Ok, this is taking the stranger a bit far..concerned?
 

Bear with me on this,it gets interesting :D

For the last few years my most comfortable sleeping position has been on my right side with my right arm under my pillow extending straight toward the side of the bed (were the pillow not there my head would rest on my bicep).

Every few nights my arm will "fall asleep" and wake me (the standard painful tingling asleep). I then switch sides to the exact opposite position which will also fall asleep(now the left arm) on occasion but MUCH more rarely and less severely. It's annoying but not a big deal.

Anyway last night I was awoken to a unique situation. My arm wasn't just asleep...that baby was dead. I mean dead dead. I couldn't move a single finger or feel any sensation anywhere on it at all, my arm just hung. I got out of bed and started weirding out a bit as I held my right wrist with my left hand and felt the dead weight of it as I manipulated it around. Very freaky to say the least.

Well I started using my left to rapidly shake and flail the right which did eventually restore flow, sensation and movement. It seemed like forever but took likely about 3-4 seconds of the shaking to start feeling that painful "limb asleep" tingling.

I guess the moral of the story is not to take the stranger too far;)

So docs, how long do I have to live? :D:D

P.S. I woke my wife while flapping my dead limb against the wall and furnishings and when I explained the deal to her she exclaimed "It's not a heart attack is it" (hey it was 3:00 A.M) to which I responded "No, I'm not that lucky".

She failed to see the humor:D

I have the same problem some nights so you are not alone.

My arm falling "really" asleep. Strange feeling it is.





BTW-My wife doesn't see the humor in comments I make, either. :)

Does yours get dead dead? I seriously mean it was like it wasn't attached to me dead. I couldn't feel any sensation at all and could not muster even a twitch from any muscle in either the hand or the arm.


It was a crazy feeling.

Yep, same thing you experienced. I think we are just getting old.
It's not consistent enough to it happens frequently so I haven't given it much thought.







Maybe more nookie with the wife would help? :) :)

Yes- I sleep like this too, and freaked-out one night when I rolled over and my dead arm hit me in the face. I've tried to reduce the 'angle of incidence' while sleeping like this by keeping my arm a little lower- this seems to help. You should be able to feel your rotator "tuck-in" a bit and that will keep the blood flowing. It will still be comfortable.

I've also tried to not sleep like this as I've had rotator cuff problems and I'm not sure if sleeping like this makes them worse.

BWAAAAAHAAA It hit you in the face? WOW! I need to get a paper towel for this coffee.

I'm no Doc but it sounds like you are cutting off circulation to your arm and that can not be a good thing.

I sleep on my belly however when I was in a motorcycle accident I had to learn to sleep on my back.

IMHO you should learn to sleep in a different position.

Yeah, my wrist popped me right in the nose. It was a surprisingly solid impact. Plus, since I couldn't feel it from the arm's perspective it felt like someone was in the room and punched me in the face. Stanger indeed.

Happens to me too. Occasionally BOTH arms are asleep. Hellava sight trying to turn the alarm off with "detached" arms.

it's sometimes called 'Saturday night palsy'
not a good thing,
poor circulation (in your case little to NONE)
getting the feeling back will in short time take longer and longer ,
and if you don't change your ways..
like me..one morning WTF...my arm ..
it just hangs there..
6 MONTHS before I got the use of my left arm back..
real beotch ..as I'm lefthanded.
if you smoke..STOP
get it checked..


Rika

Whoa, I've had this happen once in my life and it was freaky. I'm only 31, not bueno.

I have had limbs fall asleep, only woke me up about two times.
Man, I thought it was hard being a teenager. Now that I am aging I guess it is just life that is hard.

Yea, the "limb falling asleep" thing was annoying but tolerable The "Dead limb" thing is a whole new ball game. I was really freaked for those few seconds until sensation returned. That baby was paralyzed.

Again I'm not doctor (but I slept with one once) I've been told blood carries oxygen and nutrients and all kinds of cool stuff to keep your body alive so I would postulate that it is a good idea to keep a fresh supply flowing to all your parts as all times.

YMMV

Len, it can get serious overnight..
my arm was so numb..they would stick needles and draw blood...
I felt nothing..
+little electric juice just to ensure I'm not faking..
pure hell...
folks have to cut your food,
try to put on your pants and zip (use non-dominant hand)
drive..tiptronic here you come..
don't fool with this...
yrs later my L hand get's cold fast, few minutes above heartlevel=tingles then numb.
I was a few hrs away from surgery..when we decided try rehab a 2nd time.
rehab= crunch tennis ball.

Rika

Would the same effect be similar to having a cast? Or is that more so the muscle not being used due to immobilization?

I'll definitely bring it up with my doc. FWIW I quit smoking a few years back.

You could have lopped my arm off with a dull knife and I wouldn't have felt a thing, it was crazy.


Thanks.

