The Most Important thing you must do to have a Pain Free Neck

First of all I want you to know that neck and upper back pain are generally easy
to fix. By learning why you are having pain in the first place we can then set
about teaching you how to fix your pain and prevent it from happening in the
future. Sound simple? It is.
The next time you have a look around an office building, a building site, a
school, at bus stop, on a train or practically anywhere you will see people
slouching in their seats, slouching over their computers, lifting with bent backs
and doing a wide range of daily tasks using bad posture. These same people
will also more than likely be suffering from back, neck or shoulder pain (or all
three). They may have constant pain or suffer from ongoing bouts of recurrent
pain. They will probably then go to get treatment from a chiropractor, a
physiotherapist or a masseur or if these don’t work perhaps an acupuncturist.
They may try a yoga class, or the gym or Pilates and try to strengthen and
stretch their muscles only to find that their pain comes back. How can this be
they ask?
The great mystery when it comes to neck pain is that it’s not really all that
mysterious after all. As I have mentioned before, treating your own neck pain
and making sure it does not come back is easy, you just need to know how.
The overwhelming majority of neck pain is from poor posture! If you continue to
slouch at your chairs, or at the computer, or whilst you eat, or continue to lift
poorly or stand poorly you will not have removed the cause of your pain and
thus remain in pain. This is exactly why you can do your well intentioned exercise
course but you still suffer from pain. This is why you can get treated by therapist
after therapist only to see your pain return after awhile. You can see your
chiropractor five times a week but if you then get back into your car from your
treatment and slouch into your seat, go home and slouch in front of the
television, then spend hours slouched in front of your computer and then read in
bed with pillows pushing your head forward you will again experience pain. This
simple piece of knowledge will save you thousands and thousands of dollars in
therapist’s bills and get you off the seemingly never ending cycle of recurrent
bouts of neck pain.
It’s the same with many lower back pain sufferers-People will go to the gym and
do 200 crunches but still have lower back pain because they spend the rest of
the day sitting or standing with poor posture at their home or workplace.( by the
way, you should never ever do sit-ups. More of that later) You must address the
issue of posture in everything that you do. Remember, a treatment here or there
or exercising for ten minutes a day will not do much if you are spending 10 hours
a day slouched over your desk.
This is the great secret to eradicating your pain!
If you have pain in your thumb because you continually hit it with a
hammer all day, and then go to the physiotherapist to get ultrasound
on it, but the next day you are back at work hitting your thumb with a
hammer again-you will of course remain in pain. Your necks and
backs are no different. You must stop hurting, irritating and injuring your neck
each day and night so that your necks can heal exactly like you would with your
thumb. You must remove the causes of your pain. Let’s have a look at exactly
where the problem lies. It is a simple matter of body mechanics.