Dylan Reviews Katharine’s Journey from Afib and Sleep Apnea To Her Most Energetic Adult Life
Dylan reviews Katharine’s journey from being diagnosed with afib and then sleep apnea and learning how to support her breathing and sleep so she could wake up refreshed and have energy to do more in her life.
00:00
Dylan Petkus, MD
Hey everyone, I am Dylan Petkus here with the lovely Katharine, and she’s here to share some great inspiration and motivation. She’s not going to yell at you to run over some hot coals, but what she can help with is sharing her, that should be a different show segment, but she’s going to share her journey with her sleep issues and where she was at. Because it’s always helpful when you find something online and you’re doing something. Yes. When we first start out, everything’s great, but as we progress in the journey, it’s like, okay, well, I only have so much energy, I have so much time, I want to do things that work. And as many graphs and charts I can show you, that’s one thing. And then another thing is real-life people who have gone through something very similar as you have.
00:53
Dylan Petkus, MD
So that’s what we’re here to do today. And, so I want to welcome Katharine. Welcome to the, welcome to the show. We don’t have a name for the show, but we call it the Katharine Show.
01:00
Katharine
Thanks so much, Dr. Dylan. So happy to be here and share.
01:04
Dylan Petkus, MD
Of course, of course. So we’re gonna start where it all began. So when did you first start, you don’t need to give me an exact date, but like what was going on for you? Like you started to first notice you had some sleep or energy issues. When did you notice that the radar was going off, like this isn’t just a little bit of sleep problems or a little bit of fatigue? When was that for you?
01:26
Katharine
Well, when I was in my early 30s, I had chronic fatigue and immune deficiency syndrome. And so my energy plummeted, but I was sleeping a lot. But then about a decade later, I was in my early 40s, maybe 42, maybe 43, my sleep just went to hell in a handbasket. And I had always been a good sleeper, and I had always needed a lot of sleep. I would take a three-hour nap either Saturday or Sunday afternoon, typically, and I was always looking. And my mother said when I was a toddler, I would put myself to bed, I knew I needed my sleep, so, and then later, not a very long time into that, I was diagnosed with perimenopause, which is the pre-menopause phase.
02:11
Katharine
And so it was, my hormones were screwed up and I went another 23 years without getting those fixed because I’m 66 years old and I met you last summer, so 65 and a half. So it took me a long time to find the right solution. When I was in full-blown menopause a few years later, I went on Lexapro. My doctor wanted me to do that, and I didn’t like it at all. It’s a flatliner. So I took myself off. And then I learned later, oh, you should only take it off yourself under doctor’s supervision. And then I had chronic fatigue syndrome. I had started on the path of naturopathic work, and so I was always seeing different naturopathic physicians taking lots of supplements, leaving no stone unturned, is what I said.
03:07
Katharine
So I had been struggling with my sleep, and I had been using a lot of over-the-counter sleep aids, only later to learn that, and directly from people. I had a client who was using Tylenol PM because she had to get up at 4 o’ clock one day a month for her board meeting, and then she just recently passed away from Alzheimer’s. She had Alzheimer’s for like 15 years, and it was horrible. So I started realizing, oh, and I, the thing I used was again, I think it was an allergy medicine, Benadryl. And then I read about it, before I knew about the Tylenol PM with her, I knew the Benadryl was now affecting people’s brains and causing more Alzheimer’s or dementia of some kind.
03:50
Katharine
So it was a long struggle to meet, to find you, and get ready to get some permanent and real solutions. Meaningful solutions.
04:00
Dylan Petkus, MD
Yeah. And when did sleep apnea come onto the radar for you?
04:05
Katharine
Well, in May of 2024, I had my first afib incident, and they said it was likely caused by sleep apnea. And my wife had been, she was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s in 2015, just mild cognitive impairment at that time. And at some point, they wanted her to go for a sleep apnea test. So we met with this case manager person first, then face-to-face. We lived in Phoenix at that time, and they gave us a little page with like 10 symptoms, and I had more symptoms than she did, but I didn’t realize the seriousness of the sleep apnea, and so I just pooed it. I was like, oh.