In the words of Steven Wright,, I hate it when my arm falls asleep, then it's up all night

I see a new drug commercial in the making.

I have a similar prob. It was explained to me that it has not to do with blood flow at all, but nerve paths around shoulder. Mine wasn't just from sleeping, but got so bad I couldn't drive any of my manual trans trucks- every time I reached and tried to flop my arm and open my finger I got an electrocution like pain. Not a little tingle but a VERY uncomfortable pain. I'm also having problems with the outside of my left quad/thigh, it has been numb for about a year but is uncomfortable;e when touched and on a couple of occasions I've woken up with an unbearable burning sensation, really freaks me out as it hurts bad.

Wish I had health insurance...

Up all night; bummer. Does it then keep your leg up all night too (middle one)? :)

Had to find a new posture a well. I let the pillows hold my head now, and assume a prayer like posture with the arms. It helps a lot.

i've had it a few times, it doesn't happen often
and only when i'm in some really, really bad sleeping position (couch)

i just hope my cat never figures it out he can chew without me feeling it...that rat-bastard is always hungry, and he don't care how big or what it's attached to ...it's food to him

Happened a few times. The first, was at summer camp. I ad a dream my arms were cut off, I woke up in a panic and I couldn't move my arms, even worse was the fact that my blanket was covering my arms, so while a bit groggy, I freaked as I thought my arms were really gone.

Turns out my arms had some how fallen off the bunk bed and cut off circulation to both arms. All I could do was sit in bed until both arms could move again.

this one time, at band camp...:D

Try this. Position yourself as you would for sleep. Using an index finger, have someone compare the strength of the pulse in the thumb sides of your wrists. If they are significantly different (less palpable in your down arm), you may well be experiencing little if any arterial blood flow to your arm when asleep (many people have a significantly lower blood pressure when asleep) aka thoracic outlet syndrome. Of course, YMMV and this information is worth exactly what you paid for it SmileWavy

It's happens to me depending how I sleep.

My limp arm also hit me in the face. You're half asleep and BAM WTF.

wait till it happens to one of your legs and you don't relize it till you get up to pee - trust me, it ain't pretty. I spilt my chin open on a table due to this (and nearly pissed my pants) but my wife did find any humor in it.

HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!

Mike, your leg incident reminded me of one of mine.


Wifey and I were at Lamaze class for our first child. My leg fell asleep, I went to get up and fell over like a drunk, spilling my coffee all over the wife and the floor. I must have looked like Jim Carrey when he gets shot with the darts in "Ace Ventura".

Your nerves ARE dying when you cut them off. Unlike your brain and spinal cord (Central Nervous System, CNS), the other nerves (Peripheral Nervous System, PNS) in your body WILL eventually regenerate (how well, that is individual and dependent on other factors). Recommended you do not sleep on your arm anymore.

I killed the nerves in my left hand fingers riding a sport bike. Spent all day on it, just leaning hard on my wrist, with all that vibration, etc. Weird. Did not have feeling in my fingers for about a week.

I hate when that happens. Wouldn't it be nice if you could take your arms off and hang them up when you are ready to go to sleep?
You'd just take one and hang it up and then ........ no that wouldn't work ;)

Lendaddy,

Do you notice any problems during the day? I had a degenerative disc condition that was placing a lot of pressure on the nerve root as it exited the foraminal canal and would cause numbness in my arm, hand and fingers. You might need to have a doc, preferably a neurosurgeon check it out. Long term nerve damage will cause nerves and muscles to atrophy. I lost my left tricep muscle and still have some slight numbness in the fingertip of my left index finger.

Good luck to you. Hope it is not serious.

I am not a doctor, nor did I stay in a Holiday Inn last night, but...
I was having a problem with my arms going to sleep on me. I figured it was a normal, just getting old kind of thing. I stopped having the problem when I started working out regularly again.

Just something to think about.

As usual, someone else's physical maladies make me laugh.

my arms fall dead asleep sometimes and sometimes they scare the hell out of me. one time my dead arm landed on my face and i just about pissed myself because i couldn't figure out who was trying to suffocate me.. then i started flailing my arm back and forth trying to wake it up just like ace ventura.lol

In the house I grew up in, there was a built-in couch in a shallow alcove in the den. I would often chill in there, lying on my side watching MLB or NFL, semi-propped up on one elbow.

There was a wall mounted phone on the side wall about 4 feet up.

Once, I didn't know it, but part of my arm was asleep and the phone rang. I sat up, extended my arm up to take the phone off the hook, then when I went to put the phone to my ear, I discovered which part of my arm was asleep.

The result was that I slammed the phone into the side of my head so hard, I dropped the phone. Man, did that hurt.
:eek: :mad:
I had to reach down with the other arm to pick it up.

this has happened to me 3 or 4 times. woke up w/ arm totally dead, flapping around, could amputate it with a swiss-army knife no problem

figured i just slept on it at bad angle