How to Get a Good Night’s Sleep While Pregnant: Advice from 3 Moms
Key takeaways:
Pregnancy symptoms like hormonal fluctuations, frequent urination, discomfort, and heartburn can all interrupt your sleep.
Expectant moms offer tips ranging from investing in supportive pillows to trying relaxation techniques before bedtime.
For those with persistent sleep problems, turn to your medical provider for more guidance.
Sleep is crucial for anyone’s overall health. But if you’re pregnant, good sleep can be hard to come by — especially during the second and third trimesters.
Hormone imbalances, frequent urination, heartburn, and discomfort can all interrupt your rest.
Some expectant moms have figured out how to get much-needed shuteye. Here’s some advice from three women who have been there.
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1. Buy a better pillow
Kimberly Green, a 39-year-old copywriter from Florida, has four children and a fifth on the way.
During her first pregnancy, her biggest struggle when it came to getting a good night’s sleep was acid reflux.
“My heartburn was the worst,” she says. “I could hardly do day-to-day tasks or sleep without having an antacid tablet.”
But her husband bought her a reading pillow that made a big difference.
“This was such a great gift because sleeping vertically allowed me to get more rest,” Kimberly says. She could angle her reading pillow, as well as add another pillow on top to elevate her head. That kept heartburn at bay. She also tried not to eat too close to bedtime, which seemed to help as well.
With her current pregnancy, Kimberly sometimes finds it challenging to find a comfortable sleeping position. “I do a lot of tossing and turning because I'm a stomach sleeper and can no longer do so,” she says.
During the day, when she finds herself feeling tired and in need of rest, the couch often offers a comfortable place to catch a nap. “I will lie down, or sit up and lean with my legs extended.” But she’s looking forward to getting back to her favorite comfortable sleeping position once the baby arrives.
2. Take a walk, do a yoga pose, or meditate
For Jewell Singletary, a 40-year-old new mom in New Jersey, sleep problems have been part of life for some time. Jewell has been living with lupus for nearly 30 years, and one of her symptoms is extreme fatigue.
When she became pregnant, her lupus symptoms got worse, and new symptoms appeared.
“My first trimester was pretty uneventful,” says Jewell, who is also a yoga instructor. “But as soon as the second trimester hit, that's when I started having all of the complications that were kind of exasperated by lupus. And my age as well. I’m a quote-unquote, ‘geriatric.’”
Her extreme fatigue seemed exaggerated during pregnancy. And yet, no matter how tired she was, it seemed like getting a good night’s sleep was always just out of reach.
“I had really bad sciatic pain throughout the majority of my second and third trimesters,” she says. “It was really difficult to get into a sleep position that could really work.”
To help alleviate the sciatic pain, she would take walks around her neighborhood before getting ready for bed. She would also practice restorative yoga postures, like child’s pose, and use extra pillows for support. These gentle movement exercises helped relax her body enough to be able to fall asleep more comfortably.
But she still had bouts with things like anxiety that also interrupted her sleep.
“I was constantly worried throughout my pregnancy, not only for my own health but for the baby's health,” she says. To help calm her mind and allow her to relax for a good night’s rest, Jewell liked to listen to guided meditations and sleep stories.
3. Rely on a medical provider’s guidance
Kassie Hanson, a 33-year-old mother of three from Nebraska, found pelvic pain to be the main problem that disrupted her sleep during pregnancy.
“It was so bad, I would just dread going to sleep,” she says.
During her third pregnancy, the pain was so severe that there were nights when Kassie was hardly sleeping at all. Lack of sleep began to affect other areas of her life, as well as her ability to care for her two other young children.
Kassie says she relied on her doctor’s guidance about safe methods of treating the pain with over-the-counter medications.
Other things that Kassie says helped with the pain and allowed her to sleep more comfortably were pillow placement and a belly band — a stretchy band worn around the belly — to provide support. Kassie was told by her physical therapist to sleep with pillows between her knees.
“It was not a specific pillow, it was actually the number of pillows so that my knees were hip-width apart,” she says. “Once I got used to it, it was more helpful than uncomfortable.”
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