04:48
Katharine
And you know, I’m, I was as, I’ve been self-employed for 30 years, and so as I aged, my insurance got more expensive, and my benefits from my insurance got less and less. And so I really didn’t feel like I could afford to invest in the sleep apnea test and stuff. I didn’t know, you know, I thought I’d have two or three thousand dollars out of pocket. It was more than I could afford. I rationalized. And plus I didn’t know the long-term impact of it would call this afib situation where I have this irregular heartbeat. So, yes, a long time coming.
05:22
Dylan Petkus, MD
So for the viewers at home, wherever you are, I never know where to look in these likes. I’m looking over here, and it’s probably very disorientating. So I guess I’ll look into the camera for you at home, and don’t get freaked out by that. Zoom in. But afib is atrial fibrillation. It means essentially your heart, the top chambers, are trying to contract in a synchronized fashion. When they’re in afib, they’re not. So think of it like this. You have a tube of toothpaste. Usually, if you’re nice and coordinated, you can just roll that thing up. Toothpaste comes out, everybody’s great. However, if you just try to open it or like push out the toothpaste by lightly tapping it with your ten fingers out of sync, that’s not going to do anything. So that’s what afib fundamentally is.
06:03
Dylan Petkus, MD
You can’t move blood out. Now it happens because when you have sleep apnea, you’re basically jolting your heart every single time you stop breathing at night. So that’s how that can lead to that. So just for the science aside, cut out in a little segment there. But the other thing I wanted to highlight is also, it is almost like it’s never just like sleep apnea and isolation. I know we talk about that a lot, but there are so many things that are connected to it. Whether it’s beforehand, like you were saying, with chronic fatigue and like lots of other people have issues, whether it’s like metabolic, cardiovascular, or brain. Right. Because when you can’t sleep or if you’re sleeping inefficiently, like you mentioned, your body is not repairing itself. That’s like one bad thing.
06:51
Dylan Petkus, MD
And then the second big whammy is that now instead of just missing out on repair at night, now you’re also damaging on top. So it’s like you’ve gone from not taking a car to the mechanic to not only do you not take a car to the mechanic, but you also take your Toyota Camry. Like where they, where do they ride jeeps? Like, what do they call that? Like mudding or like.
07:12
Katharine
Oh yeah, off-roading.
07:14
Dylan Petkus, MD
Off-roading, yeah. You also take your Toyota Camry off-roading, which is like those two don’t go together.
07:19
Katharine
Right. No maintenance. And.
07:21
Dylan Petkus, MD
And Toyota Camrys are a great car, by the way. Anyway, so, all right, so you’re going that. And so then maybe when you’re starting to pick up and be like, okay, oh, I’m not doing so well in the MOCHA, which is probably what that test was. It’s a cognitive sort of survey. I’m not doing well on that. And I have this history, and now my sleep. And then, oh, I’m not breathing very well at night. Then from there, like, what were your initial thoughts? And like, all right, what am I going to do about, you know, this new aspect of my health? What were you looking at? What were you trying?
07:51
Katharine
I’ll have a lot of friends on afib, you know, because of my age, 66. My friends are my age or older because my wife is older. So we had a lot of friends her age. And then. So a lot of friends. I don’t know If I said afib, but they had the sleep apnea. They were using CPAPs. And I did not want to travel with the CPAP. I did not want to put all those straps around me. I knew that I would be claustrophobic. And so before I met you, I bought some meditation thing. It might have been from you, but it was a breathing meditation. And I had. I had the claustrophobia just trying to learn how to breathe with my mouth closed as I was falling asleep. So I knew I was faced with a serious issue.
08:38
Katharine
So I was just researching anything that popped up on Facebook. And, you know, the Facebook algorithms, the more you click on something, now that’s all you see, listening. So anyway, I was. I was looking for solutions, and I found you last summer, and I bought a little booklet or something from you. And I can’t remember how it got started. And I also, the people that told me the meditation, I bought a strap from them. It took months and months because it came from China. It’s real cheap, but it was designed to put around my chin, it keeps my mouth closed. So I tried that. And, you know, it’s. So I just was desperate for solutions. And I remember saying to the cardiologist, nurse practitioner, that’s, I’m only in afib 1% of the time instead of, you know, like 100% of the time.
