How an Oral Appliance Stopped My Snoring on the Road

Your body is the one piece of gear you can't leave behind, upgrade, or check as luggage.

There's a particular kind of uncomfortable silence that falls over a dark hotel room when your partner has just elbowed you awake for the third time in an hour.  It's the silence of someone doing complex math about whether it’s possible to sleep in the bathtub.
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For years, I told myself that snoring was just something that happened to other people.  I remember sharing hotel rooms with the videographer of my TV show who snored like a rusty chainsaw at full power in the lower depths of hell.  Then I got older, gained a few pounds, and somewhere around my 163rd long-haul flight and my my three-thousandth hotel room, my wife elbowed me in the back and said she couldn’t take it anymore. That's when I knew I’d officially become a snorer, and my snoring had become a travel liability.

Your body is the one piece of gear you can't leave behind, upgrade, or check as luggage. You can buy the best noise-canceling headphones, the most ingenious packing cubes, and the perfect memory foam neck pillow, but if you're keeping your companions (or the couple in the next room, or your own exhausted brain) awake all night, none of it matters. I've slept in over 120 countries, and nothing wrecks a trip faster than waking up exhausted, day after day, running on empty.
So, I did what I do with most travel problems I encounter.  I looked for a fix that was small, portable, and boringly effective. That's how I ended up with a mandibular advancement device (or MAD, an acronym that describes the mental state of a snorer’s partner). If you haven't encountered one, it's a custom-fitted oral appliance that looks like a slimmed-down mouthguard. The MAD gently shifts your lower jaw forward while you sleep, a subtle adjustment that opens up the airway in your throat.   This results in less vibration in the soft tissue at the back of your throat, which means little or no snoring at all.

I was skeptical. I'd already tried nasal strips that make you look like you're perpetually mid-sneeze. I'd tried sleeping propped up like a Victorian invalid. At home, I'd tried various pillows that made empty promises to keep you on your side, which mostly just resulted in an exhausting night fighting a pillow. The mouth guard device was different, because it wasn't fighting my sleep position or my nose so much as it addressed the actual mechanics of why I was snoring in the first place.
It comes in a travel case the size of a small soap dish, and it goes in the same pouch as the rest of my toiletries.  For people with severe sleep apnea, a CPAP machine remains the gold standard, but an oral appliance is dramatically easier to travel with. It eliminates the hassle and bulk of a CPAP, with its hose, mask and hunt for electrical outlets with the right plug adapter and voltage. It's honestly no bigger deal than packing a toothbrush.  After a consultation and 3D scan at a dentist, I was fitted with a Panthera, a custom-molded mouthguard that takes up less room than a phone charger and needs nothing but a brush to clean each morning. For someone who's spent two decades trying to fit an entire life into carry-on luggage, it’s a game changer.

What got me over the line was a conversation I had on a Viking cruise along the Danube, the kind of trip where you end up talking to strangers over wine about personal issues that you'd never normally discuss with someone you just met. A retired contractor from Miami, deep into his second glass of Chianti, told me about his own snoring saga, while his wife nodded throughout, affirming the tale.
"It was either this or my wife would make me sleep on the ship balcony," he said. I told him rooms on the Viking Jarl didn't have a balcony. "Exactly," was his reply. He said the appliance had saved many vacations over the years, and that his wife now packed it for him before he even thought to ask.  That line stuck with me, mostly because I recognized the look of a man who has been banished to a bathtub, a pull-out couch, or a spare room. Nobody wants to snore and be a nuisance, but our bodies do it anyway.
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Curious to understand the actual science behind how this little device works, I spoke with Bradley Kalmek, a Vancouver-based sleep specialist at Sleepworks Medical.  He explained the appeal for frequent travellers in particular.   "Most people don't realize that snoring and mild sleep apnea are largely mechanical problems.   When the jaw and tongue relax back during sleep, they can partially block the airway. An oral appliance holds the jaw in a slightly forward position to keep the airway open. For travellers, it's especially useful because it requires no power source, no water, no maintenance beyond basic cleaning.”  I can attest that it works just as well in a hotel in Switzerland as it does in a tent in the Okavango Delta.
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For anyone sharing a room, here’s a travel item nobody ever recommends because it isn't very exciting. But, as anyone who has ever suffered jet lag will tell you, what makes or breaks any trip is simply whether you managed to get some rest. It’s one thing to spend a night in an ice hotel, or take a road trip across Ireland, and another to do it foggy-headed because you spent the night startling yourself awake with your own snoring, and pissing off anyone unlucky to be near you in the process.

The Panthera X3 oral device

Since I started traveling with my oral appliance, things have improved greatly when I travel with my wife.  Hotel walls have stayed blissfully unblamed. I wake up sharper and ready to go, because it turns out that uninterrupted restorative sleep, even a version engineered by a small device shifting my jaw a few millimetres forward, does what sleep is supposed to do.

If you travel often, or share a bed with someone who's ever sighed heavily at 3 a.m. and reached for a spare pillow, it's worth getting properly assessed for an oral appliance instead of assuming you're doomed to a lifetime of nasal strips and apologetic mornings. I know it’s not glamorous, but you’re not wearing this thing out in public.  Like a bidet, an oral appliance is not something you usually mention at dinner parties, even if it transforms your life.  But it might just be the smallest, most quietly game-changing thing in your carry-on.  Best of all, nobody has to sleep in the bathtub. 
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Note: Snoring can also be a symptom of sleep apnea. If you snore regularly, it's worth getting professionally assessed before deciding whether an oral appliance is appropriate.

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