Neck pain

Assumptions of Neck Pain

Listed below you will find many assumptions that people tend to have about neck pain. In order to better inform my patients I have gone through these ideas to explain what might be happening.

• Strained Muscles

• I Just Have Poor Posture

• Just a “Crick” in the Neck

• Headaches Aren’t Related to Neck Pain

• I Just Slept Wrong

• Tight Muscles

Strained Muscles

Muscles become sore and painful with associated neck pain frequently – does this mean they are the cause of the problem?  Even if you can remember a specific moment when your pain started, how do you know it was the muscle that was injured?  Frequently this assumption is made, however if the pain lasts for several days, to weeks at a time – it’s unlikely to be the muscle.

This is because muscle tissue is highly vascularized: meaning it has a great blood supply – it heals very quickly, like your skin.  When you get a cut, it starts healing within a day or two, and depending on the size of the cut, the skin will usually be completely healed within a week.  Muscles are very similar – unless you have a very large muscle injury. Muscles quickly recover from strains and small traumas.

I just have Poor Posture

Posture on its own has a strong effect on your joints and your musculoskeletal system.  Many people simply understand that they aren’t holding themselves in the best postures on a daily basis.  This is good to know, but poorly understood.  Most people will say something such as:  “I know I need to improve my posture, I’m always slouching” or “I sit at my computer all day, there’s nothing I can do”

These thoughts aren’t necessarily wrong, however they are disabling in nature.  When you think you have poor posture, you may acknowledge one aspect of the problem, but it is hardly the entire story.  Posture is actually more complex than it seems.  Knowing your posture can improve is not the same as having a solution for it.   

Most people know they should “correct” their posture, but they don’t know how.  Secondly – people believe that posture is something they have not something they do.  There are many techniques available to improve posture, as well as understand what it is & how it works.  This can empower a person to spend more of their time practicing ideal posture which can ultimately improve their well-being and reduce or eliminate neck pain. 

Just a “Crick” in the Neck

Another vague and unexplained concept – what could a “crick” be?  From my understanding, a crick refers to when a person hurts their neck and loses motion – usually turning or bending to one or both sides.  The sudden loss of motion, either from an acute trauma such as falling, lifting, or turning too quick is a real phenomenon.  This is a mechanical problem – your joints are an interface between two bones.  They have precisely shaped surfaces and connective tissue which allow for smooth & uninterrupted movement.  When this movement is lost, there is a mechanical problem – something has happened to the joint itself to impede movement.  This statement may sound scary, however this is almost always a temporary problem.   Typically this is solved using mechanical means.  This means that if you have a “crick” in your neck, you can usually find a movement/exercise that will “fix” the crick.  I do not recommend randomly searching for this movement, because if you introduce many unpredictable and unpracticed movements to a mechanically compromised joint, you can make it worse.  It’s better to seek professional help from a physical therapist to find the movement that will make your motion and pain better – we call this finding a “directional preference.”

Headaches Aren’t Related to Neck Pain

Many people suffer from occasional or even frequent headaches.  There are many different types of headaches that exist, however some of them are related to or are caused by your neck joints.  Frequently, the neck can be treated in order to mitigate the effects of or cease headache related pain symptoms.  If it turns out that your neck is causing your headaches, we call this a cervicogenic headache. 

By working with the right therapist, you may be able to find a movement or exercise that will reduce your headache symptoms, stop them, or at the least prevent them.  There is of course no guarantee but it is a possibility that should be explored: especially since this requires no medicine, injections/needles, and of course no surgery. 

I just Slept Wrong

It’s interesting how people can go to sleep one night and wake up the next morning experiencing fairly serious neck pain.  It’s likely that the position one slept in, or the movements they performed while asleep, are related to the new episode of pain.  However, it’s also a strong possibility that it wasn’t the only reason.

Musculoskeletal neck pain (pain due to joints, bones, and muscles) is usually mechanical pain – pain due to movement problems causing joints to move incorrectly which irritates the joints themselves.  The connective tissue of the neck bones can become disturbed – this disturbance leads to the mechanical problems which in turn causes pain.  What causes the disturbance in connective tissue is due to the repeated forces going through those joints every day, as well as at night. 

Finding an exact “cause” of pain can be very difficult because we perform a lot of different functional movements each and every day – lifting, carrying, sitting, standing, lying down (in different positions), cleaning, reaching, etc.  Any of these activities can, and usually do, have an effect on our joints.  Simply because the pain in your neck manifests in the morning does not mean that something which occurred during sleeping is the only cause. 

Tight Muscles

People often feel tight muscles in their neck and shoulders.  This may lead you to think that the muscles themselves are the cause of the discomfort.  But pain sensation and tightness are only signs and symptoms.  They do not prove anything by themselves.  It may feel good to have muscles massaged or stretched – but if you are suffering from mechanical neck pain (which most cases of neck pain are) simply working on the painful muscle regions is usually not enough to solve the real problem. 

If you’ve ever gone for a massage while having pain – sometimes the pain from the neck will go away for a while following that massage.  This is nice to experience, as it is relief from the pain, and is almost never harmful for the condition itself – however it can mislead you to think that you have “worked on” or “solved” the problem.  Mechanical neck pain is only solved if the mechanical problem is resolved.  Sometimes it can go away on its own (for no apparent reason), but frequently it will not.  This is why addressing “tight” muscles typically only results in temporary or coincidental improvement.