The Best Exercises and Tips for Stiff Neck and Shoulder Pain Relief

Neck/shoulder stiffness is a common thing for today’s people. Most of us are stuck in desk jobs and spend almost the whole day sitting which causes stiffness and pain in these parts of your body. The simplest solution to get a stiff neck and shoulder pain relief is to be aware of the way you walk, sit or sleep.

This is because the load to hold your head upright causes a lot of muscle tension.

This tension could be a reason for migraines and headaches. Other factors include poor sitting habits, stress, drafts and bad sleeping.

Stiff Neck and Shoulder Pain Relief
There are three main muscles on your shoulder: trapezius, the pectoralis, and the latissimus dorsi. Their purpose is arm movement, while that of the rhomboids on your upper back is to support the shoulder joint.

So, as the first two muscles rotate your arm inward, the muscles on your upper back starts to get weak. As a result, your shoulder joint can move far too forward and leave its natural alignment. To avoid this, you should strengthen your rhomboids muscles on the upper back.

Here are several exercises to strengthen these muscles in order to put your shoulders back into the right position.

Exercises for Stiff Neck and Shoulder Pain

1. Shoulder Alignment

Start in a standing position and let your arms hang loosely by your sides. Then, rotate your wrists outward as much as you can. Turn your palms towards your thighs as you release the rotation in the lower arm. However, make sure your upper arm and shoulder stay in the same position as in position two.

2. Relax the Shoulders

If your shoulders are often raised, they will deepen the curve in the back of your neck. In such case, you need to do the arm swings, and full arm circle exercises described below and then continue with the following neck exercises.

3. Arm Swings

Begin in a stable lunge position (put the right foot in front of the left with knee bent and both feet flat on the floor.) Take a deep breath and swing the left arm up as far as possible. Exhale and swing the arm down and as far back as possible.

Do around 8 swings and then gradually increase the speed of the movement to make sure all the crackly noises from your shoulder joint are gone. Next, change the legs and do the same movements with the opposite arm.

4. Full Arm Circles

Start in a stable lunge position once again, and begin making slow backward circles with your right arm. Inhale as your arm goes up and exhale as it goes down. Gradually increase the speed and momentum until you feel a tingling sensation in the fingertips.

This indicates that you are making enough fast circles to throw off all the tension in your shoulders. Switch sides and repeat.

5. Yes and No Exercises

Your neck moves around the transverse, sagittal, and frontal axes when doing these exercises.

But, before doing these movements, make sure you consult a doctor or chiropractor to establish the severity of your pain.

‘Yes’ Exercises

The point of yes exercises is to move your head up and down. Try to move your head down until your chin touches the breastbone. If you succeed lowering your head this far, it means your neck is free of tension. Raise your head with the back of the neck extended as much as possible.

Repeat these head movements at a slow pace, until no noises are coming from your neck.

However, don’t go too far on this move if you have a posterior disc bulge to prevent further damage.

‘No’ Exercises

First, position your head in the center of your shoulder, central above the spine. Move your head to the right as far back as possible without raising your nose.

Repeat on the opposite side, and don’t forget that the whole movement should go at a slow pace. Do these lateral rotations until the crackly noises from your neck are gone.

‘Maybe’ Exercises

Slowly lower your ear towards your shoulder with your nose faced forward the whole time. Do the same movement on the opposite side. Repeat at least 8 times until you no longer hear any noise coming from your neck.

6. Head Rolls

For this exercise, you need to roll your head around clockwise at a slow pace. Do about 5 roles and then repeat counterclockwise. What’s more, you can do these movements under water while having a warm bath as in such environment the head is practically weightless.

Tips for Neck and Shoulder Pain
Besides these movements, here are several tips that will help you get a stiff neck and shoulder pain relief.

How do You Sleep

Your sleeping position and condition matters about your neck more than you think. If you sleep in a cold draft your neck muscles can contract during the night. Moreover, don’t sleep on a pillow that moves your neck out of its natural alignment.

Instead, choose a firm one that’s no thicker than the area your head needs to lie flat on the ear and not cause curving of the other side of your neck.

Good vs Damaging Movements

Poor head movements can be the culprit of your chronic neck pain. However, you must know the difference between the good and damaging movements. So, to prevent and reduce your neck pain do good movements as those above, and avoid the damaging ones.

Gravity Inversion Table

Gravity Inversion Table is the ultimate solution to your chronic neck pain. The gentle anti-gravity fraction will help reduce compression, tightness, and over-curvature in your entire skeleton.

These simple exercises and tips will help you get a stiff neck and shoulder pain relief. What’s more, if you practice them regularly, you’ll no longer feel pain in these parts of your body

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How To Cure a Stiff Neck Or Shoulder To Ease the Pain?