09:29
Katharine
And so I don’t. I don’t get to see the cardiologist. I have to meet him out in the community and introduce myself as his patient. But I do. I have been working closely with this nurse practitioner, and I said to her, I can’t do it. I can’t do a CPAP. I just know I can’t do it. And she said, well then, this was after I had met you. So I knew all about the bacteria and everything like that. That just gave me the creeps. And, I’m real sensitive to mold. I can’t eat leftovers because I’m sensitive to mold. So I knew, you know, I’d have to do extra care on the CPAP machine. And she said, you know, you have to do the CPAP. She was adamant. And I said, no, I’m going to do Dr. Dylan’s 90-day program.
10:10
Katharine
And, and oh no, it’s not going to work. It’s not going to work. So anyway, so that’s. We’re here now, and I still on no CPAP. So I’m very happy about that.
10:21
Dylan Petkus, MD
Awesome. Excellent.
10:22
Katharine
And I’m sleeping eight to 10 hours a night. On the weekends I can sleep 10 hours and under the week because I have to set alarm because I still work part time, I can sleep easily, sleep eight hours.
10:32
Dylan Petkus, MD
Nice, nice.
10:33
Katharine
Which is really what I need.
10:35
Dylan Petkus, MD
Oh yes. Oh yes. Different people have different sleep needs. Not everybody’s. I mean the range is seven to nine hours. Okay, everyone. Right, so the. Oh yeah, one thing to unpack there. So when you first saw us, because I think Facebook will hear you snore. I think that. I’m not going to say it’s untrue, but I think it’s true. So you found us. What were the initial thoughts? Was it like breathing or was it more so like anything but CPAP? What were.
11:04
Katharine
With. Definitely the anti-CPAP that got my attention, and I didn’t have any idea of how it would relate to the afib or how it would relate to, you know, hormonal issues. I didn’t have any of those insights at all. I. It was a huge awakening for me to work with you and to get aspects, and if you remember, I came into the program in really bad physical shape. I just came back from vacation and I was dehydrated. And even though I’ve had dehydration issues for 15, 20 years, because we, when we lived in Phoenix, we would go to Colorado every summer and we’d always have. Bonnie and I would both always have those issues. So here I’m drinking something with electrolytes in it, not knowing it’s not high quality. And I had.
11:49
Katharine
And I had some altitude sickness, and I had just fatigu,e and I was so fatigued that I couldn’t do more than two or three emails a day. Now I’m not working full time, so I’m not killing myself, but I still do three emails a day. That’s all I could do. So many days. And then I got connected with you later that month, and you got me on the right electrolytes and the right Celtic salt. And then I got an ear infection. And you had something to say about that? It advised me. And then I got two strains of the flu in mid-to-late October.
12:25
Dylan Petkus, MD
Really smooth sailing. So you went through those bumps, and then what were some of those initial, like, big wins that you had? Like, you know, like you’re on the right track. What was that for you?
12:35
Katharine
I don’t remember exactly. A week or two, 10 days. My energy shot up. I had more energy than I had ever could ever remember having as an adult.
12:46
Dylan Petkus, MD
And where do you notice that? Like whether it’s interacting with your wife, work, or just things around the house, where do you notice the big shifts the most?
12:56
Katharine
Everywhere. Everywhere. Now that’s not to say that I don’t get tired by, you know, four, five, six o’clock in the evening. I still get a little fatigue, but it’s not the same. I used to call it, I hit a brick wall. So, different times of the week or different times of the day, depending on what my calendar had looked like when I was working full time. This happened a lot. I would just hit a brick wall, and I couldn’t even think. I couldn’t think about what did we need at the grocery store? Not that I ever had to go to the grocery store because Bonnie had always done that.
13:28
Katharine
But you know, in the years that she hasn’t, I couldn’t even think about what was it I needed to get at the grocery store, or I know there was an errand I needed to run. Now I can’t think of it. And I just didn’t have the energy to go out, get in the car and run that errand. And so that brick wall stuff is completely gone. And I can cook a full meal. Not that I do that every night, but I make myself a fish soup with Old Bay seasoning, and I eat that four or five times a week for supper. And my wife eats a little mini frozen pizza. That’s what she wants to eat. And so I’m. But I still cook, you know, once a week or once every two weeks.
