♪ Bob and Brad the two most famous ♪
♪ Physical therapists on the internet ♪
Hi folks, I'm Bob Schrupp, physical therapist.
- Oh my back, oh Brad Heineck, physical therapist.
- Together we are the most famous
physical therapists on the internet.
- In our opinion, of course, Bob.
- So if you're wondering what we're going to talk about,
Brad's giving us a little hint here, back pain,
no wonder you have back pain, you're sleeping wrong.
- Oh yes.
- And plus, Brad, by the way,
we're going to do a giveaway today.
- Oh excellent, and it might be something relative.
- Right. - Ah.
- If you're new to our channel, please take a second
to subscribe to us, we provide videos on how to stay
healthy, fit, pain free, and we upload every day.
Also go to bobandbrad.com and go to the giveaway
section because this week we are giving away
a Sleep Ovation mattress, yes believe it, or not.
You can also find the contest,
it'll be pinned to the top of the page on Facebook,
go to Instagram, Twitter or TikTok
if you want a 60 second version of our program.
- That's right and now we have podcasts out there.
- Yeah.
- And they are good, I listened to one
this morning and I was just very happy.
- All right. - I was grateful.
- All right, so this mattress is a Sleep Ovation mattress,
it's got 700 individual mattresses and these
are a proprietary foam. - Oh yes.
- Yeah, and so they're very forgiving
but yet they respond well.
- I like the way you put that.
- Yeah, I don't know. (chuckles)
But this is, you won't be able to look at your mattress
this way because it comes with a cover on it.
- It's got one of these covers, yeah.
- And this is just a sample of one.
- Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- So-- - Get rid of it.
- Get rid of it, there we go, OK.
- Let's get on with the program.
- All right, if you're waking up with pain in the morning--
- Oh God.
- There's a reason, you know, it could be
your mattress, it could be the way you're sleeping.
We're going to go through at least a dozen ideas,
stay through till the end of the video
because we've got some good ones right at the end.
- Oh Bob, I'm getting excited.
- So try them, do an experiment, some may help,
some may not but you make the determination.
- Right, yep, everyone's a little different.
- Now number one is I've had a lot of back patients,
back pain patients who have slept in a recliner.
Have you had-- - Oh absolutely,
particularly if they're older, it can be
a commonplace, or if there's an issue.
- Yeah and if you're sleeping in a recliner,
we really want to progress you to back to the bed
if possible. - Right, right.
- And usually we do this in kind of phases.
The first thing I'd recommend is if you're sleeping
in the recliner, make sure that you're
getting some support behind your back.
- Right, Bob.
- This is, just again, kind of a transition.
- So yeah, a smaller throw pillow usually works quite well.
- Right.
- And you know, usually people have them around
but you know if you put it there, it's like,
oh boy that does feel good, it's a big step forward.
- Right because what we're trying to prevent
is you have your back from rounded all night long.
- Right, right, yep.
- It's just generally is not a good thing for you.
- Yep. - I mean,
so the second thing is I want you to recline
as far as you can go so you're starting to be like a bed.
- Yes, absolutely, I suggested that to many
of my patients and myself, I used to sleep
in a recliner, not a lot but I would, and I'd always go
all the way back. - All the way back.
- And part of the reason is because in the,
you'd get support from the chair typically--
- Gotcha. - On the recliners
I did so you didn't need the pillow sometimes.
- OK, the final step then is you go to the bed
and you actually have to kind of create
like you're in a recliner, so. (chuckles)
- The bed recliner.
- Yeah, so you're going to put, use like a leg wedge
like this, and Brad, you're going to go ahead and show us.
- I thought why not because--
- Brad uses this sometimes.
- Right, if my back is flared up--
- You probably don't want to have
your head hanging off the edge.
(chuckles)
We'll move down.
- Yeah, thick pillow.
- I'll move it down here.
- There we go. - There you go.
- And the leg wedge itself, I've used these
on many back pain patients. - Yes.
