Mum of two suffering with neck pain

Hello
I am a 30 years old mum of two currently suffering with neck pain. I used to
sleep on my stomach and iam  well known to have the worst posture whenever I
watch TV or carry my 14kg daughter ..the pain is located at the base of my
skull and travels upwards in the same line to my temple and sometimes to the
top of my headand behind my eye creating some type of head pressure/ mild
headache. Iam not suffering from dizziness  or vision disturbance but as an
anxiety sufferer it gives me panic attacks especially whenever i wake up at
night in pain ( usually having to correct my posture).

Also the pain goes down to my neck as if I could grab the painful muscle . I
believe I’ve “injured ” my neck a couple of times at night after the pillow
slipped from under my neck  ( kids love to share our bed) and woke up in
agony but subsided as soon as I was up again.

Please Help

Hi Sophia

I’d be surprised if you’ve “injured” your neck – you may (and do) feel pain in your neck, but my guess is that your neck is just the victim of you not doing enough elsewhere.

And the “enough” bit is really important – you sound like your a busy Mum with lots on your plate. You know what makes your worse and you know that you’ve got terrible postural sets.

The truth of the matter is you need to do something active and exercise based to change these. If you don’t/won’t/can’t then I can’t see how you can get out of this painful spiral. But certainly, passive type interventions like stretching or prolonged Physio probably won’r help, long term.

I don’t think you need to embark on gym specific, full workout, lyrics mode activities – but something that gradually and slowly increases your resilience and endurance to movement, stability and strength. Don’t expect to see over night changes but I’m sure if you stuck with a really simple exercise program to help strengthen and stabilise your head, neck and shoulders you’d not only start to feel better, but you’r be really getting better in the long term.

Why not start off with some really simple shoulder shrugs, lifting your straight arms above your head (out to the side and in front) and arms to the side, elbows bend at 90, palms up, keeping your elbows tucked in and move your hands apart from from each other. Do this x20 x2, x4 a day for the neck 5 days – then if all feels OK, slowly increase – maybe add in a 2kg weight etc. If you get any extra pain, that persists, then stop – but not all pain especially when starting to move, is considered harmful.

Physios, personal trainers, even Dr Youtube should be able to help.