It’s common for people to wake up with numbness and tingling in their arm or hands. This is often due to sleeping with an arm beneath your body or head. When there is enough weight on your arm, it can compress nerves which results in numbness or tingling. This is often referred to having one’s arm “fall asleep”.Arm numbness is most common in slide sleepers, as the sleeping position results in you lying on one arm. There is a nerve running the length of your arm called the median nerve. When compressed over a period of time, you can experience numbness.If you’re sleeping on your side, and waking up with your arm numb, there are things you can do to help avoid the problem.Of course, you want to avoid numbness, tingling and the associated discomfort, if possible. Be aware of your sleeping position. Are your head and neck being supported properly? Many people do not know that their pillow can have a significant impact on nerve compression in your arms. If your pillow is not supporting your head properly, nerve compression problems can become worse.
Try using a pillow that is firm and thick enough to support your head and neck. The firmness of your mattress also is a factor in your sleeping position and comfort. Since your body does not sink far into a firm mattress, your head is naturally higher off the surface of the bed, usually necessitating a firmer, thicker pillow.It makes sense to start experimenting with your pillow first, rather than to go out and buy an expensive new mattress. Eliminating your arm numbness and tingling might be as simple as trying a different pillow, such as a contour pillow or buckwheat pillow.Read More: Sleeping Position & Choosing a Pillow Generally if you roll over to relieve the pressure, the numbness and tingling will quickly subside. Moving your hands and arm can help restore feeling in your arm after waking up. Experimenting with different pillows, mattresses and sleeping positions can help you find relief. If you experience extreme numbness or pain, or numbness not related to sleeping on your arm, you should speak with your doctor to make sure it is not something more serious.
Already my dream is coming true. We've slept on several mattresses so far (a DWR Sonno — our old one, the Hastens Excelsior — September's test mattress, and also recently a Sealy Posturpedic). I've begun to collect information as to how this whole mattress and bed world works. Today I wanted to share with you our new bedroom out in the country and some things I've learned so far from this project. 1. Reassembling Our Min Bed — Platforms Need Softer Mattresses Above you can see my reassembly this past Saturday of our Min Bed from the city. We had to move it out to make way for the Hastens, and it's going to be interesting moving beds in and out every month. At least this one will now stay here. I love the Min frame. It's a simple, well made design that's easy to assemble and creates a nice profile close to the floor. You can put stuff under it, but it's still low. The mattress I put on top of it was an old Sealy Posturpedic, which was always my go-to mattress since I graduated from futons in college.
The Posturpedic is not expensive and has always been — for me — a good standard American mattress. That said, as I've gotten older, I find it a bit unforgiving and it really, really needs a mattress topper to soften it up. In addition, I'd say that putting it on a platform is not a great idea. Platforms are really solid and provide very little give to a mattress. While I'm not a big box spring fan, I think this mattress needs one, as I woke up with a sore back again after Saturday night. 2. Americans Prefer Firm Beds 3. Heavier People Need Firmer Mattresses/Lighter People Need Softer Mattresses 4. There's A Lot of Foam in Mattresses These Days! 5. There are Two Types of Foam: Latex & Memory Foam Natural foam is called "natural latex" and comes from rubber trees. It is expensive, challenging to work with, and firmer than the man-made version, which is called "memory foam." Memory Foam is made of "polyurethane with additional chemicals increasing its viscosity and density....
Memory foam was developed in 1966 under a contract by NASA's Ames Research Center to improve the safety of aircraft cushions." (– quote via Wikipedia.) Memory foam is the lovely soft one that you sink into and which was first branded by Tempur-Pedic. Latex you tend to sleep "on."Memory foam you tend to sleep "in." Due to the qualities of both, they are often mixed into a hybrid foam that combines their strengths. From what I understand, even though natural latex could be considered a "green" product, it is not currently recyclable in any way, so that both foams are really cradle to grave products — i.e. they create bad waste at the ends of their lives. >> Latex on Wikipedia>> Memory Foam on Wikipedia So, there's what I've learned so far. I'll continue to update you as I try out new mattresses and learn more from industry folks and from my own experience. • About The Year In Bed • Follow daily progress on Twitter at #yearinbed New Treatment Guidelines for Back Pain Stress Non-Drug Interventions, Physical Movement and Watchful Waiting
Legal Filing Accuses EPA of Unfairly Protecting Monsanto Kennedy Challenges Journalists to Balanced Discussion About Vaccine Safety Vitamin D Is More Effective Than Flu Vaccine, Study Says Healing the Body With Photobiomodulation Visit the Mercola Video Library Dr. Doris J. Rapp, MD, board-certified as both an environmental medical specialist and pediatric allergist, discusses the dangerous chemicals that may be lurking inside your mattress.Dr. Rapp is a homeopath and the author of the bestselling books Is This Your Child? and Is This Your Child’s World?. She has published 29 medical articles, eight chapters in medical texts, and 11 other books about allergy.Dr. Rapp has also produced a number of educational videotapes that vividly demonstrate the dramatic physical and behavioral changes in children and adults that can be achieved using her method of allergy testing called Provocation/Neutralization.To hear the entire expert interview, please join the Mercola Inner Circle.