- You put it there and there's something about
where the angle of this contact in your hamstring
area and your hips, it really relaxes your lower back.
Most people find these very comforting.
- Yes exactly, I actually buy them,
one of my nephews was having trouble
with a herniated disc and I sent him one of these.
- Oh really?
- Because he was having trouble sleeping.
- Uh-huh.
- And he was able to sleep with this--
- Yeah. - For a couple hours at least.
- Yeah you probably aren't going to
sleep with that all night long.
- Right.
- Because if you roll to your side it--
- Yeah, it's a problem, so. - It doesn't work.
But I usually get a couple hours
and I throw it on the floor and it helps.
- All right, number two kind of relates to number one,
I want you to keep your back straight when you're sleeping,
I don't want to be in that rounded out position.
- Sure.
- So in other words, I'll lay
down once here if you don't mind.
- Oh yeah, take a nap.
- I'm going to lie down.
- Oh yeah, there's a woman that commented--
- Yeah. - She really got after me
because I was saying lay.
- OK, so you don't want to really curl
up like this even, Brad. - [Brad] Hmm-mm.
- Your back is rounded all night long
but also if you have a mattress that's old
and you're sinking down-- - [Brad] Hmm-mm.
- It's like a bowl, your back is going
to be rounded out like that-- - Right.
- All night long too so-- - Yeah.
- We're trying to keep your back straight and we'll show you
some other hints, well I'll go into that
right now Brad, actually, here's my keys.
- Oh.
(keys clatter)
- So we're going to start off, let's say
you are a back sleeper but you have a large buttock.
- [Brad] Hmm-mm.
- If you have a large buttock--
- Yes?
- What's going to happen is, let me show what happens
here Brad, give me a pillow--
- Yep. - That little one.
My mic's falling off, my Kleenexes.
- Oh why Bob, why the Kleenex?
- All right, this is going to represent a large buttock.
- Yep. - You know?
- Oh the pillow, sure. - Yeah,
if you have a large buttock, you're going to have a gap
here and your back is going to actually round out.
- Sure.
- Can you see that?
- Oh yeah, well I can't, oh there we go, right here.
- Yeah, so all night long if you really, you know,
have a larger buttock or bigger hips, you could be
like this all night long or even off onto your side.
You could be getting it rounded out like this.
- Right, so what are we going to do about it?
- Well, you could use a rolled towel.
- [Brad] Hmm-mm.
- Brad, why don't you show that?
- So if you put the rolled towel in that,
just above the hips there-- - Right.
- In the waistline--
- To help fill in that gap.
- Yep, and you can pin this together.
- Right.
- And if you find that that feels better,
and I personally do, but my mattress takes care
of it so I don't need this, but that can be helpful,
and then when you roll to your side,
it still does the same thing.
- There's the support there, now if you find a rolled
towel or a rolled sheet works well,
you could continue with that--
- Right.
- But there is a product on the market
called the sleep roll by McKenzie that also works
for that, but you really don't need to buy one,
I mean you can really just use a rolled towel.
- Yep, if it's working fine, that's great.
Were we going to talk about if they do have a old mattress
that's sunk in and they can't afford a new one?
Because you know there's-- - They could put plywood.
- Yeah, yeah, the option of maybe putting a piece
of plywood between the box spring--
- Right. - And the mattress
just to help level that mattress out.
You know, it's cheaper, didn't you say you did that?
- Yeah we did it on our first bed.
- Yeah, yeah.
- You always have that look on your face like--
- (chuckles) I got it.
- That's why we need it. - Anyways, yeah.
- But yeah, we were poor and we--
- Yeah, use the plywood.
- And it worked. - You can't go wrong.
- All right, so again, as we're talking about it,
if you have wide shoulders or wide hips
and you sleep on your side, you're going
to want to fill in that gap in too, so.
- A good mattress will help accommodate those two things--
- Yes. - To a certain degree and--
- Yeah, Brad has a Sleep Ovation mattress,
I have a Sleep Ovation mattress
and when you sleep on your back,
it actually fills in that gap, doesn't it?
