Tackle The Three Main Causes Of Back Pain While You Sleep

Sleep should be a time when your body rests. It should be one of the best parts of the day; all the tension leaves your body and you awake feeling refreshed and full of life. This makes it all the more painful when your nights and mornings are interrupted by chronic back pain. It may linger throughout the day, but you notice it’s triggered when you go to bed. 

Your sleep gets disrupted as you either struggle to get to sleep or keep waking up with the urge to change positions. When you wake up in the morning there’s a nagging pain in your lower back that won’t go away. This cycle repeats every night, so what’s causing the back pain? 

Experts will point to numerous possibilities, yet three main causes always crop up. Most of the time, bedtime back pain is caused by the following: 

• A bad mattress 
• A dodgy bed frame
• Poor posture

A bad mattress 

It’s recommended that you change your mattress every six to eight years. Some people think this is far too frequent, but there are reasons for it. You sleep on a mattress every single night and it is under lots of stress. Over the years, it loses more of its supportive structure and stops providing a stable base for your body. 

As a consequence, your mattress can’t support you as well as it used to, which means your back is under more strain as you sleep. The same happens when your mattress isn’t suitable for your body. Very soft mattresses are bad for back pain because there’s a lack of support from the beginning. Switch to a more supportive mattress and see the difference it makes. Genuinely, you will notice a change on the first night. 

A dodgy bed frame

When you’ve got a new mattress with lots of support, back pain sometimes happens because of your bed frame. Dodgy bed frames don’t provide the mattress with enough support, which in turn affects your back. Think of there being a chain from the floor to your bed frame to the mattress and then your back. When there’s a weak link anywhere in this chain, your back will suffer. 

You won’t always need a new bed – most of the time, bed repairs will do. Fixing the slats will give the mattress the support it needs to support you! Also, repairs could help stop your bed from creaking or squeaking too much as well. 

Poor posture

While lots of people get back pain due to poor mattresses or beds, others suffer due to their own bad posture. Living a sedentary life causes you to develop postural issues, such as an arch in your lower back. When it’s too pronounced, you’ll sleep with an arched back and this causes pain. 

Fix your posture and you’ll fix this problem. It can take weeks/months to see changes, but there’s a short-term fix to ease pain while you sleep. Place a pillow or cushion under your calves and this naturally flattens your back while you sleep. If you’re a side-sleeper, put the cushion between your knees. Both options will provide back pain relief. 

Tackle the three main causes of back pain while sleeping and you will start seeing improvements almost immediately.

*This is a collaboration post