Why do you have back and neck aches for days if you “sleep wrong” one night?
In: Biology
Firstly, generally these are small muscle strains or inflamed nerves. Tight, dense muscles from life are vulnerable to strain which takes a couple days to heal and will be sharp and weak in the meantime.
Also, there are numerous small muscles in your neck and those are made of groups of smaller subsets of muscle fibers called fascicles. Each fascicle is innervated by nerves that tell them to fire.
When you sleep, you try to perform the actions of your dreams. These actions are MOSTLY inhibited. If your head is turned or flexed or in any position that may stretch or shorten a compromised muscle (tight from years of overwork/poor posture/ lack of exercise), it’s possible that a dream twitch could cause that muscle or fascicle to strain.
Additionally, as other people have mentioned, there could be a whole host of nerve interactions thar hurt due to inflammation. Nerves are complex and their interactions with other tissues is many and varied, so I tend to focus mostly on the muscle strain aspect of stiff necks. Luckily the treatment is the same, rest and ibuprofen.
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