Hip pain

Labrador

Hello everyone

newly diagnosed and how you all get a decent nights sleep, can’t find a comfortable position and very tired.

many thanks

Anna

Hello @Labrador and welcome to the online community.

Not getting a decent night's sleep is one of the challenges we can face when living with arthritis. I'm sure our helpful and friendly members will share with you some of their tips for how they deal with hip pain at night.

You might like to look at some suggestions that Versus Arthritis has put together - the link is below. They include ways to make yourself more comfortable in bed:

https://www.versusarthritis.org/news/2022/february/top-tips-for-good-sleep/

I'm sure that members will come forward with other useful suggestions.

Anna (Mod)

RogerBill

On going to bed I find reading helps, especially if it's something that's not too interesting! Sometimes when I wake during the night with hip or leg pain I find a few minutes of walking around the house can settle things down. Alternatively listening to podcasts in bed acts as a distraction from the pain so I don't fidget so much and I’m often surprised when later I rewind the podcast and find I'd gone back to sleep quicker than I thought.

stickywicket

I think a bedtime routine is useful. Also experiment with different positions. One tip from my ortho consultant when my ancient THR was playing up - sleep on that side. If we sleep on the other side the bothersome leg can move into awkward positions while we're asleep. If,it's anchored underneath us it can't

Lilymary

I found using a system of cushions to prop my body into positions that avoided stressing the worst bits of my leg. I tend to sleep in my right side or even on my stomach (my left hip was the problem, plus referred pains down the leg). So lying almost on my stomach I had a cushion under my left hip which kept the joint flexed into a comfortable,position, and another under my ankle to keep my knees flexed which help with referred pains. Lying with my legs straight out was agony. I also took a couple of cocodamol before I went to bed to deal with the worst of the pain. I could often get around 5 hours sleep this way, but to be honest, thenoain would usually wake me up at some stage. As @RogerBill says, if you do wake up, walk around a little and/or read for a while, take a paracetamol if necessary (within permitted doses per day) and/or read for a while to take your focus away from the pain. I also found keeping reasonably warm at night helped, as if I was cold my body would curl up to keep warm, and the resulting pain often woke me up.