The dreaded crick in the neck!
Stiff neck? I think we’ve all had a sore or stiff neck at some point or other.
You know that feeling, right? Your head feels really heavy and won’t turn properly. Your neck is sore and painful on one or both sides?
Sometimes it’s gone by lunchtime without much bother. Other times it gets a little better but the next morning it’s back with a vengeance.
The cause is simple. Your head hasn’t felt fully comfortable and supported during the night, so your brain has spent the whole night holding it in place with some muscle tension. When you wake, those muscles are fatigued and spasmed.
Office neck
If you work at a computer all day, I’m sure you know exactly what I’m talking about.
As the day wears on, your neck starts to feel sore from being held steady and lack of movement.
This is only made worse as you get tired towards the end of the day. You slowly start to slump, your chest drops and your chin juts forward. Yep you’re now compressing the back of your neck.
Netflix neck
This is essentially the opposite of office neck. Instead of slowly slumping forwards and compressing the back of your neck.
You lean back propped on multiple pillows, staring down at your laptop to watch the latest episode on Netflix.
This time the front of your neck is compressed and the back overstretched.
Is it all bad?
Reading everything above you’d be forgiven for thinking there’s nothing you can safely do with your neck.
It’s more the repetitive nature of our lifestyle than the actual positions being bad.
Laying in bed watching movies – no problem, spending a day in front of the computer – fine, even staring down at your phone – that’s ok too.
The problems start when you do those same things all the time, day in day out, with no variety.
We should all try and move more often in a variety of different ways.
Can massage help your sore neck?
Absolutely!
I focused on a few common reasons for sore necks above. But, there are many triggers that can lead to your neck feeling like it’s not moving properly.
Massage can be helpful no matter what has caused your neck pain.
When your neck’s feeling sore, the best feeling in the world is having expert hands slowly ease that tension away.
Having those lines of tight muscle softened and lengthened. Movement gently returning where the vertebrae have become stuck, and lifting the head away from the shoulders is pure magical.
Clients often leave commenting they feel several inches taller, try it out yourself.