Sleep by Swinging? The Actual Story Behind China’s Viral ‘Neck-Hanging’ Treatment

Would you cling by your neck for higher sleep? That’s not only a morbidly worded query however a development that social media is confronting customers with.

A latest viral video from Shenyang, China, that includes folks gently swaying from belts round their necks to alleviate insomnia and neck ache, has collected over 6 million views in just some weeks.

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Regardless of its recognition, medical specialists strongly warning that this observe could pose important well being dangers far outweighing any alleged advantages.

What Is Going Viral?

In late April 2025, a shaky video from Shenyang, China, exploded throughout social media together with TikTok, Weibo, and X. The footage exhibits park-goers looping padded belts round their necks, tipping ahead, and gently swaying for a number of minutes.

Inventor Solar Rongchun claims this “neck-swinging” technique “decompressed” his backbone and “knocked him out like a child.” The hashtag #NeckSwing shortly amassed over 6 million views.

However medical specialists are sounding alarms about this observe. Hanging any weight out of your neck places harmful stress on delicate buildings in your throat and backbone. The neck incorporates very important blood vessels that carry oxygen to your mind, and compressing them could cause dizziness, fainting, or worse. Even with padding, the danger of reducing off blood stream stays excessive.

Your cervical backbone – the highest a part of your spine – wasn’t designed to help your full physique weight on this manner. Medical doctors warn that neck swinging might trigger critical accidents together with nerve injury, vertebrae fractures, or injury to the spinal twine itself. These accidents can result in everlasting incapacity or paralysis.

The enchantment is comprehensible. Many individuals endure from neck ache and again issues from sitting at computer systems all day. They’re searching for fast fixes and are drawn to uncommon strategies that promise reduction. Social media makes these traits unfold quicker than ever, typically with out correct security warnings.

What About Hanging Upside Down?

Some folks marvel if hanging the other way up on an

inversion desk



may assist them sleep higher. They may suppose that the upside-down place might assist them calm down or cut back again ache that retains them awake at night time. Others imagine it would enhance blood stream or assist their backbone decompress after a protracted day.

The thought appears to make sense on its face. If hanging the other way up for a couple of minutes may help with again ache, perhaps doing it longer might present much more advantages for sleep. Some folks report feeling relaxed after quick periods on inversion tables, which could cause them to suppose sleeping the other way up might work too.

Nonetheless, sleeping the other way up is extraordinarily harmful and will by no means be tried.

If you cling the other way up for lengthy intervals, a number of critical issues can occur to your physique:

• Blood stress rises dangerously excessive, which may trigger strokes or coronary heart assaults
• Strain builds up in your cranium and behind your eyes, resulting in extreme complications or imaginative and prescient issues
• Your coronary heart has to work a lot more durable to pump blood all through your physique
• Respiratory can change into tough within the upside-down place

These dangers change into a lot worse the longer you keep inverted. What is likely to be manageable for a minute or two turns into life-threatening over hours.

The muscular tissues in your ankles that preserve you secured to the inversion desk additionally get drained after only one minute. This implies you may fall and significantly injure your head or backbone whereas sleeping.

Protected options for higher sleep and again ache reduction embody:

• Utilizing a supportive mattress and pillows
• Mild stretching earlier than mattress
• Taking a heat tub
• Practising leisure strategies
• Speaking to a physician about protected ache administration choices

If again ache is preserving you awake, it’s a lot safer to work with a healthcare supplier to search out correct therapy relatively than risking the intense risks of sleeping the other way up.

Sleeping in a Hammock

When you’re searching for the soothing results of mild movement to assist with sleep, a hammock is a a lot safer alternative. The observe of sleeping in a hammock affords a safer solution to expertise mild swaying movement with out placing your neck in peril.

Many individuals are drawn to the thought of sleeping in a hammock due to the mild rocking movement. The side-to-side swaying can really feel soothing and enjoyable, much like being rocked as a baby. Some hammock sleepers imagine this pure movement helps them go to sleep quicker and sleep extra deeply.

The mild movement could set off leisure responses within the mind, and rhythmic motion might be naturally calming. It’d assist quiet racing ideas at bedtime, and the novelty issue might make some folks really feel extra relaxed.