- Oh, I noticed it immediately.
- OK.
- But with my spondylolisthesis I'm more sensitive to that.
- Sure.
- Anyways, that's another story.
- All right, side sleeping, the other thing we want to do
is you, we're going to put a pillow between your knees
because if you go like this and you're sleeping like this,
this is rotating my spine, you can't see it,
it's kind of subtle-- - Right, but this angle
right here, instead of being like this--
- Yeah, is down like that.
- Which rotates the pelvis.
- Good demonstration, Brad, and if you sleep like this,
now you're stretching out the hip all night long
and you could actually end up with hip pain, I did.
- [Brad] Yeah.
- This was, so I started using--
- [Brad] You got your leg hanging off the edge of the bed.
- Yeah well, it's something like,
my wife doesn't give me any room, you know, so--
- Well, I can imagine.
- So I actually bought a pillow that you use
between the legs because it-- - Oh, it's made for it.
- Yeah, it's made for it because I'd get
kind of hot when I used a regular pillow.
- Oh, I see.
- Get too warm so I, or if you can find a smaller
one like this it would probably work,
so the other thing I'm going to show you,
it's a little trick Brad and I use sometimes
with people who have sciatica.
- Sure, oh yeah. - They sleep
on their side, now let's say I'm having
pain down this leg right here, you have
that leg on top, that's the upper leg.
- Yep.
- So then you take, is what you do, under the ankles
and feet, you put a pillow, or maybe two.
- Sure.
- And what this does, it kind of opens the spine,
it twists and opens the spine right here
and leaves more room for that nerve to exit
and it'll take stress off it, so sometimes
you can actually sleep like this without any increased pain.
- Right, and you'll know within
the first few minutes of doing this--
- Yeah, it should work immediately.
- Yeah, if it doesn't, well then
I wouldn't leave it there all night.
- If you sleep on your stomach--
- Oh, yes.
- We recommend you don't because it's hard on your neck,
your neck's turned all night long,
if you're going to though, put a pillow down.
- Put it where?
- Underneath-- - Not under your head?
- No. - No.
- Underneath your abdomen or your--
- Sure.
- Your stomach, just to give a little bit of bend
so you're not jamming the joints together of the back.
- It allows your back here to be in a more neutral
position, taking stress off the facet
joints Bob was talking about, so--
- I was just talking, Brad, to someone we both know
yesterday. - Oh really?
- That he's had back pain for 30 years
and his chiropractor told him to stop sleeping
on his stomach-- - [Brad] Hmm-mm.
- And now he can't, he couldn't sleep.
I go, if you could sleep on your stomach,
sleep on your stomach, I mean.
- Sure.
- You know. - Better to do that
and get some sleep-- - Right.
- Unless there's some obvious repercussions
- No, it wasn't causing, you know,
it just, he felt better on his stomach.
- We get people letting us know that on comments
when we way say, eh, don't sleep on your stomach
if you can avoid it, and they say, I've been
doing it for 30 years-- - Yeah.
- So yeah, there are--
- It's just a general rule of thumb.
- There's exceptions.
- I'm going to show one more thing here Brad,
how to get out of bed correctly,
so if you wake up in the morning and you really don't feel
any pain but then you get out of bed and you have pain--
- Oh, yep.
- Maybe you're getting out of bed incorrectly.
- I need to get off again. - So this is one thing
you should do is, this is one way
you can actually roll onto your side
like a log, everything is rolled together,
you don't go like, this, and then this--
- Yes.
- Or you don't go like this and then this--
- Yep.
- Everything goes together, the other things is,
a lot of times it really helps to tighten
up your abdomen-- - Yeah.
- Before you roll, I've had people that literally
couldn't get out of bed without increased pain.
If you tighten up your abdomen and then roll
and then keep it tight. - Yep, tight, tight, tight.
- Tight, tight, tight, tight, tight and bring the legs
off and put your arms up, it's amazing.
