Weight lifting leading to Central Sleep apnea

[droit]

This one is a weird one, but folks here have helped me trouble shoot a number of things with methylation cycle stuff so I'm hoping someone can help with this.

So Central Sleep apnea is when you stop breathing in the middle of the night. This is different from regular sleep apnea - which occurs when something physical restricts your breathing.

I find that after I lift weights, I experience central sleep apnea for about 3 nights afterwords. I know this is otherwise uncommon for me because I've had sleep studies.

The weight lifting probably shifts hormones, so that could be related. I've noticed that taking calcium-d-glucarate (which is known to detox estrogen) before bed helps, so it's possible I'm getting raised estrogen.

It's possible I have a nutrient that needs to be supplemented.

Any ideas are much appreciated.

 

[Wolfcub]

Do you hold your breath and kind of "bear down" inwardly when you are lifting a weight?
If so, that's a form of valsalva maneuver which has an effect on the vagus nerve...
(That one is just a thought, might be a clue, or might have nothing to do with it.)

Another thought is...if you DO that, then it might be replicating in sleep....much as some of the things we do during the day, especially if it's a habit, repetitive, or even something novel we can sometimes dream about or briefly wake up thinking about. Doing a certain thing can get into our sleep.

I don't know. It's only my own guess but I wonder...is your breathing technique okay while lifting weights?
I am probably wrong and way out.

 

[droit]

@Wolfcub Thank you so much for the very helpful response. I hope others lend incredible ideas like this.

I am very interested in this vagal nerve angle for 2 reasons:

1) I get this same response when getting acupuncture, which the practitioner is trying to stimulate the vagus nerve.

2) It's well established that vagal nerve stimulation does cause central sleep apnea. I guess epilepsy is treated with vagal nerve stimulation - but a side effect of the treatment is central sleep apnea (there's a number of papers on this).

Naturally I want to test exercise while avoiding this. Searching around for 'avoiding/dampening the valsalva maneuver' but it's hard to find notes from the side of not trying to simulate the vagus. I imagine I can study valsalva maneuver and just avoid it.

(if anyone has any ideas, please let me know)

Additionally, Is there a way to neutralize this excessive vagal nerve stimulation?

Maybe I need to normalize tone in some fashion to be able to handle these hits?