Whereas some folks swear by hammock sleeping, it’s essential to remain sensible about what it could actually and can’t do. Sleep issues have many alternative causes, and a hammock gained’t repair underlying points like:

• Stress and nervousness
• Medical circumstances that disrupt sleep
• Poor sleep habits
• Environmental components like noise or mild

There may be some restricted analysis that helps the thought, although. A small
research



discovered that males who napped in a gently swinging mattress fell asleep faster than these in a daily mattress. The rocking movement appeared to assist their brains transition from being awake to sleeping. Nonetheless, this research solely checked out 12 folks taking quick afternoon naps. Clearly, that’s not the identical as a full night time’s sleep.

Hammock sleeping could cause again and neck ache from sleeping in an uncommon place. You may need problem getting comfy if you happen to’re used to a mattress, and there’s at all times a threat of falling out in the course of the night time. The restricted house makes it laborious to stretch or change positions, and it’s undoubtedly not appropriate for {couples} who share a mattress.

If you wish to strive hammock sleeping, begin with quick naps to see how your physique responds. Use a pillow to help your neck and lie diagonally throughout the hammock for extra space. Most significantly, think about it as one instrument amongst many for higher sleep, not a cure-all.

What Medical doctors Suggest As an alternative

Medical professionals strongly advise towards neck swinging and suggest a lot safer options for neck ache and sleep issues. For neck points, confirmed remedies embody mild stretching, correct posture, bodily remedy, and dealing with certified healthcare suppliers.

For sleep issues, cognitive behavioral remedy for insomnia (
CBT-I



) has a long time of analysis displaying it really works. This includes working with skilled professionals to determine and alter ideas and behaviors that intrude with good sleep.

Different protected choices embody common train, stress administration, creating good sleep habits, and addressing underlying well being circumstances that may trigger ache or sleep issues.

Knowledgeable Opinions

• Dr. Jordan Burns:
  “Suspending your whole body weight from the neck is biomechanically unsound—much more more likely to irritate nerves than remedy insomnia.”
• Dr. Jennifer Miller:
  “Medical traction makes use of exact grams of drive; park-belt swinging is actually an uncontrolled physics experiment in your spinal twine.”
• Dr. Stuart Peirson:
  “Excessive hacks go viral as a result of they’re dramatic, not as a result of they’re efficient. Orthosomnia fuels this unhealthy cycle.”
  

Why We Fall for Excessive Hacks

Dr. Peirson factors to the rise of orthosomnia, the obsessive pursuit of excellent sleep-tracker scores. However it’s not simply an unhealthy drive for excellent sleep that may sway you to strive the off-kilter and even harmful “hacks” that promise to enhance your sleep.

When standard strategies like blue-light blockers or leisure strategies don’t immediately enhance sleep metrics, web algorithms reward extra excessive, visually compelling strategies—mouth-taping, ice baths, thick coats of face merchandise for a morning shed, and now neck-hanging.

It’s the spectacle, relatively than the science, that earns viral consideration. That’s why it’s essential to be cautious of something that guarantees swift enchancment of your sleep, particularly if you have to be a product of some sort or one other. Entrepreneurs push gadgets like grounding sheets with grandiose claims they’ll’t reside as much as.

Some are all proper to strive for many akin to viral drinks like lettuce water, celery juice, and sleepy woman drinks. The science is restricted to non-existent for the way efficient they’re, however your thoughts can nonetheless affiliate the drink with bedtime.

Restructuring a nighttime or morning routine will also be price a strive, which is why we’ve given stamps of approval to closing shift and opening shift traits. In case your present routine isn’t satisfying you, it’s all proper to change it up!

For extra on orthosomnia and sleep-tracker tradition, see our detailed information on “Sleepmaxxing.”

FAQs

Is neck-swinging protected?

No, neck-swinging just isn’t protected in any respect. Medical specialists strongly warn that hanging out of your neck could cause critical injury to essential elements of your neck like ligaments, muscular tissues, and nerves.

This observe can even squeeze blood vessels in your neck (arterial compression), which may trigger harmful spikes in your blood stress that would result in strokes or different life-threatening issues.

Does neck-swinging remedy insomnia?

No, there is no such thing as a scientific proof that neck-swinging helps with sleep issues. Actual medical research have by no means examined this technique, so we don’t know if it really works or how harmful it is likely to be.

As an alternative, docs suggest confirmed remedies like Cognitive Behavioral Remedy for Insomnia (CBT-I), which has been studied for a few years and proven to be each protected and efficient for serving to folks sleep higher.

