Sleep habits.

For the past few years I have followed nearly the exact same nightly routine: Lay on back, drift off, turn on side, fall asleep. And for these past few years I’ve found myself frequently waking up with my hands weirdly swollen. A quick internet search suggests arthritis, poor circulation, or pregnancy as the cause for such an ailment. And while I don’t think I’m pregnant, poor circulation could certainly be a culprit. Before I go about trying to improve circulation, I figured I’d first try to adjust my sleeping position so I’m not laying on my arm.

Last week I tried to change to a back only method of drifting off. And I gotta admit, things went better than expected. For a full week I was rocking sleep corpse style: on back, arms at sides or across chest. Still, I’m not pleased with this orientation and I think I can do better.

Or maybe I just need a new mattress.

9 thoughts on “Sleep habits.

  • 3/8/2011 at 2:37 pm
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    I have the same thing happen in my hands and feet all the time. I asked my doctor when it got to be a problem and he said my blood pressure was too low. If it gets too bad I’ll have a handful of something sweet and salty (like chocolate dipped pretzels) and it seems to help bring the bp up enough to keep the blood flowing. If anything its an excuse to eat chocolate dipped pretzels.

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    • 3/8/2011 at 2:39 pm
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      In my excitement over chocolate dipped pretzels, I forgot to mention that I would eat them like half an hour before bed. Doesn’t work so well to pump up the circulation while you sleep when you eat them at lunch.

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  • 3/8/2011 at 2:53 pm
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    I often sleep on my side with my hand under my head and get dead arm. It makes snoozing a lot more interesting. So I too feel your pain about trying to sleep on my back.

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  • 3/8/2011 at 4:28 pm
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    You could try sleeping on your back, arms thrown out wide. Or possibly hanging up side down like Michael Keaton portraying Billionaire playboy Bruce Wayne in “Batman” directed by Tim Burton.

    I find that the arm under the head method works fine if you use two pillows. A normal sized pillow for the first layer, then your arm, topped with a thinner pillow then your head. You get the sensation of sleeping on your arm but with the added cushion so as not to get dead arm.

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  • 3/8/2011 at 5:41 pm
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    This only started happening to me the past few months of pregnancy and it sucks. I wake up with club hands every day. Cannot wait until I have the baby and can go back to comfortably sleeping on my sides again, luckily this will happen sometime in the next week and a half. This is not helpful to you at all but I had to comment.

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    • 3/8/2011 at 9:33 pm
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      When is that baby coming, by the way?

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  • 3/9/2011 at 7:56 am
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    The most controversial part of this post is that it is filed under Acclaim to Fame, which I assume indicates that your sleep habits stem from some time sleeping in the car.

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  • 3/20/2011 at 3:45 pm
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    I will add +1 to the “maybe I just need a new mattress” part of the post.

    HUGE difference.

    Reply

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