Home Exercise Program
for your
Neck and Shoulders
10/29/19 Update from today’s session: Kenneth, great to meet-up with you today. It sounds like there are many things that are helping, so keep up with those stretches and exercises as discussed. As discussed, try doing #5 below a little more often to see if getting more extension/bending in the middle part of you back with help with the over-extension of your neck that we saw today. Basically, being able to bend backwards more through the middle part of your back would eliminate too much extension/bending in your neck. Not sure if this is contributing entirely to your arm/elbow/wrist symptoms, but it is possible.
After finishing up with you, there were a few other things I thought of that I want to look at, but I will keep those in mind for another time when we can meet. Maybe we look to follow-up next week? As a reminder to me, I wanted to look at the mobility of the three different nerves that supply the shoulder/arm/wrist that come from the neck: ulnar, radial, and median nerves.
Here might be the big addition to your program that I want to do religiously over the next week. It actually is pretty easy and I actually do this myself, despite having any pain. I do it for mindfulness and a way to reduce the stress in my life. It is called Expressive Writing. See under “#6)” below for more instructions.
Otherwise, let me know what might work next week for you to follow-up. Thanks Kenneth!
#1)
Above neck stretches can be combined. First tuck in your chin, then you can gentle let your head fall down/forward to stretch the back of your neck. Hold for 1 min, don’t push into “pain pain”, but just a “nice discomfort stretch. Perform 20 times per day.
#2)
This can have two variations. One where you bring your ear to your shoulder and one where you bring you nose towards your armpit. The first one hits the trapezes muscle and the other hits the levator muscle. Perform this stretch 20 times a day or as much as you can. Hold each time for 1 min, no "pain pain", just a "nice discomfort" stretching feel. Try to relax as much as you can. Heat before streching for 10 mins can also help.
#3)
Continuation from above. This would be the trapezius muscle, which can be stretched with the ear coming straight down to the shoulder.
#4)
This picture shows this stretch pretty well, but I would also instruct to drop the shoulder on the side of the stretch a little lower. Basically, relax the trapezius muscle when performing. Same stretching rules apply as above. If it wasn’t obvious, I would perform all these stretches on both sides.
#5)
This can be done at many points along the upper spine/back. A pillow for the head can be used. We are trying to open up the upper back, which can be a cause sometimes of neck tension. Hold one spot for several minutes, then move up the spine and hit maybe 3-5 spots.
#6)Expressive Writing
Expressive Writing Instructions: Find some scratch paper and a pen or pencil. Write for 5-15 minutes x1-2/day, no longer, your thoughts, feelings, and/or emotions you have towards those “stressors” we discussed (or maybe new ones we didn’t discuss). An example would be something like this: “I fear the worse if I don’t complete this work project. The worse being I might lose my job and the respect of others. What if I lost my job. What would I do? How does this make me feel? It makes me feel anxious, nervous, afraid, and fearful. So what if I lost my job? Maybe there is something better out there. Maybe this is all in my head. Would I actually lose my job? Maybe I should ask for help?”. I think this gets the point across on what to write. It could literally be anything. What you write is up to you.
Here is the most important part of the instructions: Once you are done, tear up the piece of paper and throw it away. This literally and emotionally releases your mind from these thoughts and feelings, freeing you up to “breath”, to “relax”, and/or to move into a new mindfulness thought process that might be healthier. Instead of the feelings being lock away inside you and causing mental anxiety, which physically can lead to tension in your neck and shoulders for example, you release them, which allows you to move into a more positive healthy mindset, which in turn can relax you physically. It basically takes your mind and body out of the “flight or fight” response to a calming relaxed creative state. Hope this makes sense. Let’s add this to your program and let me know if you have any questions.
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