Are inversion tables safer?

Inversion tables are considerably safer than neck-swinging as a result of they cling you the other way up by your ankles as an alternative of your neck. Nonetheless, many docs nonetheless have considerations about inversion tables and don’t suggest them for treating sleep issues.

Whereas they is likely to be much less harmful than hanging by your neck, they’ll nonetheless trigger issues for some folks and aren’t confirmed to assist with insomnia.

Who ought to keep away from inversion?

Many individuals ought to by no means strive inversion remedy of any sort. If in case you have hypertension, coronary heart illness, eye issues like glaucoma, weak bones (osteoporosis), or again issues, inversion might be very harmful for you.

These circumstances make inversion dangerous as a result of hanging the other way up will increase stress in your blood vessels and may make current well being issues a lot worse.

What are different harmful methods to attempt to enhance sleep?

Taking on-the-counter sleep medicines usually with out medical supervision can result in dependency and will masks underlying sleep problems that require correct therapy.

Utilizing unregulated natural dietary supplements in excessive doses might be dangerous, as these substances can work together with different medicines or trigger surprising negative effects with out correct medical oversight.

Different harmful approaches embody drastically limiting sleep hours in an try and “sleep higher,” utilizing doubtlessly dangerous units or strategies promoted on-line with out scientific validation, or ignoring underlying medical circumstances like sleep apnea that require skilled therapy.

Is sleeping flat one of the simplest ways to sleep?

Sleeping utterly flat isn’t essentially the most effective place for everybody, because the optimum sleep place is dependent upon particular person components like current well being circumstances, physique kind, and private consolation.

Many sleep specialists really suggest sleeping with a slight elevation of the pinnacle and higher physique, which may help cut back acid reflux disease, enhance respiratory, and doubtlessly cut back loud night breathing.

Aspect sleeping with correct pillow help is usually thought of excellent for spinal alignment, whereas again sleeping with a pillow below the knees will also be helpful, although sleeping in your abdomen is mostly discouraged as it could actually pressure the neck and backbone.

How can I be extra cautious with social media recommendation about sleep?

Earlier than implementing any sleep recommendation from social media, strive speaking to your physician. Particularly when you have current sleep points! And be notably skeptical of recommendation that guarantees dramatic in a single day enhancements or includes buying particular merchandise.

Social media sleep recommendation typically lacks scientific backing and could also be promoted by influencers with out medical experience, so it’s essential to confirm any claims by means of respected medical sources or sleep specialists.

Many viral sleep “hacks” are based mostly on anecdotal proof relatively than peer-reviewed analysis, and what works for one particular person could not work for others on account of particular person variations in sleep problems, well being circumstances, or life-style components.

The Backside Line Is Security First

The neck-swinging development from China exhibits how shortly harmful practices can unfold when persons are determined for options to frequent issues like neck ache and poor sleep. Whereas the testimonials may sound convincing, the medical dangers are just too critical to disregard.

Your neck incorporates among the most essential and delicate buildings in your physique. No quantity of potential reduction is price risking everlasting harm, paralysis, or loss of life. The identical drive that makes folks strive excessive strategies might be redirected towards confirmed, protected remedies that truly work.

Actual options for neck ache and sleep issues do exist. They may not be as dramatic or fast as viral traits promise, however they’re backed by strong analysis and gained’t put your life in peril. Bodily remedy, correct sleep habits, stress administration, and dealing with healthcare suppliers could take extra effort and time, however they provide real, lasting reduction with out the dangers.

Earlier than attempting any new therapy you see on-line, particularly one which appears too good to be true, discuss to a physician or different certified healthcare skilled. They may help you discover protected, efficient choices which might be proper on your particular state of affairs.

Be part of the Dialog

Have you ever seen different harmful well being traits spreading on social media? Are you combating neck ache or sleep issues and searching for protected options? Depart a remark beneath – our knowledgeable panel of healthcare professionals usually opinions reader questions and may present steerage on confirmed options to dangerous viral traits.

Share this text in your social media platforms to assist warn family and friends in regards to the critical risks of neck-swinging and different excessive well being “hacks.” The extra individuals who know the dangers, the less might be tempted to strive these harmful practices. Your share might actually save somebody’s life or forestall a critical harm.

Collectively, we may help folks make knowledgeable, protected selections about their well being as an alternative of falling for the most recent viral development.