Making the most of good sleep hygiene and following some of the steps above could help to protect you against the exhaustion of a condition that impacts your day-to-day life
The term “sciatica” is one that many people are familiar with, particularly in the landscape of health and medicine. This word refers to the pain that people experience when the sciatic nerve compresses under the pressure of spinal abnormalities or inflammation.
When you experience sciatica, you often suffer from a lot of pain and discomfort. Unfortunately, that discomfort generally continues throughout the day and night – even when you’re trying to sleep. So, how do you get a good night’s rest with this condition?
1.Get the Right Mattress
Your mattress probably won’t be the root of all your sciatica problems, but it could be making your issues worse. If you know you have serious back pain issues, getting an orthopaedic bed could be an excellent option. Remember, the kind of bed you need will depend on how you prefer to sleep. Stomach sleepers might prefer a firmer mattress that keeps the body aligned. Side sleepers need support for their hips and shoulders, while back sleepers need full-body support.
2.Try a Body Pillow
When you’re sleeping with sciatica, it can be helpful to place a regular pillow or a body pillow between your knees. It helps to keep your hips, spine, and pelvis aligned, so you’re less likely to experience worse pain and maintain a comfortable sleeping position. For some, it’s helpful to place a pillow underneath their knees so that they stay bent as they sleep. Try both methods to find which one works best for you.
3.Try Gentle Exercise and Stretches Man doing seated stretches on a deck; image by Scott Broome, via Unsplash.com.Exercise and stretching are excellent, regardless of whether you have sciatica or not. However, stretches before bed can be crucial if you want to reduce your risk of having a bad night’s sleep. Don’t exercise too much before bed, as this can give you an adrenaline rush, which keeps you awake. However, some simple stretches before you settle down for the night can reduce your pain. Try pulling your knees to your chest or performing a pelvic tilt.
4.Take a Hot Bath
Most people will tell you that if you want to get a good night’s sleep every night, you need to follow good sleep hygiene. It means that you go through the same series of actions every night to protect yourself from a bad night’s rest. You might have a cup of tea or even a hot bath to help you relax. A hot bath is a great part of any night-time routine because it relaxes the muscles, and releases pain-fighting endorphins around your sciatic nerve roots. Your bathwater needs to be pleasant, warm, and not too hot. You could also try using a hot water bottle in bed.
5.Avoid Sleeping on Your Stomach
If you can avoid it, sleeping on your stomach may not be a good idea for people with sciatica pain. Stomach sleeping is one of the worst positions because it flattens the natural curvature of the spine and causes strain in the neck because your head needs to turn to one side. Even if you think that you get relief in this position, constantly sleeping on your stomach could cause more problems with discomfort in the future. If you can’t find a comfortable position, you may try sleeping in the foetal position as it gives you the best space between your vertebrae.
Good Luck Sleeping with Sciatica
Sleeping with any condition, including sciatica, isn’t always easy. Making the most of good sleep hygiene and following some of the steps above could help to protect you against the exhaustion of a condition that impacts your day-to-day life. https://www.legalreader.com/5-useful-tips-for-sleeping-with-sciatica/
Pain caused by sciatica is felt deep inside the leg and can be incredibly crippling. Sciatica can also cause tingling, numbness or weakness in the leg or a sharp burning feeling all of which are uncomfortable. Achieving sciatica pain relief permanently involves targeting the cause of the sciatica and treating the cause, otherwise pain alleviation may only be temporary.
Sciatica refers to damage or pressure involving the sciatic nerve which is the largest nerve in the body. It runs from the bottom of the spine, through the hip joint, knee and ankle. Damage or pressure on the sciatic nerve can be caused by a variety of reasons and needs to be investigated in order for sciatica pain relief to be obtained on a permanent basis.
Temporary sciatica pain relief can involve taking anti-inflammatory medication or pain killers. In more serious cases cortisone injections may be administered. Placing hot or cold ice packs on the painful area as well resting the affected area may also be recommended to aid in reducing inflammation and help with alleviating pain.
However sciatica, which is a type of neuralgia, is often considered a symptom of a cause. Sciatica can be as a result of many things including piriformis syndrome, spondylolisthesis, spinal stenosis, slipped or herniated disk, tumours, osteoporosis, and pregnancy among others. Many of these causes of sciatica are further caused by other factors. Each of these causes needs to be looked at carefully in order to treat sciatica and help with sciatica pain relief on a more permanent basis if the pain does not ease up.
Often physical therapists can be recommended for sciatica pain relief as they can help with stretches and strengthening exercises that may target some of the sciatica causes. Piriformis syndrome can be relieved by stretching the tense piriformis muscle and strengthening the surrounding gluteal muscles to give the hip area support, taking strain off the piriformis muscle and ultimately the sciatic nerve. When sciatica is caused by back problems such as a herniated disk or spondylolisthesis, strengthening the muscles in the lower back will help relieve any pressure on the sciatic nerve which has been placed on it due to weakness in the back. A herniated disk refers to when a disk in the back has slipped or pushed on to the muscle from straining the back, a sports injury or moving in an unusual way. Spondylolisthesis refers to a vertebra slipping onto another vertebra. Physical therapists may also recommend massaging around the area where the cause of the sciatica is to relieve muscle tension, which may also aid sciatica pain relief.
In more extreme cases of sciatica when the pain can not be kept at bay and someone suffers from it continuously, surgery may be considered as a way to treat the cause of the sciatica. If spinal stenosis is the cause, which refers to a narrowing of the spinal canal, surgery may be a way to physically take pressure off the spinal cord and ultimately the lower back, relieving pressure on the sciatic nerve and promoting sciatica pain relief. Surgery may also be used to physically loosen the pirformis muscle, undoing its hold on the sciatic nerve as well as repairing the vertebra that has slipped onto another vertebra in the case of spondylolisthesis. It may also be a way to remove a possible tumor, which could be pushing on the sciatic nerve. However surgery would be a last resort as a means of alleviating sciatica pain and help with sciatica pain relief.
Sciatica pain relief can be achieved temporarily with painkillers and anti-inflammatory medication as well as hot packs and ice packs. However if the pain increases, it is recommended that you consult your physician immediately to locate the cause of the sciatica and target it to achieve ultimate sciatica pain relief.