The most common cause of stiff neck and/or neck and shoulder pain is poor posture. Few others that contribute to this type of pain are: poor sleeping habits, cold drafts, stress etc.

You can treat stiff neck, upper back ache and even headaches and migraine by being well aware of your posture. The overload in muscle tension just to hold your head up in the way, can eventually lead to chronic headaches and migraine.

Shoulder Muscles

Trapezius, the latissimus dorsi and the pectoralis are the 3 main muscles of our shoulder. Their sole purpose is to move the arm.

While the pecs and the lats are the primarily movers of our arm, the rhomboids at the back are the ones that provide stability to the shoulder joint. As the pecs and lats work to rotate the arm inward the rhomboids in the upper back become weak. This can cause shoulder joint to go too far forward, out of its neutral alignment. This can be avoided by strengthening the upper back, using the rhomboids. You can do this following exercises for shoulder alignment to feel the rhomboid muscles putting your shoulders back into their correct place.

1. Shoulder Alignment Exercise

• Stand up with the arms hanging loosely by your sides
• Rotate the wrists outward as far as you can
• Release the rotation in the lower arm by turning your palms in towards your thighs from the elbow BUT…
• Keep the shoulders and upper arm in the same position as in position 2

2. Relax the Shoulders

Raised shoulders cause the curve in the back of the neck to be too deep. Firstly loosen the shoulders with the Arm-swings and Circles exercises showed below and then proceed to the neck exercises in the following section.

3. Arm Swings

• Stand in a stable lunge position with the left foot in front and the right foot behind with the front leg bent and both heels on the floor
• Breathe in and swing the right arm up as far as you can until you feel the limit in the shoulder joint
• Breathe out and swing the arm down and back as far as you can

Start by doing eight or more swings while increasing speed and momentum until you are sure that all the little crackly noises have gone from your shoulder joint.

After you finish in this position, reverse the position of the feet and repeat with the left arm.

4. Full Arm Circles

While standing in the same position as for the previous sequence, start making continuous backward circles with your arm. Again, breathe in as you go up and breathe out as you go down. Begin slowly and increase the speed of the movement until your arm wants to circle quite fast to throw off all the tension (until you feel a tingling sensation in your fingertips).

Again, reposition your feet and repeat on the other side.

5. Yes, No, and Maybe Exercises

These exercises allow the neck to move in the three planes of motion, round the sagittal, transverse, and frontal axes.

Before attempting to do these neck exercises, you should establish the severity of your pain by consulting your physician or chiropractor.

Yes

In this exercises the point is to move your head up and down. If the back of your neck is completely free of tension your chin should touch your breastbone when you look down.

On the upward movement keep the back of your neck as long as you can.

Slowly repeat upper and down motion for as long as the little noises inside your neck disappear.

Caution if you suffer from a posterior disc bulge avoid going too far down on this move as it could increase the damage.

No

On the “No” sequence, keep the head central above the spine (between your shoulders). Try to see as far back behind you as you can on each lateral rotation without lifting your nose. Slowly repeat rotations to the left and right until all the little noises inside your neck disappear.

Maybe

On the “Maybe” sequence, drop your ear down towards the shoulder while keeping your nose facing the front.

Gently repeat each move eight or more times until all the little crunching noises in your disappear.

6. Head Rolls

Slowly roll the head around clockwise to see how much of your entire periphery you can see. When you’ve done about five rolls, repeat them counter clockwise. For optimal results, head rolls may be done in a warm bath under water where your head is virtually weightless.

7. How do You Sleep?

Certain sleeping conditions can cause a stiff neck. Sleeping in a cold draft will cause your neck muscles to contract during sleep. Avoid pillows that move the neck out of its neutral alignment. Your pillow should be firm and no thicker than the space needed for your head to lie flat on its ear without curving up the other side of the neck.

No More Pain

In most cases of chronic pain, the pain is self-induced from poor movement habits. By modifying your daily movement habits and patterns and being aware of the difference between “good movements” and damaging ones, you are on the road to healing yourself. Just avoid making the damaging moves.

Ultimate Solution is Getting a Gravity Inversion Table

The ultimate solution to chronic neck pain and stiffness is the Gravity Inversion Table. The bottom line is if we have to reduce compression, over-curvature and tightness in the whole skeleton. This can most easily be achieved in a completely passive way with gentle anti-gravity traction.

The exercises and tips given above will help you develop a level of physical consciousness and awareness to treat and cure a stiff neck or shoulder to ease the pain forever.

source: healthypage365

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