Dealing with Chronic Neck Pain

Dealing with Chronic Neck Pain

Any type of pain is no laughing matter. It can ruin your day even your week. When you are dealing with chronic neck pain, it’s a lifetime struggle to stay fit and enjoy life too. As a health care provider, I see many patients with different types of discomfort. Some of it nearly beyond a person’s ability to cope.

Neck pain comes with its own unique problems like stiffness, or trouble sleeping. Rarely is this problem a ‘stand alone’ issue. It interferes with many parts of our life and it shouldn’t.

5 Ways Dealing with Chronic Neck Pain Works

  1. Maybe you’ve invested in expensive pillows only to wake with headaches and neck pain. Night’s can be long when you shift all every 30 or 45 minutes trying to find a way your cervical spine feels relaxed. By morning you wake exhausted. I once invested in a $100 pillow just to stop my own neck pain, it didn’t do much. Yet changing your pillow can have significant benefits.

Chronic Neck Pain and Fitness

2. Not all patients complain about sleep problems along with their discomfort some have problems staying fit with chronic neck pain. I personally have trouble lifting weights; many times neck muscles become stiffer as you try to do a standard workout. So what can you do to sleep better, and do the fitness program you like best?

My discovery and that of the majority of my patients take it slow and go light. Use lighter weight freestyle works best in most cases. For women 3-10 pounds. Men do well up to 35 lbs. If you’re shaking your head why bother, it’s a start. The right moves can make the difference with these lighter routines.

Stay away from bodybuilding moves where you lift your arms above your shoulders lifting heavy weights. This will help reduce pain. Ask your trainer or Accent On Health for some alternatives.  Use a 10 to 20-minute upper body program. 

Chronic Neck Pain and Acupuncture or Dry Needling

 

  1. One of my clients injured years ago when he fell down stairs at work had messed up his knees. Later he realized his neck was hard and stiff too. By then he’d changed careers, but the pain and tightness continued. In Colorado, a qualified acupuncturist or Chinese Medicine professional are fully trained to provide you with acupuncture and dry needling. Insurance covers these in office visits with us too!

     

    So what can you expect for results? Most patients even ones with chronic pain in the neck found acupuncture reduced the pain by 70-99%. Many discover they maintain the relief for 4-6 weeks or more and then schedule ‘tune-ups’ like you do with dental cleaning, car oil changes, or getting manicures and pedicures. The best part is health insurance covers acupuncture OR dry needling. Let our office make a quick inquiry for you dry needling uses a specific code.

Acupuncture Injection Therapy Better Than Cortisone

  1. Remember my client with the fall? With acupuncture, we achieved a 60% reduction in pain and an increase in movement of 45%. That’s good since the injury was very old and there is degeneration, but he wanted to try acupuncture injections to see how much better his chronic neck pain would improve.

The great news – he is over 90% pain-free! He has about 80% better movement, and his tightness is gone. 

 

How’s Your Micronutrients?

5. As strange as it sounds you are what you eat and sometimes you’re not. Recently a client came in struggling with insomnia and nothing else. She proudly announced that she had no other problems. So we did a micronutrient test and a Methylation test. These two together revealed a large problem with her ability to absorb minerals in her food or orally. These are genetic problems that are treated in our office. It had taken four months before she began to sleep something she had never done more than 45 minutes at a time her entire life.

So what does this have to do with chronic neck pain?  She referred many people some with various types of pain all who had problems with their micronutrients, hormones, or methylation. Sometimes we do acupuncture, add fitness and still don’t fix our discomfort because our body can’t restore balance if our ability to absorb our food is low or our hormones are off.

Personally, I don’t know why you have chronic neck pain my job is to help you find out and get you feeling better. Don’t give up on yourself. Don’t buy into the story that you’re getting old or pain happens with age. This isn’t true! Many of these people are in their 60’s or older. Dealing with chronic neck pain can be difficult some things can improve it and help you.

Find out more by calling our offce. Call today!

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images from BigStock and by John Arano, Jesper Aggergaard, and  rawpixel on Unsplash

Relieving TMJ By Treating The Root Problem

Relieving TMJ By Treating The Root Problem

TMJ

It is a busy day for you four meetings and one of your children is home ill. The pain starts without much notice. A tingle then tension in your jaw; it is a tiny thing compared to the searing pain that travels up your skull from your cheek. Then you notice it. You’ve clenched your teeth tight. You have TMJ or temporomandibular joint pain[1].

The voice inside your head whispers, not today.

TMJ Pain Leads To Migraines And Neck Pain

TMJ can cause migraines, headaches, neck pain, and facial pain. Stress is the primary cause of temporomandibular joint disease or TMD although many clients complain it started dental work[2].

temporomandibular joint disease

Many clients try mouth guards wearing these at night. They do little for the daytime stress that leads to TMJ accompanied by head or neck pain. Often they do not fit well or cause more problems. Acupuncture can effectively decrease pain, ease tight muscles along with massage.

Adding some simple life changes will help you end TMJ permanently. Acupuncture can treat the symptoms although getting to the root will ensure long-term success.

These three tips can help you stop your TMJ pain.

Temporomandibular Joint Relief With Breath Meditation

We’ve all heard meditation can help calm your nerves; it is real. It is a practice of taking a moment to let go of the drama in your life. Meditation is helpful for anxiety and sleep too. Breathing meditation is one of the best and simplest ways to start reducing TMJ pain.

Meditate

  • You can do this just about anywhere and several times daily. It does not matter if you take 1 minute or 5 minutes.
  • Take a seat that is comfortable for you. Place your tongue behind your upper front teeth stretching your cheek muscles
  • Let go of the air in your lungs. Slowly breathe in keeping your mind on the air coming in your nose while you count to 4. Next hold the breathe gently for a moment before you begin to release your breath threw your mouth pushing your lips out. Then relax your face before taking another breath in, in the same manner.
  • If you only do this 3 or 4 times, you’ll notice your jaw muscles relaxing. Doing this 4-5 times daily in the beginning can have an immense impact on your TMJ.

Relief TMJ with Jaw Exercises

temporomandibular joint diseaseStrengthening your temporomandibular joint is helpful.

  • This first exercise will strengthen the joint with pressure and tension.  Use the palm of your hand pushing up gently under your chin. Carefully try to open our mouth without causing pain. This is a gentle stretch. Do this several times daily at first until your pain subsides.
  • You can also use your fingers to push down on your lower teeth, softly.  Carefully try to close your mouth. Just be sure not to bite down on your fingers! This exercise is the opposite of the first.
  • Stretch the neck muscles.  Stretching the neck muscles helps to relieve pressure.  A smooth move is to act as though you are creating a second chin.  Lean your chin down toward your neck, but don’t bend the head downward.  Doing this for ten seconds elongates the neck, stretching it to loosen the muscle.

Use Acupuncture To Reduce The Pain

Acupuncture is a bonus when you are in pain. For TMJ, it helps ease the pain by reducing inflammation, and tight cheek muscles. If you are experiencing headaches or neck pain acupuncture with massage is essential.

TMJ disorder does not have to be a permanent problem.  Implementing these three steps will help eliminate your pain. When you relieve your jaw pain and headaches you will sleep better and feel a sense of freedom from the underlying problem.

[1] http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/tmj/basics/definition/con-20043566

 [2] http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMH0002207/

 Images for this article: Fotolia, Bigstock, Pixabay Free, Google free to use license.

Definitions: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tension_headache

 

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