14:09
Katharine
And so I have the energy to do those kinds of things and socialize more in the evenings and just enjoy life more. I’ll go to the gym. I’m. I think I’m trying to go to the gym. It’s hard. I have to get a sitter, so it’s expensive for me to go to the gym, but I’m going at least once a week, and then I’m getting a sitter to go to once a week yoga at the Y. So I’m going twice a week. And I had the energy to start exercising locally that we live across the street from a big park with a lot of stairs. So anyway, just the ability to exercise more, the ability to not hit that brick wall, and then the ability to start sleeping more, you know, I, right away I started sleeping more than my usual three to five hours.
14:59
Dylan Petkus, MD
Just doubled it casually, you know.
15:02
Katharine
Oh, it was life. It was life-changing. Yeah. I used to say sleep deprivation is a terrible thing because you’re just so ornery and agitated.
15:13
Dylan Petkus, MD
Oh, yeah. So, yes.
15:15
Katharine
Awesome.
15:15
Dylan Petkus, MD
So then. So things are much better now. And so what would you say to yourself, like when, like from where you are right now to, like when you first started to have sleep problems? What would you say to Katharine, then, having the sleep problems, knowing what you know now?
15:42
Katharine
Well, I’ve said for a long time that our health is our wealth, I believe, you know, since I was like 32 when I was diagnosed with chronic fatigue syndrome. And 70% of the people that have that can never work again. And I found a naturopathic md. He’s an MD by training, but he was using naturopathic approaches. Got my health back and. But I’ve known all ever since. Oh yeah, my wealth is my health. I have to invest in my health. But it was like I was coming from a reactive after the fact perspective. And now my mindset is, okay, well, what naturopathic approaches can I use to proactively? Like when I got the flu, I had two strains in October and then in on February 6th, I came down with the flu again. And so right away, oh, my neti pot.
16:33
Katharine
I hadn’t been doing my neti pot, and I don’t even use a neti pot anymore. I use a little Walgreens plastic thing. So it’s so much easier. You don’t have to get your head just, you know. Exactly. Right. And so. But guess what? I started doing my neti pot, you know, picked it right back up because I could hear your voice in my head.
16:50
Dylan Petkus, MD
Excellent.
16:51
Katharine
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
16:55
Dylan Petkus, MD
I have achieved.
16:56
Katharine
Yeah, you’ve achieved simulation there. Yeah.
16:59
Dylan Petkus, MD
Awesome. So, yeah. So that. There’s Katharine’s journey of where, unfortunately, an uncommon.
17:07
Katharine
Not.
17:08
Dylan Petkus, MD
Not an uncommon one, which I always struggle with that saying, because. Why would you say not uncommon? Anyway, the. You gotta use two double negatives. It’s rather a silly phrase. But prevalent.
17:18
Katharine
Yeah.
17:18
Dylan Petkus, MD
Let’s just go with prevalent of where having sleep issues. Yes. And then also, like in. In a flurry of a bunch of different things. Right. Because we could have just pinned it on hormones. We could have pinned it on. We could have even said, like, oh, women don’t get sleep apnea, or they don’t have a breathing problem. We could have done that. But really, by addressing, you know, metabolic things, breathing, sleep, and all that, here you are today, doing a lot better, having more energy for yourself, your wife, and things you want to do.
17:47
Katharine
Right.
17:48
Dylan Petkus, MD
Took action. You’ve been a she.
17:50
Katharine
She’s aging rapidly. Every day she’s going down. I got to be with her when she wants to be with me and have those little moments of joy. I mean, that’s. We’ve been together 43 years next month. I can’t. I can’t cut corners with, you know, my relationship with my wife. I have to be there for her, and I want to be there. So, yeah, now I have the energy to be there with her in a better way.
18:12
Dylan Petkus, MD
Yeah. That’s what it’s all about. And that was great. Thank you so much.
18:15
Katharine
No, thank you.