Apnea caused by this kind of blockage is known as obstructive sleep apnea. If you have sleep apnea, your nighttime breathing and sleep patterns will be disturbed. During deep sleep, your throat muscles relax and the airway that leads to the lungs becomes slightly smaller. If you have obstructive sleep apnea, the airway will close down completely and your breathing will stop for a moment. To overcome this obstruction, the breathing muscles work harder and harder and eventually win.
Breathing returns to normal for a while, until the airway closes down again.
This repeats over and over, up to hundreds of times each night. The result is daytime sleepiness, which can lead to other serious health consequences. People who are overweight tend to have more fat tissue in the throat region. This makes their airway likely to close more completely and more often. If you are often sleepy during the day or have trouble concentrating, or are told that you snore a lot, you may have sleep apnea.