Neck pain is a big problem and can really make your life miserable. It can get so bad that you don’t enjoy doing any of the things you used to find fun.
Computer work and driving are often some of the big culprits of neck pain. The prolonged positions and bad postures that often occur cause increased muscle tension in some muscles and weakness in others. When this happens often enough or long enough the tense muscles get overworked and cause pain.
The good news is there are simple exercises you can do to strengthen the weak muscles, correct your posture and get out of pain.
Chin Tuck with Head lift
This exercise help increase the strength and endurance of some key neck muscles. Research has shown that these muscles often don’t work well in people with neck pain and headaches.
You don’t need to lie on a fancy table like this video shows. You can do this lying on your bed or on the floor.
Tuck your chin into your neck, lift your head just 1 inch off the floor. Hold for 5 seconds and then lower it back down.
The most important part is to keep your chin tucked into your neck the entire way through the lift, hold, and lower.
Start with 2 sets of 10 every other day. As it gets easier, increase the hold time to 10 seconds.
Tall Sitting
A slumped forward posture is not the end of the world if it is a small part of your day. But if you spend a long time like that it can cause neck pain and definitely any neck pain you already have worse.
To do this exercise correctly, just try to think about lengthening your spine. Your upper back will get straighter and your chin will come closer to your neck.
Tall sitting helps you to recover to a less stressful position and improves your body’s control of your spine.
It’s not important to try to hold this position all day long. Do a few reps every hour as a re-set every to keep yourself from staying slumped over all day.
Neither of the exercises above should make you hurt more. If you’ve tried these and you’re still hurting, we can help you!
At Solutions Physical Therapy & Sports Medicine, we’re experts at treating neck pain and headaches and will develop a plan to help you beat them.
Call us at 703-810-7487, or click here and a member of our team will schedule you an evaluation with one of our expert physical therapists.
Working to keep you living your best life,
The Solutions Physical Therapy & Sports Medicine Team
