Sleep Apnea and Bipolar Disorder

Posted by Dianne Hansen | October 10, 2008 .

Dave has sleep apnea and he used to be sleep deprived. When we first married, he slept only 2 hours a night, sometime after midnight. Terrible schedule for a new bride who didn’t know a thing about sleep deprivation!

Evidently bipolar people often have sleep apnea and sleep deprivation. You should look at the website of Dr. James R. Phelps, M.D. who mentions that Dr. Tam Kelly, thinks every patient who comes in with bipolar symptoms should have a test for sleep apnea.

Bipolar sleep apnea is a disruption to be controlled. We'll show you how.

Bipolar sleep apnea is a disruption to be controlled. We can show you how...

The first solution we found for Dave’s loud snoring was Peppermint Oil by Young Living Essential Oils. I kid you not! We simply put 2-3-4 drops of Peppermint Oil on Dave’s pillow case corners before he slept each night and it calmed his breathing and snoring patterns. Try it!

Of course, having a loving wife and companion who really cared about him, did soothe his life’s concerns and he eventually relaxed enough to sleep a few more hours at a stretch. Now he sleeps around 6 hours a night quite regularly, especially in our Montana wintertimes, when we have fewer daylight hours. The darkness helps him sleep later.

Another thing that has had tremendous impact on his life and his sleeping patterns is our diet. Dave used to eat a lot of junk food and coffee and tv dinners. I’ve taught him the importance of a more natural diet and the importance of leaving off white flour, white sugar, caffeine, overeating in general, and restaurant eating. We really don’t buy much from the traditional grocery stores either, unless it’s produce during the wintertime. He’s learned these lessons so well, that when he binges or goes back into the Standard American Diet (SAD), he can recognize the ramifications all by himself. He doesn’t need me to point out the results of eating specific foods anymore.

I’ll be writing more about some of the solutions for sleep deprivation we’ve discovered…and I’ll be sharing facts about the terrible rantings and roaring noises of sleep apnea…what to do. Stay tuned!

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1 Comment so far

Bipolar Sleep Apnea | Dave Changes His Bipolar Mind October 18, 2008 1:36 pm

[...] Hurrah for great success! And we’re able to soothe away the severest sleep apnea symptoms using peppermint oil under his nose and on his pillow case….and flag lignans as a supplement twice a day. The flax lignans simply heal his immune [...]