SELF Magazine reports on how sleeping with knee pillows may help alleviate pain in the back and lower body.

The biggest benefit to using a knee pillow is its effect on your lower body and spinal alignment, Alice Chen, MD, physiatrist at HSS explained. When you sleep on your side, it’s easy for all the weight of your top knee to rest directly on your bottom knee, leading to uncomfortable pressure. The same goes for your hips, which can also collapse forward, shifting your spine out of proper alignment and causing you to sleep more on your stomach than your side (a position experts say is bad for everyone’s back).

With a little additional space between your knees, courtesy of a knee pillow, the weight of your top knee is better distributed; your hips are parallel and stabilized; and your spine can stay in a more neutral position, Dr. Chen said.

Read the full article self.com.