Why is it that kids (or people who don’t seem to have back problems) can sleep in the strangest, most bizarre positions, but never seem to have any pain? How is that they can sleep in totally unnatural positions and still sleep just fine? And why is it that even when I try to sleep in a perfect position, on a great bed, with tons of pillows, I can’t sleep. What the heck is going on? After many years of sleepless nights, I figured out the answer. Exclusive Bonus: Download a bonus step by step guide here to getting pain free (2 tips not mentioned here). Alright, so you’re going to have to trust me on this next one – your spine wants to be perfectly aligned all day. Standing, sitting, walking, sleeping – your spine really only has one optimal position, although it’s obviously built to accommodate flexibility and constant motion. When you mess up that natural, optimal alignment for too long (like when you sit at work for 8 hours and get terrible lower back pain), pain results.
Here’s a common misalignment of the spine, where the shoulders are hunched and the head pokes out (computer caveman syndrome anyone?): And here’s another common spinal misalignment that is frequent in many of us who sit a lot. Tight hip muscles cause the lower back to overly arch: So what do any of these have to do with your sleep? It’s important to know what proper spinal alignment is versus dysfunctional alignment – so that when you sleep you can quickly remind yourself how to get into a properly aligned position. The real question is how to keep the natural position of the spine while sleeping. Depending on how tight your hips are, if your legs are too straight, it will pull the lower back into an arched position. If your legs are too bent, tight hamstrings will pull the lower back into an overly-rounded position. The key is to find the sweet spot in-between. For many of us with tight hamstrings, tucking the legs up too close to the chest will result in an over-rounding of the lower back.
For those of you with neck/upper back pain, it’s really important to pay attention to your shoulder and neck alignment. Generally, the main problem that people have with back sleeping is that the lower back starts to ache. Usually this can be because of tight hip muscles like the hip flexors & psoas. It’s pretty easy to figure out if they’re tight: Just bend your knees to a 90 degree angle – when your legs are pulled up, is there less pain and does your lower back feel less arched? If so, it’s probably tight hips. The easy fix is to simply add a pillow beneath your knees, which will let the lower back settle a bit. The problem here is very similar to the problem that people have with sleeping on their back – but in reverse. Here, you want to put a pillow or flat towel under your stomach/groin to help push that lower back up into alignment a bit. Usually you can immediately feel the relief. If you’re having problems with your back or neck, I highly suggest sleeping on your back.
There are a number of reasons for this: first – just from personal experience, sleeping on your back is generally the easiest way to aggravate the fewest number of things (well, except for snoring ). When you sleep on your side, you have to worry about your back alignment, neck alignment, your hips twisting, etc. When you sleep on your back there is less than can go wrong and fewer variables to experiment with to get comfortable. Second, when you sleep on your back, you are naturally laying flat which is letting gravity re-align the body a bit. It’s offsetting the fact that you might have just been sitting in a caveman computer pose for 10 hours (here’s how to fix that back pain). Also, if you have neck pain, I’ve found that back sleeping is also easier than side sleeping for some people. People with neck pain tend to have protruding necks (in my case – from staring at a computer screen for 10 hours a day). Usually when they go to sleep the neck continues protruding and stays in the poor alignment, reinforcing the pain.
It took me years of waking up to throbbing neck muscles and spasming trapezius muscles, with a crap night of sleep, to realize this. At the end of the day, deviation from your body’s natural alignment will cause pain in the long-run. The key is to maintain better alignment throughout the day, and while you’re sleeping. If you’re at work, make sure to focus on sitting properly to prevent back pain. If you’re in pain when you’re sleeping (or when you wake up), take the same precautions – for a few weeks, awkwardly force yourself to get into a more aligned position when you sleep. Missed sleep sucks, and I’ve been there with the back pain. You just need to be patient and experiment. I also have a free back pain E-course for you in the private insider’s list. Just click here (or click the image to the right) and it’ll bring you there.For decades, back pain sufferers have been told they will get better by sleeping on a hard mattress. It might not be comfortable but there's no gain without pain, the experts have claimed.
But now a study has overturned the long-held belief that having firm support is good for you. It found that those with bad backs were twice as likely to improve by using a medium-firm mattress. Having 'a bit of give' in the mattress resulted in less pain and made it easier for sufferers to get out of bed in the morning. They even needed to take fewer painkillers compared with back pain victims who were sleeping on firm mattresses. Doctors and physiotherapists specialising in back care say the findings will revolutionise the lives of back pain sufferers. They will also change the shopping habits of millions - currently, threequarters of orthopaedic physicians recommend firm mattresses. Bender said: 'The one question every physiotherapist is asked by patients with back pain is, "What kind of mattress is best?" 'Until now we didn't really have an answer. For the first time this research gives us good evidence on which to base our advice. 'The most important thing is to make sure your mattress feels comfortable and this research shows you don't have to buy a rock-hard mattress to get some relief from back pain.'
In the study, Spanish researchers from the Kovacs Foundation in Palma de Mallorca investigated the effects of different types of mattress on patients with chronic nonspecific low back pain. More than 300 volunteers tested mattresses rated as 'firm' or 'medium-firm'. They were unaware of the type of mattress they were being asked to test. Overall, patients who used medium-firm mattresses were twice Chartered physiotherapist Mark as likely to report improvements in low back pain while lying in bed, and when getting out of bed. They were similarly less likely to need pain-killing drug treatment. About 13million working days are lost in Britain each year to back pain and the cost to the NHS, business and the economy is an estimated £5billion per year. At least 5million adults consult their GP every year over back pain. Mr Bender, who runs the Harley Street-based Sports and Spinal Clinics and is also physiotherapist for Britain's Davis Cup tennis team, said back pain sufferers want to know how to help themselves.