This is, that's really a sign of what we call
instability at the spine-- - [Brad] Hmm-mm.
- There's micro movements-- - Sure.
- That are causing the pain, another way to get out of bed,
do you want to show this one Brad,
where you get off on your stomach?
- Oh, yeah.
- Yeah, that's a different way.
- Yeah, I've used this with people.
Acute phase of back pain or it's pretty sore
and so I have people logroll all over--
- And then again, tighten the abdomen if you need to.
- Tightening, yep, and the hard part can be getting
this arm through here so do that slowly,
tight abdomen, and we're going to slowly get just
this leg off until you can feel the floor with your toes,
keep your back straight, tight abdomen,
you're going to walk with your hands, up straight,
tight, and up to here and oftentimes once
people get up, they're OK, then--
- Right.
- That transition, that transitional pain
or irritation is avoided that way.
- That absolutely saved me, I mean
when I had an episode of back pain,
I could not get in bed unless I did it that way.
- Maybe we should listen to it, Bob. (chuckles)
- What are you talking about?
- Well I've heard this story so many times
over the last-- - Oh yeah, I know.
I know, shut up. (chuckles)
- No, it's a good one though, but there's
people that have never heard it before.
- Right, exactly, all right, now number nine,
do not lie in bed too long, in other words,
don't watch TV in bed-- - Ah.
- And then fall asleep, what happens is
your discs fill up with fluid at night--
- And they're supposed to, it's natural.
- They're supposed to and, but if you sleep
too long or lie in bed too long--
- Yeah.
- You can actually start getting pain
in your back from being in bed too long.
- Right.
- They say that when, you know, you get a fever
or a flu and you're in bed for like 24 hours--
- Sure.
- You get that icky spine.
- Yeah.
- A lot of it is due to the increased fluid
in the spine, not necessarily the fever.
- Right, because you need that weight being up--
- Yeah.
- So that those discs imbibe and that's a whole
nother story, but there was this, that was going to
lead me in a segue but I forgot it. (chuckles)
- OK, all right well another thing is it's nice to walk
in the morning because that helps get those discs--
- Right.
- Get the fluid out of the discs so you're less
prone to injury in your back--
- Right. - In the morning
and last, I'm going to show them one exercise,
Brad, here too, before you get out of bed,
just to get the spine a little bit of movement
and again, if this helps, you do it,
if it doesn't help, you don't do it.
- Oh, yeah.
- Just gentle rotations like this.
It's moving the hips, it's moving the back.
- Yep.
- Get a little bit of nutrition in there--
- Yep.
- And hopefully warmed up for the day.
- It's like feeding your spine breakfast.
- Yep, there we go.
- Nutrition. - There we go.
- Well you know, analogies always help.
- All right, so we're going to allude to the mattress
here too, the Sleep Ovation mattress.
- Yeah.
- If you are a slight build, I'd consider
myself someone of a slight build.
- Thin. - Yeah, thin.
- [Brad] Hmm-mm.
- Yeah, and like a lot of the Asian community,
they sleep on like mats on the floor.
- Right.
- Because they are thinner and slighter build,
they can tolerate a harder surface.
- Sure.
- So if you're of a slight build, you could probably
get by with a very firm mattress.
- [Brad] Hmm-mm.
- If not, you want one that is supportive but forgiving
and that's a Sleep Ovation mattress
I've found. - Yeah.
- But there'll be other ones out there too.
- Right.
- But I'm just saying that it conforms
to your body but yet it supports you.
- Right, yep.
- So, all right, anything else we want to add, Brad?
- Well Bob, no I'm thinking once again,
we've solved many more problems
except for we still are working on--
- We can fix just about anything--
- But that broken heart.
- Yep, and--
- And we're still working on that.
- I wish you'd put some time into it, Brad.
- Bob, you know, last night I woke up
thinking about it-- - Yeah.
- That's another step.
- All right, see you later.
(synth chimes)