good story.

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