Sarah’s Health Notes: Take the strain off your neck
Fact: your head weighs ten to 12 pounds. That’s when it’s set upright on your body, with your neck vertical and no strain on the muscles.
The scary thing I discovered from chiropractor Dominic Cheetham is that when you lean forward – as you would over a laptop or tablet, your mobile phone or even an old-fashioned book – the weight more than doubles with each 15° incline.
So at a gentle 15° angle the weight jumps to 27 lbs – nearly two stone in old weight.
At a 30° angle, it’s 40 lbs; 49 lbs at 45°. And by the time you are peering right down over your phone at a 60° angle the weight of strain on your neck muscles is a monster 60 lbs. (I can’t even work out how many sacks of horse feed that is…)
I found all this out recently when ongoing severe neck and shoulder pain, which had begun radiating down my upper arms, took me off on the three-hour train journey to London to see Dominic, who’s treated my various problems for well over a decade and can quickly pinpoint causes and sort them.
As well as manipulation, he gave me a (kindly) lecture about holding phones up in front of my nose and propping my tablet on a stand or stack of books. If you have a desktop computer, make sure the screen is straight ahead and you are typing at eye level; I find a standing desk is much the best for me. An ice pack is useful to reduce inflammation and pain – tie it into position with a scarf.
Dominic also gave me an exercise, which I call ‘sky gazing’ to his amusement. Could be ‘ceiling gazing’ actually, depending where you are but sky gazing is more fun – you see clouds and birds and trees and even sometimes sun…
This is how it goes:
• Stand up straight, feet a hip width apart. Be careful not to lock your knees so just bend them slightly
• Let your shoulders drop down and back and softly pull your shoulder blades together; imagine you are gently holding an orange between your shoulder blades
• Put your hands together behind your back, palms up and lace your fingers together
• Start with your head and neck tucked into your chest, and then gently roll your chin up until it’s pointing as straight up as you can. You should feel the muscles at the front of your neck stretch a little. Watchpoint here: don't let your shoulders creep up and don't tense your jaw
• Take a few gentle slow breaths. I find listening to the sounds is soothing
• Then SLOWLY bring your chin down again
• Stop and do this every 40 minutes, or more often if you can.
Finally, one thing to avoid is deep massage. I went to see a lovely therapist who got really stuck in and things got much, much worse. Dominic explained that my already sore muscles became traumatised by such deep work and went into spasm.
So it’s back to stroking on Tiger Balm (brilliant but do get the white variety or you stain everything).
My neck is recovering with all this TLC and sky gazing. I really don't want to go through this again so am trying to do the right things!
NB To find a qualified chiropractor in your area, visit the British Chiropractic Association.
