Your neck is one of the commonest places to get triggers – and no wonder! Your neck muscles are working every waking hour of your day. They’re constantly supporting your head, adjusting your posture and working with your shoulder muscles.
Especially for people with office jobs, knowing how to self treat your neck trigger points is vital. Why office jobs? If you’re sitting at a computer all day, take a moment to look around your office. In all likelihood, you’ll see your fellow workers slumped or hunched over their desks in varying degrees of tension.
Because you’re focusing on what’s going on your computer screen, it’s all too easy to forget how you’re sitting. And doing this for eight hours a day, five days a week (or more!) all adds up.
So, first things first – what’s a trigger point? The short definition is that it’s a tight band within your muscle. It’s like your muscle has switched on a small spasm, which just hasn’t relaxed out.
Why does your body do this? It’s part of a defensive reflex. Your muscles naturally contract when they feel they’ve been stretched too far. But for many people, parts of your muscle don’t release, and this leaves behind small ‘trigger points.’
And while some people get these triggers from a physical accident, it’s equally common to get triggers from sitting for a long time in a position where you’re putting strain on your muscles. (Like sitting with your neck in an awkward position.)
So, how do you self treat neck triggers? Firstly, you need to be able to find trigger points. You’ll be looking for tight or thickened bands of muscle within an area that feels tender.
Another key with trigger points – they can refer pain to other locations. For example, triggers in your neck can refer pain up into you head – even causing what seems to be a tension headache. If you press on a spot in your neck that causes pain shooting up into your head – you’ve found an important trigger.
The commonest muscles to cause a pain your neck? Scalenes, Suboccipitals (neck) and the Infraspinatus, Levator Scapulae and Trapezius (shoulder muscles, but can refer pain up into your neck.)
So, once you’ve found a trigger point, how do you self treat it? Well, the technique of acupressure works well for triggers in any muscle. When you’re using this technique on your neck, you can use the weight of your arm to create gentle pressure.
Some people also use a theracane (knobbly cane with bits you can stick into your muscles instead of using your fingers) or a knobble board (same idea, but you can lie down on it.) Both types of devices work well, however so do your own fingers, and especially when you’re learning, you need all the feedback sensation and sensitivity you can get.
The self-treatment works like this – using gentle pressure, push down on the trigger points. You’ll know you’re on the spot if it’s tender, or refers pain to another part of your body.
Then – this is important – back the pressure off. Reduce the pressure until you don’t feel any pain. Once you’re below the pain threshold, slowly increase the pressure over 60-90 seconds, always keeping below the point of pain.
Then, slowly release the pressure and stretch out your neck muscles.
How this works: trigger points are caused by a protective reflex of your body. When you apply pressure to the point, you reduce the blood flow to the muscle knot. This ‘resets’ the trigger and turns off the protective reflex.
That’s it! One very effective way to treat neck trigger points. And the key – it should be completely painless. If it hurts, you’re not doing it right. So just go gently, you’ll find the triggers you need to deactivate and then switch them off.
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After Jonathan Kuttner had a serious hangliding accident above the cliffs of his home coastline, he had 6 years of chronic back pain.
This lead him to specialise in treating....
{ 9 comments… read them below or add one }
I’m so greatful for this I am about in tears. I have been struggling with myofascial pain and was telling my husband I had to find some kind of remedy for the pain I don’t want the meds just want some relief and then this I just stumbled across thank God. I have not had this much relief since my diagnosis in November I’m so very grateful I will do these things daily it’s totally awesome!!!
Hello La Shonda
I am so pleased to hear you are getting real benefit from the treatments on the site. Keep up the good work!
Kind Regards
Jonathan
[Please note- I cannot suggest a specific treatment for your complaint as I have not taken a full history, examined you or reviewed your investigations.
Therefore all comments I make can only be general - relating broadly to the problem you have described. ]
Dr. J. Kuttner
I would like to thank you for all the support and information that you send me by E-mail, about having trigger points , myofacial, and muscle spasm. It started when I fall 4 feet from a 5 step ladder backward to a steel flooring at work, I had concusion and was send to the hospital. I had a lumbar spine injury, and neck.Since you were sending me all the exercise and how to find trigger points ,it was so relieve that I”m back to my work full time again. But I have one more problem ,I notice that I have tingling in my left hand and my fingers are getting numb you think its related to my injury?
because my left side was the one that was injured the most. But my Doctor told me it was carpal tunnel. I”m still waiting for the test result from last two weels ago. Doctor can you help me?
Thank you so much and God Bless
Mercy Manalo
Dr. Kuttner, you have been a Godsend to me. Not only am I able to help myself relieve my osteoarthritis pains, but as a student massage therapist and having to do 25 massages and find my own people to do them on in order to graduate, I have used the information sent by email to help others. I’m very excited about this.
Also, because of the information you forwarded me to help me with my NeuroMuscular/Trigger Point presentation in class, I got an “A” for the assignment with the teacher’s comment “Great Report.”
Thank you so very much. If I ever get the opportunity to go to New Zealand, I want to meet you in person. Keep up the good work. You are helping so many people through your work and website.
Much of what you are teaching I have already learned and use. It has been helpful to me in that it confirms that my self-treatment is accurate. I think emotions of anxiety, worry, and fear all increases the pain. The more one focuses on one’s pain the worse it becomes.
Knowing that others suffer from the same symptoms is very helpful.
Hi _ How do I find a physician in my area that uses this treatment? My zip code is 30096. Thank you.
I have been experiencing pain on the right-hand side of my head for some time. It feels more like pressure and can make me feel dizzy and disorientated. I have a lump above my temple. The top of my scalp is pink and very tender. This is worse now than ever and makes me feel like this is something very serious.
Does this sound like trigger points to you ?
Thank you
Leanne
One word – THERACANE.
The doctor refers to it here and it will do wonders for you. I have suffered with should pain for going on 7 years now, and once I bought a Theracane (2 days ago, by the way), the pain is on it’s way out. I now realize that my shoulder was so locked up, so deep down, that everything hurt. I knew I needed to get in there deep and really work it out, but I could not do it with my own fingers and any massage that I got just didn’t cut it. I used a Theracane many, many years ago for my back and just rediscovered them and bought one on Amazon for $29. I promise you that if you have deep pain caused by trigger points (even if you didn’t know what the heck a trigger point was), this amazing little tool will be a miracle for you. My wife and kids laugh at me when I use it since you look a bit silly, but I don’t care. It’s a lifesaver.
Just a suggestion Dr. Your first sentence has a misspelled word. Actually it’s a made up word. There is no such word as “commonest”. It’s “most common”. Other than that…great job and way to go on helping so many people.
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