According to the AMA, 30 million Americans suffer from sleep apnea, and it destroys work productivity, quality of life, healing from illness, and poor quality of life.
What Exactly Is Sleep Apnea?
Sleep apnea is not just poor sleep or snoring. It involves a stoppage of breathing during sleep that can occur many times a minute and destroy the endocrine, nervous and immune system over time. It may contribute to many other illnesses at their root.
It may involve a central mechanism where the brain stem centers are malfunctioning, or peripheral where the throat, sinuses, tongue and other structures outside the brain cause the stoppages of breathing. Often these breathing stoppages can be seen and heard by others when an affected person sleeps.
Is It Curable?
What does cure mean to you? It may not mean what you think. It may shock some of you to learn that the word “cure” is legally controlled by the FDA and FTC, such that only drug and surgical options meet the criteria for curing all diseases in the US.
This means we have to talk about reversal, recovery, mitigation, healing and other words when we talk about truly getting better with sleep apnea. Because the word cure is legally controlled and owned, there will always be distortion to earnest claims of cure that orbit around rent-seeking behavior of the PHARMA industry.
Real, lasting and root-cause solutions will be obscured as long as this and other terms (diagnose, treat, cure or prevent are other such owned words) are legally controlled.
The good news is that there are anecdotal reports of amazing progress some people make using these methods for stoppages of breathing. There are no guarantees, but here are some of the best ones.
Pros and Cons of Conventional Treatments Vs Holistic Treatments
For sure, people feel much better after getting a device, and it is important to note that sleep disorders can and do result in preventable death. A CPAP or other device can save lives. But is that all there is? Can we get any healthier than strapping a hose and mask to our face? Can this be a transition to truer and deeper health states?
Orthodox research is a tool for validation and clarity in health care and science. It is comforting to read studies that show safety and efficacy for treatments in medicine to sort out the less reliable and fraudulent methods.
For sleep, there are a few medications for poor sleep, but they do not help apnea, and the positive pressure devices that force air into the lungs during sleep. Stress management with a licensed counselor may help too.
Reputable scientists like John Ionnidis have called out the corruption, payoffs and graft in science journals, professional associations, government agency and industry science funding and individual authors and authorities in our peer reviewed, indexed journals. This reduces the authority of safety and efficacy for all published studies and the largest and oldest journals, such as The Lancet.
The problem with the current CPAP solution (photo) is that the cause of the breathing stoppage is not identified or addressed, and there are downstream health effects stemming from the underlying problem even when the machine corrects the airflow.
How To Get Rid Of Sleep Apnea Holistically?
Elimination diets
The foundation of several theories of apnea and snoring are based on the nasal and throat mucosa, which is the wet tissue inside our noses, ears, throat and tongue. Decades ago, nutrition science journals published evidence of mucus-producing foods that cause the passages to swell and become mildly inflamed, have post-nasal drip, chronic ear infections and itchy ears, throat and eyes.
These foods have proteins that irritate the mucus membranes directly, even without an immune antibody reaction. The molecules are called lectins, haptens and other proteins that are dense in grains, beans, seeds, nuts and other plant materials. They do occur in other foods, but less so.
There are also irritating proteins in some dairy products. These food proteins do not bother everyone the same-there is a large amount of biochemical individuality.
Eliminating alcohol as an experiment can help, because alcohol reduces muscle tone everywhere, including the throat.
Cutting out these foods for a period of weeks has helped many people identify which foods contribute to their problems of swelling and mucus. Then at some point they can add back the foods to discover their own individual tolerance levels, so they do not have to cut out most foods 100% of the time. It can take time for the irritants to leave the body in stool and the sinuses to recover.
Download my Free E-Book on Elimination Diet.
Insulin Resistance and Fatty Tongue?
Visceral fat or non-alcoholic fatty liver is a dangerous fat that releases inflammatory molecules that affect the brain. This is different from fat under the skin. There is no direct blood test for this, although it tends to occur highly in those with insulin resistance, pre-diabetes and diabetes.
Skinny people need to watch out too because a fatty liver can hide in an otherwise lean person. Only ultrasound, CT or MRI imaging can reveal this source of inflammation within us.
The surprising thing about visceral fat is that it has been demonstrated in tongue imaging too. Some people develop fat deposits within their tongue, and this bulk contributes to apnea and blockage. Further, the visceral fat of the liver is inflammatory-these molecules released from this dangerous type of fat are called adipokines, and they can even cross the blood-brain barrier and affect the brain and the brain stem where the breathing control centers are.
When people lose weight on low-carb diets, they tend to lose their visceral fat first before they lose lots of subcutaneous fat. High carb diets may drop weight, but visceral fat is not lost as easily.
Supplements
Supplements for sleep have included magnesium, zinc, potassium, vitamin E, passionflower, German chamomile, vervain, valerian, and marigold. Supplements for adrenal support when sleep is affected include phosphatidyl-serine, EPA/DHA omega 3 fats as fish or krill oil or algae, and vitamin B5 for the adrenal glands. CBD products and other similar molecules can help sleep in some cases.
Sleep hygiene
Sleep posture for sleep apnea, whether back or side sleeping, requires the correct length, thickness and stiffness of pillows. Getting a brief consult with a chiropractor on pillow usage can really help.
Next Steps
I want to invite you to watch our YouTube channel for videos on Sleep Apnea, Mental Health and Digestive Issues.
Here is one of the videos to get you started:
Get Started Today
If you’re ready to dive into alternative approaches to treating chronic illness, I suggest that you visit our YouTube channel here.
Or you can book a coaching session with Michael Pierce here.
