5 Sleeping Positions that will Help Improve Your Spinal Health

If you were asked which piece of furniture in your house does more to influence your spinal health than any other, which piece of furniture would you choose? Would it be a chair? How about the sofa? How about the bed? If your choice is the bed you are correct. No other piece of furniture in your house exerts as much positive and/or negative influence on your spine's health as your bed. Every night you conk out and select contorted positions that you spend eight hours or more in that can and often does sabotage your back.

The shape of our spine is what makes us human; no other member of the mammal family (except the great ape) has the same type of elongated S shaped spinal column. This elongated S shape is the super structure of the body which enables us to move around flawlessly. If misaligned in anyway, this flawless movement is hampered. Contorted sleeping positions can misalign your spine.

One way to help maintain your spine's alignment is by sleeping on your side. Lying on your back or your stomach can alter the normal natural curve of your spine. Another way to improve your spinal health is to select a sleeping position in which you bend your knees and hips slightly; sort of a semi fetal position. This position will aid in reducing the pressure on the disks in your spine while you sleep.

Keeping your body and spine in plumb is important. The position of your head, shoulder, hips, knees, and ankles were all designed to interact and operate on the same plane. Your muscles and bones are constantly fighting gravity and gravity appears to be winning. The S curve of your spine is being pushed, pulled, compressed, and it is slowly beginning to loose its shape. This is causing musculoskeletal dysfunction all around us. You must do what you can to prevent this from happening to you. Your sleeping position can play a prime role as a preventative.

By placing a pillow between your knees while you are sleeping, you can reduce the stress on your legs' upper sciatic nerve. Tilting your head is an unnatural position for your neck and can force your cervical spine out of alignment. Find a comfortable natural position to place your head in while sleeping. Your arms should be in front of your body when you are asleep. Hugging a pillow will add support to your upper arms and shoulder while keeping you spine in proper alignment and shape.

When it is time to sleep the only thing important to us is our individual comfortable sleeping position that enables us to fall off to sleep. In a lot of cases, although comfortable to you physically, this individual comfort position may be wreaking havoc on your physiology. Don't turn into that little old bent over person you always swore you would never become. Converting your sleeping position is difficult and will demand a lot of work from you, but your spinal health is at stake. Do what you have to do to make it work. In the long run, you will benefit handsomely for having done so.

Resource: Health Bulletin - Men's Health Magazine, October, 2008