I come from a long line of prodigious snorers. I have fond memories of evenings with my dad, my mom, my brother, and our Boston Terrier, snoring in perfect synchronicity so there was one continuous snore drowning out Johnny Carson''s monologue while I drifted off to sleep.
When my wife Sharon first told me that I snored, I shrugged. When she told me I was snoring so loudly I was rattling the windows, I rolled over and yawned. When she told me I was gasping for air like a freshly caught walleye in the bottom of a rowboat, I sat up and took notice.
After an appointment with the pulmonologist, I picked up a sleep apnea home test kit: a wearable device that combines the sleeping comfort of chain mail with the labored breathing of Darth Vader. When I walked into our bedroom that night, my wife looked at me, paused, and then said, “This is going to be interesting.”
I returned the kit after two nights of awkward sleep. It was kind of like sleeping on your stomach while wearing a football helmet. Two weeks later, the diagnosis was severe obstructive sleep apnea. Along with the kind of snoring volume usually only heard in 1940s cartoons, I apparently stopped breathing around 60 times an hour. The condition was also contributing to high blood pressure and daytime fatigue. All these years, I’d just assumed everyone woke up ten times a night and couldn''t keep their eyes open after lunch.
The diagnosis resulted in a prescription for a continuous positive airway pressure (or CPAP) machine, a pump that uses mild air pressure to keep breathing pathways open when throat muscles relax and close them off. When the pathways close, the brain reacts by interrupting breathing. Seems like a suboptimal strategy (breathing good), but apparently that''s how we’re wired.
The first night I used the CPAP, I woke to my wife staring at me, wide-eyed.
“You didn’t snore. You didn’t make a sound. That thing is the best machine EVER.”
"Isn''t it kind of loud?"
"It''s not as loud as your snoring."
"Fair enough.”
Over time, you get used to the sound of the CPAP and the feel of the mask becomes normal. I''m not sure I could sleep without it anymore.
All was well for a few months until my Facebook feed was suddenly flooded with ads for CPAP-adjacent products. Unfunny T-shirts, disturbing stuffed toys, and various “cleaning systems”, one personally endorsed by Captain James T. Kirk. The last straw was a smorgasbord of lubes and unguents designed to alleviate the dreaded “mask face.” I guess even the best machine ever has a downside. | 
