Sleeping on the floor has always been my go-to for general soreness but especially back pain. When I was an athlete I always slept on the floor after long practices or games because it *felt* like my body was readjusting itself, never had any evidence to prove it. It was just comfortable. I still sleep on the floor periodically, usually after heavy deadlift days.
Bought a sleep number bed about 5 years ago and never looked back. Noticed this same thing (about 12 years of lifting plus spondylolisthesis at L5/S1 I probably got falling out of a tree as a kid) and complained about stiff back in the morning to an old guy at work (we’re steamfitters, plenty of beat up old guys in our trade). He suggested a sleep number because you can make your side as firm as you want. Cranked all the way up, it’s a lot like the floor. The trick is to get a lower model which doesn’t have a massive pillow top which destroys the whole thing
Yo idk if you read the comments but i’m a heavy weight powerlifter and the best thing i did was buy a bed for big people. Mine is called a big fig. It is super hard almost like a floor lol. Its been amazing
I've been sleeping on two layers of 15mm gym mats, and a memory foam topper, for a long time now. It's been a game changer for my sleep. I still use a low to the ground King Size bed frame. My partner has added a thicker blanket underneath for her side, but she also found that the extra stiffness has helped her a lot. It's also a lot cheaper than a mattress. And way easier to move, and maintain.
I've been sleeping on a shikifuton (traditional Japanese mattress) for almost a year now. I got it so I can roll it up during the day to have more space for calisthenics training in my room during the day.. The mattress is 4 inches thick (they make one's that are 3 inches thick). At first it hurt to turn over on my side because I wasn't used to the lack of cushion, but now I can sleep on my back, my stomach and my sides with no pain and my body feels so freaking good in the morning
I don't sleep on the floor, but I have a really hard mattress, and at first it was a pain to get used to, but man.... that thing has saved my life. Who knew that my wife's pillow top cushion was killing me slowly.
Another thing to really help with sleep is tape your mouth. I know it sounds crazy but I sleep so deep and so much better since I’ve been doing it. Give it a try
@@AlexanderBromley yes. There is actually a lot of info about it. It gets into your diaphragmatic breathing. Not mouth breathing which stimulates you. Rest and digest part of your nervous system. I know it sounds weird but give it a try.
I've slept on the floor for about twenty years now. (Long-term lower back issues going back decades before this.) And I'm also a 'side-sleeper', or 'fetal-positioner'. A little off-topic here, but I've had to train myself to sleep on both sides, because my right shoulder has (apparently) taken a beating over the years as a result. (Rotator cuff issues despite a protracted 'bulletproofing' regimen.)
I have a pretty firm mattress and a couple years ago I ditched the pillow and slept in the same position as 5:21. It fixed the constant neck soreness I was having at the time but eventually I went back to using a pillow. I feel like I'm starting to develop some chronic upper back pain and trap tightness so I'm going to try sleeping like that again and see if it works.
I had a neck injury that I never could afford to get checked out. Sleeping on the floor, and eventually getting a firmer mattress was very beneficial. I don't know why cause I don't know what I did to it. I just know what makes it feel better or worse, and what makes my limbs tingle. Whatever it is it's getting better over time, and this is one of the biggest things driving that.
This is so interesting. I sleep mostly on my back, due to the cpap mask, and I have a pretty firm mattress (Big Fig). Every morning I would wake up with the pain in the lumbar area, which I alleviate a little bit by having a pillow under my knees. I just got a Tempur-Pedic topper (3"), and I am waking up without back pain and don't have to stuff a pillow under my knees anymore.
but the thing being also is a westerner is different in so many ways to African or asian, one can attempt to sleep just like them but in most cases would fail.
Mattresses in prison are about 3.5" thick (4" new). Inmates sleep like a baby, and this applies to ALL inmates with medical conditions. Interesting observation when you've been a correctional officer.
Bro they make beds for bigger people. Look into a bed for big and tall people (I don't think you're thst tall- like me- but weight capacity is an issue)
I guess it depends on the problem that you're having but just having a more in shape back and not lifting so damn heavy all the time seems to be a big helper for a lot of people a lot of guys will have their back feel better if they can do sets of 20 to 30 reps on a back extension machine or glute ham raise. I've even recommended burpees to some bigger fata guys because of all the flexion they have to do and they get really intense lower back pumps for the first week or two
Training is catabolic, you are breaking down your body. Recovery (sleep, nutrition, hormones) is anabolic. You grow bigger and stronger because you *recover* from your training. Not because you train.
A truth that hardly ever seems to come up in training circles is that competitive activities are not healthy activities, even though they're sold that way. In the short term extreme fitness will certainly yield benefits, at least in the markers your physician would posit. In the long term however, there is a price to pay for continually riding your physiologic boundaries. The goal of extreme fitness is high performance, not long term health. This is well understood by elite athletes who realize their competitive lifespan will end around a particular age after which the knee and hip replacements, shoulder reconstructions, and spinal fusions will define their lives. Don't get me wrong here. I'm not bashing strength training. I'm saying there are more things to live for than just winning and sensible strength programming can extend your active life by decades if you don't waste the fire of youth in your first 25 years. When we're young and healthy it's hard to imagine our mortality, or that our bodies will in fact stop giving back so freely after abuse. It will happen though. You have to decide what is most important to you, short term glory or long term, sustained benefits that payout dividends in so many other pursuits than sport alone.
