Sleep while Preggy

SLEEP! And it's not the getting up to pee thats bugging me but the pain I am in.

I was always a tummy sleeper, when I stopped being able to sleep on my tummy I moved to my back, now I can't do that anymore so I sleep on my sides. But this is proving to be quite painful for me.

I am quite wide in the hips and long in the legs. When I sleep on my side I wake up and my hips ache insanely. My lower back also hurts cause it's being twisted by the weight of my legs and tummy.

I have tried sleeping with pillows between my legs to take the weight but this isn't helping.

Also, you know that feeling when you leave a hair tie on your wrist too long, your skin goes red and gets indented and it kind of feels like a burn. Well, I get that on my hips too. If the sheets get crinkled up under me, I wake up with indents all down the side of my legs and they feel like burns.

I don't sleep most nights anymore because of the pain I'm in. I have quite a high pain threashold but this is too much even for me, especialy since it is disrupting my sleep.

 

Any suggestions? Next plan for me is to get someone to crack me in the head with a frying pan to knock me out. LOL

I slept with a pillow behind me so that I was not actually on my side or on my back it seemed to help. I maybe completely wrong but I am sure you can sleep on your back up until at least the third trimester.

I happily slept on my back till 30 weeks- man it was comfy. I made the most of that as once I was forced onto my sides it killed my hips.
I sometimes used a pillow betwenn legs (from knee to ankle) and a pillow against my back. I would tilt forwds so bump was lent on a little.

You can cuddle a pillow when you're lying on your side, that helps the shoulder that's off the bed and your upper back as these parts lean forward and ache. Something I've been on lately is magnesium, apparently it's really good for joints & muscles while sleeping and if you take before bedtime it relaxes everything so theoretically helps you get to sleep quicker. I've always been a crappy sleeper, so I don't find that I'm getting more sleep but I'm not in as much pain. Talk to your MW, maybe you could do with accupuncture/pressure or a chiropracter? Ah the joys of pregnancy!

I'm not sure if its my own paranoia or what but sleping on my back can get uncomfy. The extra weight pushing down on my insides.

 

Might have to see if I can go find one of those long body pillows or stock up on a few more pillows from somewhere else.

I had one of those full body length pillows. I wrapped my arm around it and it went under my tummy supporting that then between my legs. The pillow under the tummy stops your top hip rotating down which is twisting your back and giving the back pain. The hip pain is just pressure. I switched side to back to side to back to side etc. Eventually i found the couch way more comfy - after 34 weeks maybe. I could sleep sitting up on the couch.

Couch seems to be the general consensus.

I live at home with my parents though And Dad gets up at like 5am to ge ready for work. Maybe I'll sleep on the couch for a few hours a night so at least I get SOME sleep.

I surround myself with pillows including behind me so I'm kind of half on my back, half on my side. Or what if you propped yourself up with lots of pillows behind your back so your half sitting up/half laying down to take some of the pressure off your back?

Or what about a nice relaxing bath before bed to relax some of those tense muscles, might help with laying on your side. Sleeping is such a pain while pregnant isn't it?

I've also heard a rolled up towel under your bump helps? Haven't tried that though.

I do hip and pelvic stretches pretty much every day and I also go for walks almost every day.

 

I had a better sleep last night using some of the suggestions on here about pillows under my belly as well as between my legs. So hopefully that will progress.

I am a tummy sleeper too and struggled to find a comfy position when I was pg. The couch was good (or a comfy armchair) although I have a thing about sleeping in the same room/bed as DH so I never slept a night on the couch. Silly.

Like HeidisMum I slept with a pillow behind my back when I was on my side so that when I (inevitably) rolled onto my back in the middle of the night I stayed on an angle rather than being flat on my back.

Experiment with as many extra pillows as you can find/borrow/steal - I also found stacking them up behind my shoulders/upper back helped me be more upright and I could sleep "on my back" for longer.