hi I'm Bob Shrum physical therapist
branding physical therapy and together
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of course but we know I'll import a good
night's sleep is or I ever believe it
but it's amazing how much injury you can
do to yourself at night when you're
laying in one position if it's a bad
position so we want to avoid those
terrible that's right I've had myself as
well as many patients say boy I was
feeling good and I woke up in the
morning had this terrible neck pain I
don't know why neck pain or arm pain or
you know something showing up at night
some little elf came in in the middle I
hit you with a hammer but okay the main
goal with with sleeping posture is that
you want to try to keep your head and
what we call the neutral deserve bread
you must stand I wasn't faced that way I
do okay I bet he really does he would
what you want to do is you want to make
sure his ear if you drop the plumb line
lined up with his shoulder okay that
means he has good posture that way this
person he's not forward right and that's
what you're going to want to do when
you're laying down too you want to make
sure that your is kind of lined up with
the shoulder the other thing is from the
side here you want the head in the
middle you don't want to bent this way
you're bent this way so in other words
if you lay on your side you want to have
probably two pillows
not one pillow you see how that
remission you know cook over a little
bit that'll make sense time to take off
all right once you start off Brown late
now flat on your back with too many
pillows Bob I just got the urges say I'm
feeling strong like bull today
okay matters all right all right
so number one terrible posture sleeping
with too many pillows underneath your
head by doing this what's going to
happen is that's going to feel like
normal to you so when you get up in the
morning and you wake up Brad Brad wake
up when you mix up his head's going to
be like this all day long it's going to
feel normal and if I tell them to
straighten up because I'm straight
because of your positioning sense you're
going to think you are in a normal
position energy forward so don't sleep
with three goals on your head
goes if you can get by with one that's
what you want to do right in hill oh
okay make him do things to the neck we
were getting other things I could
besides half of that so how about
sleeping on your stomach Brad with your
neck turned only one direction or the
other direction well if your stomach
sleeper your private envelope right I
don't imagine maybe people leave with
some people honor Simon going to pill it
all but one way or another if you're
sleeping on your stomach nobody's like
this you have your head up to one side
or the other right and one thing we know
about joints and this is a this can be
said about pretty much every joint your
body your neck has a lot of joints
that's quite a few of them joints don't
like to be able to have what we call end
range so like this is my elbow joint
this is all the way at end range okay
it's being stretched all the way all
night long and any age item that is
turned all the way one direction or
another yeah it's just not good for the
joint it's just being stretched all
night long and just an interesting fact
is this is just anecdotal but I went to
a class one time and the teacher asked
this was all physical therapists how
many of you are stomach sleepers and a
certain percentage of them raised their
hand he also has how many of you get
headaches every one of the people that
had that were something their stomach
got headaches so I I think there is a
correlation between getting the
headaches that come from the neck alone
add and sleeping on your stomach so fee
if you have headaches that's certainly
one of the first things I would
eliminate the last posture Brad that you
all don't want to do when you can do
this you can do this some people do it
yep some people doing laying on your
stomach or they do it laying on the back
having their arms above their head yeah
and what this is doing especially if
you're prone to what we call thoracic
outlet syndrome you're getting pressure
on some of the nerves of the arm medium
nerve radial nerve alder nerve and even
the the chest muscle itself can be
putting pressure on that the clavicle
can be putting pressure on the nerve and
if you've ever woken up or woke up with
numb hands or tingling fingers or even
if you have carpal tunnel syndrome this
that will make it a lot more irritated
the carpal itself the tunnel get the
nerve itself will get more irritated
from being put in this position so you
really want to avoid sleeping with your
arms overhead you hope you're sleeping
on your back like this ideally bread
what you want to do where there other
pillows hook in there this is actually
the way to do it it it is to have a
pillow I know this is going hello crazy
but this is a comfortable position for
your arm because even the arm down like
this it's hard on it so this is actually
a very good sleeping posture another
good sleeping posture with since we're
out of bread once you lay on your side
face up having you two pillows and you
hug a pillow and then the last pillow
which we don't have pillow go gather
this is probably the ideal sleeping
posture right here now you could hug a
person too right Brad oh yes yeah yeah
by always so but see his head is in the
middle his arm is supported this arm is
not up too far it's it's it's where it
needs to be and and there's no twist on
the back all right so the pillow between
the knees that's it so I'm real
comfortable yeah but yeah I've shoulder
injury that's always we see
here and you've heard of body pillows
Brad oh yeah
long body pills I think with the body
pillow you can actually put it between
your legs and hug it at the same rise so
if you're having trouble sleeping at
night these are some things to consider
wait Bob wait I just wanted to say one
more thing if you only have one pillow
and you're on your back you can sleep up
here and if you're on your side can you
keep tossing and turning you can always
double that cuddle up there I have no
trouble with you bringing your arm up a
little bit like this - Brad that's not
so so problematic as long as you don't
bring it way up like that that's the
problem
so all right as a little hand grab on to
them and they're like pearls of wisdom
Brad sleep well yeah peace