Throughout the day you move freely, without a great deal of back pain at all, but at night when you lay in bed for more than a few minutes, the severe lower back pain starts to nag at you, interrupting your sleep when you just want to get some rest. Unfortunately, if you have problems with nocturnal lower back pain, this is the story of your life. Even though people go to great lengths to try and alleviate the back pain they feel when they try to sleep, in a lot of cases, there is something more serious going on and you should talk to a doctor about your symptoms. Here are a few things you should know if you have consistent problems with nocturnal lower back pain.

It could be a lot more than just a bad mattress.

The first thing people tend to blame if they have a difficult time sleeping because of back pain is their mattress. Even though in some cases a mattress can be the problem, there is usually something more worrisome going on. A good test to see if your mattress could be to blame is to lie on your back without a pillow and see if the bed seems to conform to your body. A good mattress provides support to the entire spine when you lay flat on your back; a bad mattress will leave open gaps where your spine is not supported at all, especially at the arch of your lower back.

If it's not the mattress, what is the problem?

Nocturnal lower back pain can be caused by a lot of different things, some more major than others. If the pain that you experience while you are sleeping has just started, you may have injured a muscle or inadvertently sprained the lower spinal column. However, if nocturnal back pain is something that you have been dealing with for a while, there are other things that could be going on. You may be dealing with:

  • scoliosis
  • endometriosis if you are a female
  • spinal stenosis
  • arthritis
  • certain forms of cancer
  • disc degeneration

Even though about 80 percent of the population has dealt with some form of lower back pain, this type of pain only at night could point to a bigger issue than you realize. Because nocturnal lower back pain could be something serious, talking to your doctor about your symptoms is always important. To find out more, speak with someone like Valley Chiropractic.

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